You appreciate that Jonathan was uploading TR “sound bites” a long time ago don’t you? A change in aesthetic can hardly be attributed to one, moderately popular YouTuber.
Dylan puts out some interesting stuff but relies on “clickbait” for most of his popularity.
Just enjoy the ride and stop trying to force the connection IMHO.
Have you ever watched the Podcast feed? That’s where he sits, since he shifted to his new home and built out his man-cave/started doing the Pod remotely.
I think that Kolie Moore has had a larger impact on TR in general. Dylan used TR’s popularity and a clickbait title to generate views and increase his viewership more than anything.
But you do you, I don’t want to get further into a debate. It seems like a personal vendetta to me lol.
If thats the case, I think they need to grow up and start acting like a professional company that had some criticism, it doesn’t seem to me that that episode has done them any harm. so why act like it has
Maybe @Crosshair is backwards hat dylan… 
I kid!
I actually think Dylan had a few good points in his video. I look at it almost as an intro for AI training as it was so close to being ready when the video came out. Almost like it was a co-ordinated effort… You have problem with our plans??? WELL here is TR HYPERGAIN BEAST MODE with AI… SMACK DOWN!!! MIKE DROP!!!
LOL
I like Dylan and find him entertaining. I like the TR crew and really liked Jonathans new video… Dont really care about format. Dont really care about style. Good information and loving the TR training experience.
I really don’t see the point in choosing sides or making an issue out of it. Dylan’s video was interesting at the time but TR has far surpassed the issues that were raised on the video IMO. If I am wrong I could always go to another or better product(although I do not feel one exists)!
Good job on the last video Jonathon. I very much enjoyed it.
I really don’t understand why people are saying that video looked like a Dylan video. It feels like a real stretch to me. I watch Dylan more than I watch TR (because I don’t have the time for 2+ hour videos), and I just don’t see it. It’s a video with a guy talking about things and showing material that backs up his argument. Kind of like every informative video on every topic, not just cycling.
It’s not a “pick one or the other” thing. As Bbt67 pointed out, many of the competing products incorporate strength (and more) into their cycling plans, so in their cases, it’s “pick both”.
I think you misunderstood my post and took it personal. I wasn’t making any judgement on your experience level, I was talking about the general fact that TR’s audience spans from beginners to world-class athletes. Where you are on the spectrum didn’t matter for my arguments.
This confuses me to no end: I completely agree with you, TR should include that in its offerings and schedule strength sessions at least as an option in its plans. I said so many times, including in this very thread.
The only place where we part ways is that TR’s current solution does work for me, too, although it is clearly not as good as having strength sessions as part of training plans with e. g. a clear progression. One life lesson I have learnt for myself is that if I were to wait for the perfect tool, very little would get done. So I try to make do with what I have the best way I can.
Ingesting both is good. In my observation, both sides reacted well to it: TR’s deep dive on polarized was really great, and Dylan’s video motivated TR’s team to create polarized plans — win-win-win.
Given the thread (doh!), the polarized debate invariably comes to mind. Staying non-ideological and having an open, yet skeptical mind has worked well for me. Sweet spot training is not as bad as adherents of polarized claim, and polarized training isn’t a panacea either. But what fanboys forget is that it isn’t “either-or”, “and” is also an option 
I have done two polarized blocks with specific intentions, and they have worked well for me. Polarized blocks are another arrow in my quiver.
So not to make a joke of anything but I am ON the spectrum and at times have trouble understanding. It seems that I just added 2+2 and ended up with three.
So I think we agree. We just don’t really agree on how we agree 
My apologies!
No problem, these things happen!
Happy posting!
The thing that always amuses me when we have this sweetspot vs polarised debate is that I’m pretty sure I remember a video where Dylan said that early in his cycling career he built a whole bunch of fitness on a diet of sweetspot training.
So a whole bunch of his aerobic base and muscle endurance was built by sweetspot. All the adaptations he got doing sweetspot were carried over when he switched to a more polarised model.
So many ways to skin cats. Some optimal. Some good enough.
One benefits the other, the other doesn’t.
Curious, I just watched the Polarized Training AACCP on youtube. This video is a direct response to criticisms of TR training plans. Polarized Training Deep Dive and TrainerRoad’s Training Plans – Ask a Cycling Coach 299 - YouTube
After watching the video, and especially listening to breakdown of the science, the limitations of these studies, all of the different variables, I still don’t know what the best way forward is.
More importantly, I am very encouraged that Nate and Amber seem to feel the same.
They did NOT dismiss polarized training. They said it did show promise, and not only that but they built training plans around it.
To me, it shows an openness to learn, a willingness to look at areas to improve, and shows that a LOT of thought process goes into what they do. This makes me trust TR a lot more. I hate nothing more than confident fools who will blind you with confidence until you learn more and figure out that although confident, they were incorrect the whole time. Typically those people have fragile egos and will react aggressively when challenged or questioned. TR is willing to look at the science and makes very valid questions about the quoted studies.
Good stuff TR.
My tl;dr is: rather than either polarized or sweet spot, I say polarized and sweet spot. One of my more popular posts is me summarizing my experiences after my first polarized block. I have done a second one in the meantime, and my opinion hasn’t changed much. The tl;dr of my experiences is:
And the hard workouts were just hard.Hence, I use polarized blocks with that purpose in mind, i. e. whenever I want to build my base and train my mental fortitude. Personally, I recommend trying it, e. g. before you start a new training block. See how your body reacts and whether it makes sense for you to integrate it in your training plan.
I think that the type of training you’re mentioning with the analogy of a “longer life bar” akin video games is talked about way too little. Its all about quick gains that shows itself on a ramp test or the like.
I started with getting burned out from TR Mid, thought that I’d try a coach, and ended up being able to ride 8-10 hours a week in the winter, and around 13-14 hours in the summer.
Z2 mixed with 1 really hard session per week, and 1 mid session (LT1 intervals or 3x25min tempo intervals for example)
The gains from that volume, consistency and whatnot, has resulted in a huge improvement in LT1. I have gone from around 190w to 235w, and goal is to get to 250w by the end of November.
My LT2/CP on the other hand hasn’t gone up by much, still at around 285, with FTP at around 305w. Because thats not what we are training at the moment.
What this means in practise is that riding 25-26 hour weeks on Mallorca are no issue, doing hard intervals at the end of a 4-5 hour ride is no issue. My efficiency is what has gone up immensely. But its not something that you might feel too much of if you’re just doing shorter and harder rides, or if youre not riding back to back a lot.
This of course is my personal view on it, but I feel that if TR spoke more about long term gains as a cyclist, and less about FTP gains, then you might touch base with the real endurance athlete. Not only for those looking to see FTP go up every 4 weeks.
My numbers are a bit different but similar result. Working with a coach on my aerobic engine. Endurance went from 150W to 200W. FTP went from 250 to 270. Resting heart rate dropped 10bpm. Took about 18 months to fix 4 years of overdoing intensity.
Just out of curiosity, was your really hard session something like 30/30s or more like extending the length of time you could hold Threshold or VO2 intervals?
No offense, but I think you have misunderstood my post.
Your point, as I understand it, is that FTP isn’t everything — which is precisely the point of the analogy, too: fitness does not manifest itself as power, but also as endurance. Polarized blocks emphasize the endurance aspect. In my experience, I have seen modest-to-no FTP (= LT2) gains, but very strong endurance gains — which was exactly what I intended. So I cannot see any disagreement on the substance.
I’m also a bit confused, why you think my plan is about “making quick gains that show in the ramp test”. I don’t remember explaining my training strategy go you. First of, I validate FTP test results, something that is especially important for polarized training plans since they involve a lot of time at or even slightly above FTP. In my experience, smaller errors (think 1–2 %, well within e. g. the error bars of most power meters) can determine whether you can manage the threshold workouts or not. And if you set it too low, well then your threshold workout just became a sweet spot workout
Lastly, please do not jump to conclusions about others. My training plans go over several years and I have alternated building the base of my power tower and making it taller. This year is a base year, which is why I have scheduled and completed two polarized blocks.
My comment about polarized blocks are not to diss them, but to set expectations: in my experience they are good for increasing your life bar but not my power bar. If that is your goal, then polarized blocks are an excellent choice. Also, a lot of people who have burnt out on intensity think that polarized blocks (at least the way many stricter adherents see it) are easier, and I think it is fair to caution them. TR’s regular plans are less polarized also in terms of difficulty, whereas polarized plans are, well, more polarized. Even the easy days have been harder since I had to get up earlier. I’m just cautioning against misplaced expectations.
What you describe is simply a training plan with a lot less intensity than a mid-volume plan and endurance to fill up your time budget. I think it is a common conflation of training time in TR’s menu with intensity, and a problem for TR when steering people towards the training plan that is best for them.
Your plan certainly seems to work for you, which is great, and given your training plan your progression makes sense: you massively increased your life bar and have had more modest gains of your threshold. Again, this isn’t a criticism, I’m saying it is a tradeoff — and a good one for some. E. g. this thread’s namesake does a lot of endurance racing — so emphasizing that in training makes a lot of sense. It makes less sense for crit racers with a long background in cycling — especially if you already have a good aerobic base.
(Although I think many adherents to polarized training wouldn’t call it a polarized training strategy since it involves tempo, i. e. the zone polarized plans deliberately avoid. Not that I care, though, whatever works for you, works. 
)
I think this is something that TR will have to address at some point: go away from just offering “time crunched cyclists’ plans”. I hope that comes with a revamped version of Plan Builder.