Hi,
I am 48 yo and I injured my leg in a cycling accident on Feb 26 and I was able to resume pedaling with 2 legs by mid April. During my month and a half without cycling I did arm workouts to limit my loss in aerobic power and towards the end some single leg cycling.
Starting April 11 I was cleared for walking and cycling at limited power, so I started cycling on the indoor trainer with power increasing slowly from constant 100W on April 15 to 140W with intervals at 200W on May 1.
From May 4 to May 14 I took a break from training because of travelling, and then on May 14, I was cleared for training as hard as I wanted by my physical therapist.
I rejoined Trainer Road on May 18 and did a ramp test. Then I started a base plan.
My problem is that I have trouble reconciling the GreenLightRedLight feature of Trainer road with the fitness graph I find here.
TR is complaining that I am pushing too hard and recommending me to skip workouts and take rest days. Whereas on the fitness graph over here, I am âfreshâ or in âGrey zoneâ.
So I am wondering who I should listen to.
Today I was planning to do some sweet spot training, but TR is recommending to switch to an endurance/recovery ride.
I have the impression I am holding back and I am looking forward to riding more. Or should I listen to TrainerRoadâs RedLight GreenLite telling me to take it easy?
If I look at my fitness graph on intervals, I have the impression my fitness is not increasing with my current volume.
Thank you in advance for your advice, and replies!!!
Who should you listen to?
In short, your own body
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Does TrainerRoad have your training workouts history from april - may?
If not, it thinks youâre starting from scratch and you need to build from zero⌠Hence it warns you to take it easy, like it should do.
Always prioritize how you feel. Use the tools to guide you and eventually confirm what you feel but be aware that the tools are not âexact scienceâ.
And the fitness graph has your pre-injury peak fitness of ~80 which disrupts the view on todayâs situation. Fitness is increasing but the scaling is hiding the upward trend.
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yep
TR has all my workout history. Everything thatâs on Intervals is also on TR as both use a direct import from Strava.
@MedTechCD
mmm I just realized TR did not import my hand-ergometer workouts.
but so, based on the data on intervals.icu, what would be a good ramp value to stick to in order to get back to my previous fitness without overtraining?
What @nasatt said.
Iâm listening to you and hearing that you are in a hurray to press your current and ongoing limits as closely as you can and want to know what Computer says that is. The truth is Computer doesnât know.
Computer is pretending to be a coach and has limited intel to boot. While its programmed predictions and analysis can be duplicated with mathematical precision and accuracy for its single crafted subject which is a mathematical algorithm , we are not that. We are a complex biological organism.
We donât know. Your asking us to take the data you feed the computer and arrive at a different conclusion. We canât.
So, back to what @nasatt said. How do you feel?
Itâs the pirateâs code. Any crafted man made system trying to interpret and predict in this situation with the limited data available are guidelines really.
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Tough to give a ballpark-type answer here, considering the injury and without knowing the full training history, but since you seem to insist on oneâŚ
Per Joe Friel â
A reasonable ramp rate is one that you maintain for a few weeks before taking a break for a few days. While it depends to a great extent on who the athlete is, Iâve found that an increase in CTL of about 5 to 8 points per week is about right for most.
But that is in healthy athletes in their prime, in ideal conditions. Your mileage may, and probably will, vary.
5 CTL/wk may be something to aspire to? Carefully. While paying close attention to your body feel and wellness metrics and backing off at the first sign of trouble.
Get well! 
P.S. I should probably elaborate on what I meant by âaspire toâ â
I would advise you to not try and follow a rigid plan or force a specific weekly ramp number, but instead have goals and be flexible about the specific execution based on your feel and readiness day to day, and not be afraid to back off when your body (or objective metrics) ask for it.
A couple things to read on this âdynamic loadingâ-type approach:
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And remember that CTL load from Easy work is much easier to recover from then the same CTL load from Hard work. Make sure to balance in favour of Easy work.
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Alan Couzens has a reply to that exact Joe Friel post:
Joe suggests that most folks can handle a ramp of 5-8 CTL per week. Perhaps itâs just me growing more and more cautious as the years pass, but Iâve found these numbers to be a little too aggressive over the long term among my sample of high performance (often working age group/âhigh life stressâ) athletes. I typically aim for a more conservative long term ramp of 3-5 CTL per week (or ~10-20 per 4 week block) as a good long term figure.
Personally Iâve found a lot of success at 4-5. But the body keeps the score, and the bodyâs information does come first. This was tougher to do when I was just starting out. I wasnât keyed in to my own fatigue. Maybe you need to get burned yourself before you really understand where your own limitations are.
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I hope it is okay, if I post my question in here, as it concerns the same topping of comign back after injury and how to interpret the fitness-page of intervals.icu.
I am a 26year old male self-coached XC-rider of roughly 75kg. I did not race much in the last two years.
Last fall I had big plans for the 2024 season - and promptly injured mysel 
. Probably while doing squats (to much to qucikly). I had a nasty infection of a tendon in one knee but was cleared for training in march and have since performed bike-fitting and also lots of physio during the time of the injury. All knee problems are gone (and I hope it stays this way).
Before I injured myself I had a CTL of about 70 points, I could do 368 watts for 20min, 408 for 10min. These were all time best numbers for me.
In March 2024, when I could start riding, I initially just messed around on the bike, having fun and not riding more than three times a week for a month or so. I have now completed my first 3 week training block of Z2 riding (which I did by feel). I did a 20min test in the recovery-week i took after that, coming out at 337 watts.
I have just yesterday started second three-week-block. My form is in the deep red, as you can see. However, i feel fine. Sure, I have had heavy legs after longer rides or the first intervals, but my resting HR and HRV (according to Garmins Body-Battery thing on my forerunner) are fine. I dont want to take any risk reinjuring myself, but my body doesnât feel like I am donig anything drastic.
For my next three weeks of trainig I plan on doing 2-3 interval sessions a week (Z4 and sweetspot), mixed with lower Z2 riding and strenght sessionaon friday.
Is it plausible to assume, that form is not really adequatley represeting what is going on? For example, with my current fitness of 50 CTL I have a higher FTP than I had a couple of years ago when my CTL was higher.
