šŸŽ‰ šŸŽ‰ šŸŽ‰ Introducing Adaptive Training! šŸŽ‰ šŸŽ‰ šŸŽ‰

Would be surprised by this. If Iā€™m maxing out at say a 7.0 on my VO2max workouts, then add 10% to my FTP, Iā€™d be VERY unlikely to still able to do a 7.0 VO2max workout. At least not for a while.

Im not 1oo% sure but I think that TR treats AT Levels separately from FTP. As I said someone else will know better than me but I think TR treats an FTP test separate from Levels, so initially those levels wont change with an increase in FTP but like you say after a while once AT learns how you are responding to training at the higher FTP the levels will adapt and but still independently from the FTP.

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That would be extremely unpleasant (I donā€™t want to fail a bunch of workout before it rejigs itself), and Iā€™m hoping itā€™s not correct.

I recall them saying in the podcast that this would be the solution to sessions being too hard right after a FTP test, and that wouldnā€™t jive with the zones not changing.

Also this from @SeanHurley :

Once your FTP increases, your progression levels go down to cushion the increased challenge of your subsequent workouts. Itā€™s simply a reflection of your current relative abilities, at your current FTP.

So with that saidā€¦ not updating after an increase looks like a bug here (unless it needs to be a certain size increase).

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Yeah I think it depends on the size increase. They said it was only a few watts, which would suggest to me the behavior of ATā€™s levels remaining the same is expected behavior. If, however, it is a jump of 20 watts or more, thatā€™s when I would really expect to see progression levels drop to cushion. That said, @NickL, thereā€™s no harm in reaching out to the support email to confirm if the behavior is expected or not.

What I gather is that if the jump in FTP is quite large (Iā€™d say 10% is quite large) your levels will decrease to compensate for that power bump and build you back into your expected levels and the plans targeted levels. For a 10% increase, it is probably quite likely that the levels will drop (i.e. your VO2Max will go from like a 7.0 to a 6.0 or something). So yes I think you are correct in this assessment for a 10% increase.

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Even if the levels didnā€™t drop your feedback will be taken into account and they should be dropped.

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This is true, but by that point youā€™ve already likely failed sessions (or ruined yourself trying to get through them), which is definitely less than ideal both from a confidence / training consistency perspective.

Will be interesting to see where the line is for the ā€œcushioningā€.

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Having completed a struggle pass of a VO2Max workout with AT, I can tell you that it changed all my workouts immediately after that one to adjust to my level. The workouts have been excellent ever since, and it only needed that singular input to make a difference. Short term discouragement for long-term success is good in my book.

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I could live with a single failure being enough.

Whatā€™s the current workaround for wahoo workouts outside? Did a nice steady 4h endurance ride outside this morning, but doesnā€™t appear to have any influence on END level.

Find a similar workout in the TR library and associate it?

If it was a free-ride and not a structured TR outside workout, just leave it unassociated. If it was a TR workout as part of your plan that your pushed to the head unit, associate it with the workout that had been planned for the day (this should happen automatically).

Essentially, the practice theyā€™ve preached is donā€™t do anything differently than you normally would do. Maintain the same behavior you always have and it will adapt appropriately when the bug gets addressed. My guess is as soon as the fix is implemented, it will scan the previous ones and bring those into the progression level calculations, so donā€™t overcomplicate your side of things.

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Thanks - was just a free ride so will leave as it is. Seeing any alteration in the END level wouldnā€™t change my schedule anyway, just would have been interesting to see the outcome.

Thanks again.

I wonā€™t take exception to people calling our baby ugly but the user experience has come a long way from the beginning. Xert Mobile, where we had the most complaints, has been replaced with a nice and fresh new app called Xert EBC. Itā€™s been very well received and is much improved over the ā€œexperimentalā€ Xert Mobile (which was quite old and even pre-dates Xert, having been the app we had developed for Bioshift Automatic Shifting). Xert Sessions has a very nice presentation layer as we moved to much newer tech platform in the development of this new feature. Stay tuned for more UI/UX goodness around the corner, thanks to your continued support!

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Polite suggestion: If you want to discuss, promote or defend Xert, why donā€™t you have a separate Xert thread, and not confuse this one. Please. There is enough noise on this thread here without this as well.

Just an ideaā€¦ but the topic is TRā€™s Adaptive Training :slight_smile:

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Completely agree. My point was that people knock it without understanding it. I agree and stated it doesnā€™t look good at all. But the post I referenced dismissed the part about not needing an FTP test. You donā€™t. Unfortunately, it costs a lot of money these days to get things to look slick and a big workforce. Xert has neither of these things. They have concentrated on what it does rather than how it looks. Iā€™m pretty sure xert would be happier people knocking it for looking bad rather than saying it looks great but is completely flawed. I applaud Xert for bringing the only truly adaptive training out there to the market first. Personally I can get over the looks of something if the content has something of value. Xert does, but it does take some personal investment. However, that unfortunately is a view that is quickly becoming outdated.

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Iā€™m on day 3 of AT closed beta (I made a little squealing noise when I got the email on Monday, much to my wifeā€™s amusement) I was already on a training plan with Plan Builder, and my event is 81 days away, so I just told AT to go do its magic on where Iā€™m at so far.

So here is my interesting observation (bug? quirk?): AT had me pegged at level 7.5 VO2Max and down in the 2-5 range for everything else. But weirdly, AT then immediately flagged my previously-completed-successfully VO2Max workouts as ā€œNot Recommendedā€ or ā€œStretchā€, and recommended bumping my future Tuesday VO2 workouts down to level 1.5 (even though it still showed my VO2Max level as > 7!)

So rather than fight the machine learning, I figured Iā€™d follow its recommendations and did a super easy VO2Max workout on Tuesday, flagged it as a ā€œmoderateā€ effortā€¦ and to its credit AT did bump me all the way up to level 2 VO2Max workouts for the next few week.

But the plot thickens! yesterday I did a 45 minute endurance pace ride, unplanned, using Train Now (I chose West Vidette). Afterward, AT showed ā€œprogressions pendingā€ and recommended bumping my VO2Max workouts all the way back up to level 7+ again! Iā€™m not sure what magic it saw in how well I completed that easy zone 1 ride, but obviously it was impressed.

So I guess the moral of the story is: Iā€™m going to let AT do its thing even if it seems a little goofy. Seems like it might not nail the progression out of the gate, but the changes itā€™s making seem to make sense. Weā€™ll see how it goes for the coming weeks.

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I cannot give my proper opinion about training system and adaptive character of xert so I didnā€™t. I was a subscriber for a year and wanted to try it but every step was challenging. It looked promising but it required a lot of ā€œgoing deepā€ into mechanics and understanding underlying concepts. I am not a lazy guy, i like to dig into things (for example i love tinkering with wko all the time, which is another example or excellent idea and powerfull software but horrible execution in terms of usability).

Yes, the proper execution requires a lot of money, but if you want userbase to earn money and not beeing in super niche, you need to invest in the whole package. On the other hand there is intervals.icu - completely free, done by one guy but greatly balanced example of simplicity and usability. I know it is completely different case but shows that not always you need to be backed by big vc money or invest hundreds thousands of dollars into something to be at least appealing.

Like I said - the idea of xert is appealing and on the surface and from the information provided in educational repository it is proper adaptive training. (I would not go into details of their power curve and how it fits the real profile like pdc from wko5 etc because it is different matter that should be discussed on xert forum)
But if every contact with the software makes me suffer on many levels I really do not want to use the software - it has to be really indispensable. Do not get me wrong - I like what they do from the idea point of view and how they are completely different and wish them a lot of luck as there is a lot of place for everybody.

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OK, now Iā€™m really confused. As expected I utterly failed the VO2max workout that TR seemed to think was achievable (I did try!)ā€¦ at the end I answered the survey with ā€œIntensityā€ and I was looking forward to it making an adaptation to my plan and level. Except it did, and it didnā€™t.

Rather than modifying my VO2max next week (7.3 after I just failed a 6.9!) itā€™s modified my session a week Saturday from Threshold 5.5 to a Threshold 4.6, and my session a week Sunday from a Sweet Spot 8.9 to a Sweet Spot 7.9.

!?!?

Oh, and itā€™s left me as a VO2max 6.9ā€¦ which I very much am not.

Edit - In my career todayā€™s workout is showing ā€œAchievableā€. Anywhere I can see what it rated it after Iā€™d completed it?

Hey there, Iā€™d definitely hit up support. Sounds like somethingā€™s for sure amiss that would be worth having the engineers check into! This is why weā€™re on Beta. :grin:

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Specific address for that? The invitation email was surprisingly light on detail!

Support@trainerroad.com with info about your beta issue should be plenty.

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