oik01

Hi all,

I was hoping to get some feedback from people who have used both platforms in the past.
I am really an amature post covid cyclist. FTP peaked 6 weeks ago at 225 and has been going down because of life since then. I have some good training time ahead in terms of work schedule for the next 5 weeks or so followed by a tough week and then some reasonable training potential again. I have used trainerroad in the past but really dislike the fact that I can not do outdoor training properly. Even if I load their workout for outdoors, I end up with intervals that are up and down above and below the target because of the hilly nature of the area, and I also end up with a good effort before and after to get to the area where there are fewer stops.

The advantage of Trainerroad as I see it:
Bigger database, Ive had experience with it, I like adaptive training if I stick to their workouts indoors.
Disadvantage: I want to still do hard outdoor efforts which I think I'd have to stop because their adaptive training doesn't factor it in too well.

Xert:
Advantage: Can do my zwift races, outdoor efforts and they will be considered.
Disadvantages: I don't know if their dataset for adaptive training is as large? ( as someone who has dealt with data before I am always fearful of big claims if they come from too small a sample source).; It has seemed weird to me now: It estimated my FTP way too low- in fact lower than the average power I held for a 65 minute race today ( it had that file for analysis too which is bewildering and makes no sense). It thinks Im very tired so its recommending recovery rides when I want to do hard workouts for the few weeks I have before another hard one intervenes.

Any thoughts on your own experiences? Recommendations?

PeteHski

I would stick with TrainerRoad and not worry too much about the "quality" of your outdoor intervals. Indoor intervals are always going to be more accurate, but it's not that critical. You will still get fitter and stronger if you continue to train consistently both indoors and outdoors. If your outdoor rides turn out to be harder than the intended workout, then just compensate for it with slightly easier indoor sessions or a bit more recovery. Tracking your TSS in something like Training Peaks or Strava should help in managing your workload vs fatigue.

GhostRider62

I did not find XERT to accurately model my fitness or freshness (fatigue). Another thing I did not like, the endurance workouts were too close to threshold. It does weird things such as labeling a 12 hour ride with 60 minutes at threshold and 180 minutes of tempo and the rest in Z1 or Z2 as an easy ride whereas a 60 minute TT at threshold as hard or whatever their nomenclature is. Very weird. YMMV.

I am looking at trainerroad and considering it but no experience with it.

redlude97

Until TR gets their outdoor workout algorithm figured out, adaptive training is worthless if you do inside and outside workouts. Xert has a steeper learning curve so the results might not make sense until you set it up for your own fitness and training. It also doesn't really program a whole season so you have to have an idea how to set your own progression towards your peak.

hubcyclist

It's fine for outdoor workouts, it's not fine for random outdoor rides. I mostly do my stuff indoors, but I've done a lot more TR workouts outside and they have worked flawlessly, and that was even before they started automatically giving passes to any outdoor workout by default due to the whole Wahoo not playing nicely. I have a suspicion that a lot of random outdoor rides people do wouldn't really impact their progression levels for AT, at least not to the degree they think, and personally I think if someone really cares that much about their progression levels and adaptive training, they should stick with a plan and give most rides a purpose.

redlude97

The weakness is of course if you have a heavy race season or do a lot of group rides. There is of course going to be adaptions there that TR can't account for and if a significant portion of your intensity in a week is from non-structured riding then AT cannot fit progression correctly.

caloso

I'm on TrainerRoad and prefer to do some of the workouts outside. Select the outdoor version and push it to your computer. Some work better than others: long sweet spot intervals for example. Anything with microbursts is best done at home, though.

AT works fine with outdoor workouts if you schedule the outdoor version of them. Or post ride, you can associate it with a similar workout.