I was wondering if anyone has any suggestions for working more trail rides into my plan? I ride a lot but I’m not always able to count my rides as finished workouts due to the random nature of trail riding. So my progression levels aren’t moving as much as I think they should.
Welp, what I’ve done when doing unstructured outdoor rides, trail or otherwise, is take the corresponding workout in the plan, or change the plan workout to something more appropriate, identify that workout as a solo ride, then associate the actual ride with that workout. I believe this is what you’re supposed to do, but IDK what or how it works.
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Hey @JoshH187, welcome to the forum! 
Good question, by the way!
In terms of incorporating trail riding into your plan, your best move would be to use those rides as unstructured free rides that don’t necessarily need to be tied to your prescribed workouts. Trying to follow a prescribed TrainerRoad workout while out on the trail is going to be really tough and likely not generate the best results.
Those types of rides are still really important, though, as they build skills and are often really important for mental health, and a fun/social standpoint. They often build motivation to keep training, too!
@Saddlesaur is on the right track for the most part here. “Solo” and “Group” rides are a good way to build some of these unstructured rides into the schedule of your plan if you want to keep things tidy.
You can edit your plan to include these types of rides by switching them from Indoors to “Solo Rides” or “Group Rides” in the scheduling step when using Plan Builder.
Additionally, you can make these changes to individual workouts on the fly by right-clicking them in your calendar on the web. Just know that the ride effort that we expect from you will change based on whether you’re switching from an easy or hard workout to a solo/group ride. If you switch a hard workout to a solo ride, we’ll recommend that you push the pace on that ride a bit. If you pick an easy workout, we’ll recommend that you keep the effort low and assume that you’re following the recommendation.
Since you have 5 workouts a week (three hard, two easy) you have lots of options as to what you want to switch to a solo/group ride. If you’re going to ride easy, pick an easy workout; if you’re going to push yourself, pick a hard one.
Let me know if this helps and if you have any questions about this. I’d be happy to chat some more if you’d like! 
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Hi eddieginwald,
WRT Solo Rides, I was in the middle of a plan mid Mar and quit doing structured workouts and instead changed and/or added workouts, identified them as Solo Rides, and associated my outdoor rides with them. My outdoor rides had significantly higher TSSs and IFs than the plan workouts. After about two weeks of this I got plan adaptations that showed huge increases in PLs, IFs, and TSSs. It seems this was in response to my Solo Rides. Is that what happened, or was it something else? And if it was the Solo Rides that caused this, is this a new feature where TR is better accounting for non-structured rides?
Hey there,
That’s a good observation, but those solo rides aren’t affecting your Progression Levels. We recently released some improvements to how we recommend workouts, which is likely why you saw a change in some of your prescribed workouts’ levels.
Also, all of those solo rides could be affecting your fitness as well, which, in turn, translates to better performance in your workouts, and ultimately, higher PLs.
Let me know if you have any other questions!
Hi Eddiegrinwald,
Interesting. I totally stopped structured workouts on 3/15. That was the last, and I actually bailed halfway through it. I then did nothing but outdoor Solo Rides. About two weeks after, around 3/30, is when I got all the big plan adaptation greatly increasing PLs etc. It would seem to me that nothing I had done in any structured workouts, all prior to 3/16 would justify such a big jump, especially coming 2 weeks after having done no structured workouts at all.
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I don’t see anything in your adaptation history that shows any major jumps in WLs. 
I also don’t see anything that’s majorly out of line in terms of your upcoming workouts in comparison to your current PLs. There are certainly a few productive workouts coming up, though, but this is likely related to my previous explanation.
Do you have any specific examples of what’s concerning you? I’d be happy to take a closer look!
Hi eddiegrinwald,
Thanks again for looking into this for me. Unfortunately, a couple of weeks ago I accepted all the large positive adaptations my plan received after two weeks of only Solo Rides, so I can’t show specifically what they were. All I can provide is what I’ve already said. They were very much bigger than any prior adaptations and occurred after two weeks of only Solo Rides. I’ve only done Solo Rides since. Also, since I don’t plan on following a plan or doing structured workouts this riding season, and I don’t yet understand the utility of TR in that situation, I let my TR subscription lapse. With that, I can’t view any of my TR data or history. I did sync my TR workouts with other platforms, so can see those there. TR seems to be evolving rapidly, so I look forward to re-subscribing when the riding season here is coming to an end.
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