I highly recommend the Trainerroad training plans. I've had excellent results using them.

TrainerRoad! You can pick a training plan and go from there. Use the low volume Sweetspot base plan (3 rides a week) and see huge improvements :)

TrainerRoad is a good product. I've been using it a few months and it has some great workouts. It has been a good value for me. I've got a free month that I can refer to you if you want to PM me your email address.

On one of their podcasts, when the subject of the slowtwitch forum came up your signature line of "AERO & LIGHT is RIGHT" was mentioned.

The two basics to training with power are using power data to do focused riding in specific zones for specific durations to drive specific adaptations (i.e. fitness) and to use the data the power meter generates over time to track some basic metrics to manage your training load and fatigue and track your progress in specific areas.

You can literally get a PhD in a whole host of sub parts of all of that but, for regular folk purposes, all you need is a collection of various workouts put together in a plan and some rudimentary software to track your data over time. You actually do not even need to know what you are doing if someone else is doing the planning for you but there are some basics you will want to get familiar with, especially if you are going to be running your own show (i.e. no coach). Read this https://www.trainingpeaks.com/...-training-with-power

For actual training, as mentioned above, TrainerRoad is by far the best bang for the buck. For $12 a month you get access to their training plans and workout library. If you follow their base, build, specialty plan progression you will get a solid training program. It is almost as good as having a real coach for a fraction of the cost. And, after you do that progression once or twice, you will have a very solid look at how a training plan works over time if you pay attention, giving you the ability to freelance.

For tacking purposes, if you do all your workouts indoors with TrainerRoad you will get some rudimentary performance graphs but it does not incorporate outdoor rides. Strava Premium has some performance metric graphs but they are limited. TrainingPeaks is the best choice. It's $99 a year and very easy to use. It will track your training and the key power metrics and give you quite a bit of insight.

Thanks kdb,

I did read about TrainerRoad and have now started to read their thread on here and realize that they have quite the following and must be the option to training with power indoors. I will have to do more research on this and might take you up on your offer just to check this out but it might have to wait until after August.

I think that is funny that they reference my "AERO & LIGHT is RIGHT" and would like to hear that pod cast and what brought that up.

I also just read the front page which I do have to admit that I do not do enough and if Dan is reading sorry. I did see the article on training with power indoor and the results that the lady had that made the same change as I did. Her results while individual are what I would like to work hard at achieving. Even thought I am not doing any long events, I want my shorter events to be done at a much higher power output so that I can arrive at T2 faster and more efficiently to allow for a better run.

I just left TrainerRoad after two dedicated years, not because I didn't like it, but because I was tired of following the blue line. I moved over to Zwift and am having fun with group rides and chasing people down. TrainerRoad is a great way to improve and I loved it, until it got boring. When I moved over to Zwift I got my ass kicked (more often than not) and it pulled me out of an indoor trainer rut. I'll probably ping pong between TrainerRoad and Zwift just to keep it real.

Most of the time I question the accuracy of my power meter. Not because I think it is faulty, but because "how the hell is my w/kg not higher!? It must be the power meter."

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Hillary Trout
San Luis Obispo, CA

Your trip is short. Make the most of it.
https://www.slogoing.net/

Another big vote for TrainerRoad from me. I agree that it would be quite straightforward to make your own plan once you've been through a few cycles, but they do change their plans up sometimes for a bit of variety. I like their workout collection for times like now, when I'm between events and haven't yet started a new plan. For example, I want to do an easy 60 minute endurance ride tomorrow morning: just use their workout filters to find a ride that suits. I also find that chasing a Watts/KG target really helps me keep my weight that little bit lower than I probably would otherwise.

I really recommend GoldenCheetah for the after-ride analysis. It's not as pretty as Strava Premium or TrainingPeaks, but it is free and extremely powerful once you learn how to use it. There are some fantastic YouTube guides for that.

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http://www.howesgreg.com

I'm the "lady" you mentioned :-) Funny that you brought up the shorter events. I didn't write about it in the article, but I recently did a sprint triathlon. I did the same race last year. Bike results (10.75 miles): 2016 - 33:24; 2017 - 31:46. Huge improvement over a very short distance. You can see from the results (https://www.vtsmts.com/...print-overall-women/) that I'm still not super competitive on the bike but the improvement since using TrainerRoad has translated to both short and long course races. You also mentioned arriving at T2 "faster and more efficiently for a better run" ... this is another area I saw a big improvement. Last year I ran a 9:09 5K at this race, this year I ran an 18:25. Of course there are always other factors to consider (i.e. I did 3 months of run specific training earlier in the year), but overall I'd say training with power (TrainerRoad) has had a major impact.

Good luck!!

~Sika

I read the article too and it seems that the lady bacame 2 mph faster thanks to Trainer Road. She rode another trainer with other workouts before.
But she did not specify what was different with Trainer Road compared to what she did before.
Probably no use really knows: it's the software which provides for the right training units based on the acquired FTP of the user.

I got a lot faster too on the bike after some frustrating stagnating years. What I started to do different were mainly introducing hard 5*5 intervals (mainly outside) and also do my long bikerides a little bit faster. My bikeride is now with the best in my AG.

Probably the Trainer Road program does something similar. What strikes me though is that no one tells what exactly they train different using Trainer Road.

Anyway, there are a lot of ways leading to success. And training indoors following the commands of a software seems to be one of them.

Although I saw once a very good biker write:
"You become better in what you do a lot. So if you train a lot on your trainer you become merely good in riding on a trainer".
Maybe that's not true?

Here is how TrainerRoad works. It is no different than any other structured training program. It is just that only a tiny percentage of amateur athletes, no matter how hard they are working on any given day or how many hours per week they are putting in are actually using daily structure to efficiently and with focus move themselves along through a well balanced program over time. There is no particular magic to TrainerRoad, other than it is easily accessible and only costs $12 a month. It is just that very few people prior to using it were actually using a structured training program. Put anyone on good structure who has not had structure before and if they hit 90% of the workouts and the targets, they will see a decent jump in performance.

Good warm-up and then go almost all out for 5 minutes to clear out your anaerobic reserve first, rest for 5 to 10 minutes, then do the 20-minute time trial.

It's not 5 minutes as hard as you can possibly go, its 5 min at a threshold like pace. If I'm doing a 5 min all out effort there is no way I'm doing a 20 or 30 min test afterwards.

If you are doing the 5-min at threshold pace, then you are cheating yourself and holding back for the 20-minute test, which will skew the results. I always do the 5-minute effort at upper VO2 max pace, around 115-118% of my current FTP.

Read the test protocol at the bottom of this link from Kurt Kinetic, especially the 5-minute portion: https://www.kurtkinetic.com/...it-tip-know-your-ftp

TrainerRoad has a 20 minute FTP test workout that will run you through the whole testing protocol. After you warm up but before the test it has you doing 5 minutes at 110% of FTP, then a 5 minute recover spin, then game on.

https://www.trainerroad.com/cycling/workouts/1270-20-minute-ftp-test

From Hunter Allen: http://www.hunterallenpowerblog.com/.../01/what-is-ftp.html

Now the real test begins.

3. Ride 5 minutes all out. Punch it and hold it! Start at a high pace, but not so high that you die at the end. You should have a little energy held in reserve to kick it toward the finish line in the last minute.

Well guess it sucks I cannot read right. My bad on the mistake.

For most people "all out, punch it and hold it!" for 5 minutes is going to be somewhere between 110 & 120% of FTP so we are all saying essentially the same thing - go really hard but something you can hold for 5 minutes.

This is why people use power meters - to avoid having debates how hard hard is ;-)