Hi guys
I’m really struggling to know what it what. I know my data might be a little out.
But the issue is I feel like I have been training pretty hard the last 3 weeks - Typical week is as follows
Mon = Rest
Tues = Zwift points Race
Wed = Loop outside (20miles easy)
Thurs = 2x TTT Zwift Race (one hard, one med/hard)
Fri = Loop outside (easy)
Sat = Zone 2 Zwift ride
Sun = Loop outside (40 miles pushing the climbs)
Garmin has me at the absolute top end of Optimal (productive) and this morning into over trained.
Intervals has me just dropping into Optimal
Strava has me Steady build/upper end of build.
To give you some more context I had a dodgy trainer last year which read really high. But I’ve since upgraded and set my season on Intervals to the date I changed trainer.
Also I was on holiday for a week at start of June and rode an e-cargobike with the family logging over 100miles - I recorded the miles on Garmin but didn’t wear a HR strap.
Any insights as to what might be happing would be really appreciated.
That looks pretty inconsistent but there are a couple of remarks/questions:
- What are you using as load measurement? HR only or do you have power? Or is it a mix of Power indoors and HR outdoors?
- Are the zones on all three sources setup equally? HRmax/HRrest/LTHR; eventually FTP
- If Garmin puts you at the over-trained border, you better check thoroughly because Garmin is pushing you by default way too hard to do High Aerobic workouts
- If the above is a “typical week”, you are doing way too much high intensity
We will need some more details to evaluate what is going on.
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Thank you for the reply
MedTechCDSupporter
15m
That looks pretty inconsistent but there are a couple of remarks/questions:
- What are you using as load measurement? HR only or do you have power? Or is it a mix of Power indoors and HR outdoors?* Power indoors and HR outside (I should have Power outside before too long)
Are the zones on all three sources setup equally? HRmax/HRrest/LTHR; eventually FTP. Just checked - A little out thanks. Garmin 20w below Intervals/Strava. Max HR a couple of BPM out
If the above is a “typical week”, you are doing way too much high intensity I feel pretty fatigued but didn’t want to feel like I was just wimping out. I was stuck in the grey zone on Intervals and someone suggested that my body had acclimatised and needed shocking to push into Green so thought I’d give it a few hard weeks but barely making it green (when it feels like should almost be Red)
We will need some more details to evaluate what is going on. **Thanks for your input 
**
Hmm, shocking your body… That is rarely (never?) a good idea!
Your body needs time to adapt to a new situation. Forcing it to adapt quickly almost surely will lead you to overtraining/injury.
You seem to be one of those lucky guys who has the time to train 6 days a week. That is a tremendous advantage if you use that time correctly. Keep the frequency but reduce the intensity. Do more (much more) Z2 riding. Make at least one of those days a Long Ride and keep it at or below Z2. 40 miles for someone who is riding 6 days a week is not exactly a long ride. One or max 2 rides a week can be with hard efforts. Keep the rest of the rides easy and develop your aerobic engine. You should see and feel positive adaptations relatively fast.
Add about 10% Load per week and take a recovery week every 4 weeks by reducing the load about 30-40%.
Build your fitness with consistency and time on the bike, not by riding like a weekend warrior 6 days a week.
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Yep - I am lucky to be able to ride most days but most of it its on the trainer or short loops outside early in the morning/late at night.
I’d say I only have 2 flat out sessions. I prob need to back off a little on the outside loops for sure and be more responsible when following mates up hills/hills that are segments!
I was just trying to get a hard 4 or 5 weeks and a little taper before heading off to alps for 4 days. I would say generally my load isn’t that much higher than it typically has been over the past year… a bit for sure.
I’m still a little confused as to why Intervals, Garmin & Strava are all so wildly different & which one I should be following. I really like the Intervals platform but would love the fitness graph to work for me.
Why do you think it is not working for you?
I am a big fan of a single source of truth. I would focus on one platform (Intervals) and ensure that the data you are providing into it is accurate and well organised.
How are you feeding Intervals workout data? Are you sure it has everything coming through etc. I would also double check your settings again just to be sure.
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It’s just a fitness graph, nothing less nothing more. No magic there. It is just your avg load over ~60 days. And load is measured using your ftp (1h@ftp is 100tss) There can be a slight diffeence how different platforms measures avg watts (just avg pwr or normalised) of your ride. But none of this graphs will tell you what your RPE and level of fatigue is. There are just to help you compare you overall rpe and tss and plan your ramp rate over longer time. They are to plan you training not read your fatigue. Imagine two weeks with same workouts but one week you got angry at work, had a fight with your wife and couln’t sleep that well, and on another week you got a rise at work, you’ve met a new girl (future wife) and bought new super comfy bed and you sleep as a stone. For your garmin, Strava, and Intervals those two weeks will look the same. But for your body one will be much more fatiguing then the other.
I agree 100% with everything @MedTechCD wrote.
And can only add: training 6x/week is not a joke. I mean doing anything 6 times a week is not a joke ;). Platforms like Strava and Garmin aand their graphs are mostly for people who 'train" one ore two times a week every second or third week, so there is no chance they will overtrain but some rising graphs are motivating for them.
You train a lot so I would stick with Intervals and would use its grpahs to plan some simple training progression You can enter your Alp trip as a Race/event, then plan backwards as it supposted to be done. Just before Alps one week easier so you are fresh (google legs openers training ), then before it one or two weeks of some vo2max, before that some ftp work, rest weeks between every block, check your ramp rate and maodify workouts accordingly, and at the and you will get you future fitness when in Alps on your magic graph but you will get there safely and as planned without risk of injury or overtraining 
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