Because tr is more than the plans. You can do your own plan using their vast library of workout. And that’s absolutely fine. I think people are allowed to complain about their experience. Maybe there is something for them to learn from their users…
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Here is one observation about “the thread” over the last few days:
The evening shift (EST) is actually quite productive and puts out their points pretty clearly without pointless attacks.
Then the morning/midday shift ( again EST) comes in:
Screeching ensues
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In your forum user preferences you can add other users to an ignore list which will hide all of their replies. It’s not perfect, because you still see people responding to them, but it might help your sanity.
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I know something is wrong (in my mind at least) because I’m pleased that this thread exists. I’m not the only one who’s noticed a shift.
Since finding the AACC Podcast and this forum, it felt like I had an extended cycling family. Somewhere to ask my questions. More often than not, I’d get a range of great responses and I could actually fashion a way forward.
Over the last few months, I’ve muted more threads than I care to mention. Yeah, maybe I’m more of a snowflake than I’d previously cared to admit.
Personally, I don’t care if the same questions gets asked time and time again. If I have experience with a particular situation, I will try and offer advice. I don’t deal in or reference the science, which, lets be honest, seems to change from one week to the next. I like to try and put a personal spin on things. Like a friend would on your group ride. Like you’re talking to a real person.
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That’s a good way to see things, from a certain point of view 
Think it’s mostly men complaining here…
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There is a difference between asking genuine questions related to training and complaining, criticising and fueling conflict.
It has become difficult to ask relevant questions on the forum. There seems to be more interest in anything that creates controversy or proves an argument.
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I think it all stems from a recently new video review of TrainerRoad, also everyone has been locked up for a year without racing til recently. People need to release some tension and anxiety, so they head to the forum.
Sure there are more negative things going on, but like the real world, IMO I focus on the positive things still happening. I still see and read people giving great training advice and sharing stories of where they road and positive changes they’ve had. As the Buddha says
“what you focus on is what you become”
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Please feel free to flag posts that don’t abide by our community guidelines of not being excellent to one another, or attacking the person not the idea. I do engage in follow up conversations with all of those approved flags, and we ultimately do remove users from the forum who don’t contribute constructively to the dialogue apart from creating dissent. Here to help!
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If there were a survey done of people that have been regular Forum readers since its inception, I think a majority would say that the quality of the Forum has declined since its first year of operation in all regards, from content quality to assistance of others to tone of discussion. I also think that it would be a false assertion to assign sole blame to the pandemic (i.e. in 2022, will the Forum magically transform back to its roots?). Root causes are many as are its fixes and a path to improvement.
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This sounds VERY “back in my day”. Which is never a good look.
When the forum started there were probably much fewer people here that now.
With more people more opinions and different topics of discussions.
There are plenty of threads with questions, and funny enough, most of the questions have already been answered or discussed in the past, and possible multiple time. Just ask @mcneese.chad and more than likely he can give you how many times he have point people to the right thread regarding their question.
There are only so many things people can talk and discuss about on a thread regarding stationary bikes.
Also, as other have point out, you can mute the conversations or threads you personally dont like.
Just complaining how YOU like things before doesnt improve the forum…
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I am sorry that your reading/interpretation of my post is just complaining. I might suggest that you read my post again. In the early part of my commentary, I define 3 aspects of the Forum in the early days:
- Content Quality
- Assistance of Others
- Discussion Tone
Are you suggesting that trying to achieve positive ratings for the Forum in each of characteristics should be confined to the past and not be goals of the Forum going forward?
Also, if you re-read my last line: “Root causes are many as are its fixes and a path to improvement”, what I am inferring is that if there is a desire by Forum members, including the TrainerRoad staff, for Forum improvement you would:
- Begin by setting goals for the Forum, that I believe would include the 3 characteristics I list above
- Identify the problems/issues, including root causes, preventing achieving such goals
- Assemble a detailed plan of improvement, that includes both fixes and opportunities to make the Forum even better than the past
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For me, the tone shift began in April, I started a thread where I was sharing my experience doing a vo2 interval progression based on a Chad T’s progression he had shared on a podcast and here on the forum. Someone came into the thread and questioned why I was doing 2.5min vo2 intervals and that vo2 intervals were at least 3mins in length. And that basically derailed what was just a topic sharing my experience into the bickering we see in a lot of threads now.
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All of them are your personal opinion (maybe shared by other forum members)
In a counter, I joined a year ago and i have find people here are helpful and point me into the right direction if I have questions. The tone of some threads can be better, but unless you are 15 and this is your first message board, none of this should be of any surprise. Every single message board that ive been part of in the last 25 years have look exactly like this in tone and how the threads evolve. And in every one of them, you will always find the early users who would not like the “way of the forum now days”. This is 100% the case on every forum of the internet (and probably society as a whole, but that nor here nor there).
- What goals? Your goals or the goals of the people you dont like?
- Who said there are problems? You may dont like some post, but this is far from a total disaster. Yes there are a few threads that tensions are running high, but there are isolated and you can ignore them.
- Why would they do that? The owners and multiple moderators are active in the forum, and if they see somethings moving in the wrong direction Im pretty sure they could do something. For that reason, it pretty obvious that they will let this forum be whatever it may be…
And the thread about not arguing just for the sake of arguing devolves into arguing just for the sake of arguing. 
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This is the thread for arguing about people arguing on threads…
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Can we make another thread, where we argue why we argue in the thread that’s about arguing in other threads?
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Cant argue against that!
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Well, given your user name, I’d think you’d be quite the agreeable type!
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Nono … i am all about the money! If you give me the rent… i will agree
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