Power Zones gone Macro!

I was just reading on Joe Friel’s blog about intensity vs. volume, in how we plan for it and how we express it in a quantifiable way. TrainerRoad plans are obviously accounting for both of these variables, in the volume level of the plan, be that low, mid or high volume and then in the intensity by the type of plan a rider chooses to target their desired power curve adaptation, short power build, crit specialty, etc. Through Performance Analytics we can track the outcome of that training through PRs, both seasonally and All-time as well as through Season Match, all of which are genius features. Thanks!

What I’d love to see though is to look at say my Sweet Spot Mid-Volume I plan and be able to see my Power Zones for that entire 6 week period. You could probably tell me what this should be before I even start the plan but between sickness, outdoor rides, pedaling backward, etc. we’re all going to come up with a different time in the various zones and yet we’ll wonder what’s up when we don’t see the desired adaption at plan finish.

This time in zone could also be expressed as a percentage of target, i.e. if your 6-week plan called for 360 minutes at Tempo and you did 340 minutes then you hit 94% of your goal. Conversely, and more likely for many of us, our weekend rides end up a little snappier than is ideal for us Northern Hemisphere folk in late October. Maybe this 6 weeks called for 180 total minutes at Vo2 Max and I ended up doing 210 so I’m at 116% or 16% over the recommended amount. This type of insight could be huge in identifying why we’re not seeing our desired gains despite carefully laid plans and perfectly structured intervals from Coach Chad. It could also be huge for better understanding the whys and why nots of our recovery; how often is our Tuesday pretty rough despite the day off because we spent way more time in VO2 than we should of on Saturday or Sunday? We blame sleep, nutrition, etc. because the overall TSS might be pretty close to the target but really we’re shooting ourselves in the foot in ways that can be invisible from TSS.

This time in the zone would, of course, need to change as FTP changes happen within the selected period but you guys are smart folks so I’m sure you’ll have that stuff dialed.

This could all live in the Personal Records screen. How cool would it be to look at time in Sweet Spot for 2017 vs. 2018? For the time in Neuromuscular in the Specialty phase as a direct causation to our improved sprint finish performance. Ultimately, if we’ve made it this far in this rant we’re all dorks who want to analyze the why and why not of our performance and this seems like a super valuable way to keep us on track to our well-laid plans or to do post-season analysis.

Interesting request.

(TrainingPeaks does show you both time in zones (power and HR) in as detailed a view as you like, by week, month, year etc.)