Hi all.
I’m using Train Now for some ad hoc training. The workouts are annotated A - Achievable, P - Productive, S - Stretch. I can’t see a definition but am assuming that Stretch is a possible fail level of intensity but A vs P? The workout recommended today is an Achievable with Productives available for not TR’s recommendation. What am I getting with As vs Ps?
Thanks folks and sorry if this has been answered elsewhere but I couldn’t find it.
There is a blog post that explain this, and the rating system…
found it!
Thank you, that’s perfect.
I’m confused. I keep seeing Achievable as my recommendation. I would think that someone who wanted to improve would want Productive or higher. Why the default to the lowest level?
I’ve seen this where the workout time isn’t enough to get a productive suggestion. Up the workout time and see if that helps.
The Productive options take exactly the same amount of time.
Then I can’t help
FWIW, my thoughts as to why you have it in your plan are
It gives ML a chance to see what is easy for you and then adjust from there. If you consistently complete Achievable workouts and rate them as easy, the plan builder should adjust the difficulty in future workouts. Could also be the case when you’ve adjusted to a new FTP and thus have new levels, what is “achievable” now is very different than what was previously achievable so its good to make sure you can do the work.
Achievable still is, “money in the bank”. Just because the workout isn’t at a level that is higher than your current progression level that doesn’t mean it isn’t beneficial. The more times you can do an achievable workout, it strongly shows that is well within your level of ability.
Periodization. Higher than Productive workouts are at progression levels that are higher than what you are currently. That larger stress stimulus should of course increase your fitness provided that you are able to recover from it. You could set all of your efforts to breakthrough but you will likely hit a wall very quickly because it would be difficult to recover from. Sometimes you just need to have an achievable workout to give you time to recover while getting you to move still.
Those are my thoughts. I do know TR was criticized in the past for being too hard. Now they seem to get more complaints about it being too easy. If you really think it is too easy, I’ve found subbing in a workout that is from the alternates section but is in a higher level than what you are assigned is a good way forward.
that makes sense. I am subbing in harder workouts as needed and that seems to be working.
Thats what I did too. Be a bit careful as I was ambitious the first 2 weeks into my build block and made the threshold workouts breakthrough both weeks. The final few weeks were absolutely crushing.
Its fun tho. Good to push yourself. Good luck!
did the same! I think I have a handle on it now.
This topic comes up all the time. Trust the program and adaptive training. There’s nothing wrong with achievable levels. If you think you need more, increase your volume instead of intensity this time of year IMHO