I liked: If you aren’t on the edge, you are taking up too much space. 
Brakes don’t work on my trainer. It’s like riding a fixie to a point… 
Help I can’t stop!! 
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I agree! Haven’t rode outside since October. Though next week is in the 60s so I took the week off of work to break in the new bike. Spring fever is real!
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I would be interested to see what the indoor training stats are.
I just about manage to get my low volume (3.5) hours in per week. How many TrainerRoad users are on a plan?
I wear gloves on the trainer 
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Fast bikes are bad for your fitness.
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1% of what? TR active subscriptions? People who own a trainer? People who own a bike? People on the planet?
I don’t exactly understand the point here.
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Maybe, maybe not…
On that note… I have always wondered why people go with aero clothing for training. It’s just practice! 
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There are no fast bikes, just fast riders
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Back when I was doing tri’s, I used to train on 32h alloy wheels with Gatorskin tires and whatever kit I had laying around. I trained to power / time, so I didn’t care how far or fast I went. Then when I got to race day and I put on my race wheels and kit, I felt like I was FLYING for the same power levels.
But if most of your outdoor riding is with groups, it is hard to handicap yourself with slow gear / kit. #RaceDayEveryDay 
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As do I
True! One ride a woman showed up on a fixie. This was a road ride, and she was totally in for it. People asked her if she was ready for the ride, and she said ‘Hell yes! Let’s do this!’. And we took off, and she not only kept up, but pulled several times! People were ready to worship her, riding a steel fixie and not only not being dropped, but PULLING the group. (No, no one heard a motor, aside from her breathing as she rode the crap out of that bike)
I remember back as a kid when Bob Hurricane Hannah was described as ‘being able to win on a watermelon’. So much of riding is HOW you ride, not what you ride, but riding a ‘fast bike’ does make it a little easier. But a slow rider can still make an expensive bike look like money wasted.
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My training clothes only have no wrinkles because I’m big boned, not because it was designed to be aero. 
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Too many coaches/apps/plans place an overemphasis on strict adherence to “the plan” and then blame the riders lack of progress on them not following every workout exactly. (I blame erg for the obsession of sticking exactly to the power target and if not its failure).
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Yeah, this always gets me. There’s a whole slew of apps and coaches (this is in no way unique to TR) who will consistently say to trust the plan, FTFP, just stick with it, etc., right up until the point things aren’t working, then will follow that up by saying you need to be flexible, know your body, and be smart about making your own adjustments when things aren’t working, pushing it right back to the person having the issues. To be fair, finding that inflection point can be tricky as hell but the intense focus on compliance makes it a lot more likely people will only see that point in the rear view mirror.
It’s virtually impossible for a human to be 100% compliant with a plan 100% of the time, and if they are, the sacrifices they’re making to get there are probably at least as destructive as any lack of compliance. Training when overtired, additional, non-bike stress about how critical compliance is piled on top of the actual training stress, that sort of thing.
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I don’t disagree with anything you have said, but how many times have we seen a TR user say “I followed” the plan to a T and didn’t gain fitness, and then TR staff looks at their history and they have huge variations from the plan? Not just those 1 or 2 days where life got in the way or fatigue was too much. 100% compliance is virtually impossible, but somehow us humans easily fool ourselves into thinking we have been 90% compliant, when in actuality we are 60% compliant. I think it’s moving that compliance closer to 90% is the message that coaches are saying. They understand that 100% compliance isn’t a thing.
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Erg mode for endurance rides should be heart rate based.
Fitness gains only happen when recovery meets the workload even with 100% compliance to the best training plan. Time crunched folks that can only fit in 45-60 mins a day almost certainly aren’t able to fit in the required recovery needed to make full adaptations either, and are the first to overcook themselves with intensity. Expecting a super structured plan to overcome lack of recovery and training time is like eating a salad and hoping it will stop the bucket of fried chicken from making you gain weight. The real problem is type A athletes thinking they can use mind over matter to brute force fitness improvement and when it doesn’t happen it must be the coaches or plans fault. These are the TSS collectors using the “more stress equals more gain” equation, and wonder why they plateau, regress, and burnout. These are usually the guys that swear they only need 6 hours of sleep, or don’t have time to cook their own meals, but are seemingly shocked when their ftp goes down by 5 watts after a training block of blasting 4 hours of sweet spot a week with only 5 hours of total training.
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Um… what?
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Pro riders are not even slightly inspirational. Fascinating? Yes. Entertaining? Definitely. People to hero worship? Absolutely
But not Inspirational. I don’t make purchasing decisions on the bikes they ride, the clothing they wear, the expensive gels they eat. I don’t feel the need to change my training to match what they do. I will never be like them so have absolutely no interest in being a poor copy.
Inspirational people are ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Or the bloke at the coffee shop who says “I’ve just tried this new gel/jacket/bar tape and its actually pretty good”
Then I might spend some cash.
Reading about some middle aged guy on a shopping bike touring Great Britain is much more inspirational than some pro rider breaking another record.
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You don’t need a power meter, HR monitor, a carbon bike, aero wheels, or structured training to enjoy cycling and be a good cyclist.
I’m reminded of this when I visit and ride with my 80 year old Dad. Yes, he has an e-road bike now to help his maintain his speed due to some heart issues.
But he spent 30+ years riding with his friends on club rides and doing 6 or 7 challenging centuries a year, riding in good weather and bad putting in 3-5k miles a year without ever knowing or thinking about power, zones, HR, or aero anything. They had computers that measured distance and they rode hard.
Don’t get me wrong, I love my tubeless wheels and Trainer Road training (I am getting fitter and faster), but there are days when I think I could just chuck all the tech, stop shopping for bikes and bike gear, and just ride.
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