TR hasn’t answered the ‘why’ though. It’s been said quite a bit, but they should share what their data is telling them.
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as someone who religiously did SSB HV, I can say from my experience changing my approach to 2 a week (and increasing z2 time, so ending up with 14hr weeks) as been no worse and possibly even better. I just wrapped up my first “base” period today, and I began my phase with 3x20 and today I did 2x45 at 90%, I feel like a lot of the progression can be accomplished in fewer workouts with less fatigue while building endurance with longer endurance sessions.
edit: and just for a point of comparison, here’s the same workout done last year and today
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And with 2 a week you can also remove rest weeks from equation (usually) or at least doing them when you really need them.
i do maintain a strict 3:1 ratio, it’s never a bad thing to take it easy routinely, i believe
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I don’t think their plans are that far detached from what established science has proven i.e. that 2-3 intense rides a week is generally enough. With endurance on top of that to add volume.
I think it is clear the data will steer TR to offer the plans it offers. What transparency do people want? If the data proves certain sessions or training plans are generally effective then why would TR go against that? Is the “transparent” output/conclusion not just the sessions and plans that are provided??
Yes, they want people to do sessions and not just do sessions, but achieve demonstrable progress to sell their product. But if you do make progress and trust that you will make more progress, do you object to paying for the service? If no one but you (“one”) does a particular training plan then however successful it is for you then with such a limited sample size, you can’t prove it is effective for most people. And if people don’t choose a plan because it’s generally too hard for most people, then ultimately TR doesn’t sell subscriptions.
My view is to do what works for you. There are no guarantees other than if you do nothing you won’t get fitter. Even if you do the same as you did last winter, you might not get the same gains. I’ve sometimes unexpectedly made bigger improvements doing less volume and less intensity. It’s almost like people want the TR software to act like a 1 to 1 personal coach. Having had a personal coach for a good few years and since then used Trainerroad adaptive training for a few years, both can deliver good progress. Try different things 
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And if McDonald’s stops selling bigmacs and starts selling pizza, it’d be nice to know what made them stop selling the hamburgers before you switch to eating only pizza.
Not if it’s catering to the middle of the bell curve, and the goal is to not be in the middle of the bell curve. That’s why I specifically bring up the flipping between SS and Z2.
That’s the fundamental problem with AI, right? It’s only as good as the data you feed it. I know Nate knows this, because he’s talked about it on podcasts and how they look at and integrate peoples ride history from before using TR.
I mean if TR has moved away from SS work, which it clearly has…does that mean that the AI is screaming at them that SS is terrible? The AI has been fed hundreds of thousands of people doing SS base, and from that has determined it should only be done once a week. Is that the transparency that should be inferred?
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Thanks for this, you articulated it better than I could.
It feels like many changes are quite reactive to user experiences. In a way I guess that’s good - at the same time, as you put it,
“other people’s lack of adherence shouldn’t justify a change to a plan, IF the plan is fundamentally better.”
For example, people advocate for Z2 and complain about workout intensity (“Dylan” thread). Many got burned out on HV intensity, very often despite it being not recommended for them. And you can read many examples that hang themselves up on a “sweet spot base” name, but it has workouts that are not sweet spot.
“I worry at the ends of the bell curve, for people who are already consistent and put in the time year-after-year” - good point!
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I myself have no strong feeling one way or another, have seen great progress both approaches (SSBHV vs self created plan akin current Masters General Base HV)
Anyway, quick googling of “endurance high intensity training frequency” reveals interesting paper (I admit, read only abstract) and it does align with TR plan changes:
@timon So is the worry is that those at the top of the bell curve can tolerate tougher or different training to those in the middle? Is the assumption that those in the middle have lower power figures because they have historically adhered less to the to the tough work outs and plans so TR makes the plans easier to encourage those in the middle more, and get better adherence to plan from them? There also might be a lot of people in the middle of the bell curve because that’s human genetics despite a lot of people in the middle training regularly and having a long training history.
If there is a bigger mass of the population in the middle of that bell curve then it’s probably a good business move to target the majority unfortunately.
Personally, in my own mind I validate/justify the plans and the sessions that TR provides me against what I hear on numerous other cycle training podcasts, cycling books and club knowledge. I train generally like the guys I know. A few subtleties, but we all have slight differences of opinion and favoured methods despite the science sometimes. I’m perhaps one of the lucky ones to be in the 90%+ part of the bell curve and I might get more benefit if TR focussed on athletes at that end of the curve, but I didn’t really go massively better with a personal coach, who you might think could tailor sessions to suit being nearer the top end of the bell curve than a lot of people. But i know that my TR training is consistent, achievable week on week and month on month and that I don’t have to be absolutely psyched up for each gruelling session just to get a few watts more.
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As the food may or maynot be better for you (like long rides) i think the annology is more like a gym removing all it’s light dumb bells, because nobody is using them and when somebody small comes in … or somebody who wants to do a lot of reps comes in … they are told to use the heavy bells (because nobody was using the light)
The reason for removal (nobody was using them) is disparate from the need for having them
Right, but all you’re saying here is that you don’t really know, you wing it, which is what we all do. The opportunity for TR is to say, ‘of course we’re all snowflakes, but statistically, people just like you, with a similar training background, do best with X plan’.
It’s as simple (not really that simple) as them giving us better insights into why they’re prescribing what they’re prescribing, and it would massively benefit them. An example would be, ‘based on everything we know about you and your history, if you comply to this plan, it’s 72% likely to increase your FTP in 8 weeks’, and they could show other plans as options as well. Really cool would be if they could suggest volumes and intensity distributions based on periods in your past where you had PB MMP durations, and then tweak prescriptions, based on how you responded.
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“we’re all snowflakes” 
. Too true
Indeed nobody knows and it’s best guess. If we’re looking for confidence that a training plan will deliver for us then that’s perhaps a dodgy road for Trainerroad to go down, for those that have topped out, reached their genetic potential or moreover their potential based on other life commitments… Can you imagine the predictor that predicts 3 watts in 10 weeks time and by the way, it’s only 5% likely…[cos you’re really at the top of your game and as good as you ever will be] Or the “gain” and its likelihood perhaps the difference between a good day and a bad day.
The data analysis to be able to dive to where you had peak powers and the training you were doing at the time would be cool I agree
Which makes it ridiculous that they are named “Masters Plan” since this is probably the plan that 95% of rides should adhere to in the long run.
Not for the fast gains, but for the consistent gains.
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This is my biggest objection - the plans look pretty great and sustainable for most people. They are not masters plans but plans that should be default for most people that want sustainable plans all year long.
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Jaysus - they really can’t win. For years people looking for a “masters” plan, and they create one and it’s still not enough! They specifically say for people who struggle with recovery/ have stressful outside of training lives too.
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You’re missing the point, the Masters Plan is a great plan, for everyone. That’s what my comment was all about.
They are addressing it as it’s some kind of “oh youre getting old and not recovering, or have life stress”.
It’s a great balance of intensity and ride hours for everyone who wants a sustainable plan. You could literally run this plan over and over and over - which is great!
You cannot do that with the other plans since you’ll eventually burn out and/or stagnate since it’s too much intensity.
The Masters plan should actually have been the new Base Plan, and then move the rest of the plans into some sort of speciality 
The issue is not the plan itself, but the branding and who they made it for.
Imagine if Apple went out and said the the Plus models were made for older people who were getting bad eye sight and needed bigger fonts. No one would want to buy those since they would not relate to that type of marketing.
Same thing here, great product, silly silly marketing and communicate of it.
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just my opinion of course, but you’re putting a lot of stock in their insight and providing reasons, I don’t think it’s that deep. training actually isn’t that complicated, so I think a lot of this “personalization” (which, let’s be honest, is merely tweaking the difficulty level of specific workouts and not changing workout types) only serves to create an odd dependence to “following the personalized plan” that really may be no better or even worse than following more basic approaches.
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Absolutely agree!
I think we probably agree. What I’m saying is that there’s nonstop discussion here about two seemingly conflicting things, 1) everyone is different, and no two prescriptions work for the same person and 2) training is actually really simple. I would have thought TRs bank of data, and their perspective on the data, could be informative, at least as much as studies done with 60 athletes over a 6 week period.