Originally Posted by
john m flores
That's an interesting point that I had not considered before. I imagine that a large number or amateur athletes train without a coach and using training plans + data to provide the structure and feedback that a traditional coach would.
Thanks for sharing.
That is exactly what I do. I use a data driven adaptive training plan. Power and HR are the key input metrics for this. But I also just like to keep a log of my rides and small group of riding friends. I find Strava convenient for that purpose. Once set up, everything is automated, so there is very little effort involved. I basically just have to start and stop my Garmin and the data goes out to my training app (PILLAR) and Strava. Indoor ride data from Zwift also goes straight into these apps.
I also have a simple fitness tracker (Fitbit) but I only really use that for monitoring my resting HR and HRV and it doubles up as a watch and alarm. I find resting HR quite a useful metric for fatigue and recovery, but I’m not convinced about HRV. For me HRV doesn’t seem to vary much or correlate with fatigue. I always seem to get relatively low values so maybe I’m just shot all the time! The other use I have for Fitbit is automated weight/body fat monitoring. I have one of their scales and it automatically feeds data straight into the app via WiFi. So I have a complete weight log going back to 2014 when I bought the scale. All I have to do is stand on the scale for a few seconds every morning.
I don’t find any of this difficult or onerous and it makes a big difference to my overall health and fitness.