Age considerations

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Two issues:

  1. Training Status and Form stars: I presume the number of stars shows my status relative to the entire population of riders in your database, correct? If not, what is the population we’re compared to? Since you have the age of your customers it would make more sense, I think, to show the stars based on age group (10 year groups as you use on the Rankings page). I want to know how I stand vs people who have my capabilities and whom I compete against, not riders 30 to 50 years younger. I think that would be generally true of masters riders in any age group.

  2. When I play with the Improvement Rate on the Goals page it lets me pick any of the rates and then tells me what I can expect TP and 5 minute power to be in 6 weeks. Picking Aggressive 2, for example, tells me 5 minute power will be up17 watts at 340 and TP up 13 watts at 270 at that time. I’m already at 100% of the population for my age group ("forever"setting) on the Rankings page, so that should be the first clue the prediction is unrealistic, and I know for certain there is no way I’ll ever have a 2 70 watt TP or a 340 watt 5 min power (and I doubt I really have the capabilities you currently ascribe to me). Trying to use that progression would be extremely counterproductive based on any training advice, e.g. Joe Friel “Fast after Fifty”, I’ve ever seen for older athletes. So this makes me question the viability of any of your progressions choices and predictions. Both of those should be tempered by both age and where anyone currently stands vs their respective Ranking population to make them truly useful, and credible.

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  1. Training Status and Form stars and classification was selected based on our experience with athletes and expected training loads. The stars and categories are somewhat arbitrary as a helper to new users that are looking to interpret what Training Load means.
  2. Firstly, sustaining Aggressive-2 for 6 weeks isn’t possible The system doesn’t (yet) map out how much improvement rate you can sustain over 6 weeks. There are a lot of “it depends” for that as you point out. Check out our blogs and glossary to understand Improvement Rate. The prediction is based on your historical data and the relationship you have shown between your fitness numbers and training loads. The Goals tab simply provides a way to show this relationship that exists in your data by extrapolating based on your current TL and chosen Improvement Rate. Achieving this improvement is up your available time to invest, recovery demands of the Improvement Rate and if you continue to demonstrate that relationship between training and improvement. On the XPMC, If your TL black line aligns well with your T P hatched gold line, you should feel pretty confident that your fitness improvements will track with training load changes. Also, 100% is a percentile. There are a lot of athletes in the top 1% with even higher power/w-kg. :frowning:
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My guess is you don’t have enough valid data history for the algorithms to work well (yet) OR you’re already a world class rider in your age group.
If that’s true then the 100th percentile reflects the fact you’re Xert’s top rider in that age group for the data they’ve collected to date.
For the percentile to vary below 100% you’ll need to ask all your fellow age group competitors to join Xert and contribute their data. Until they do you’ll remain at the top of the heap. :slight_smile:
As far as stars go, if you can regularly complete 4 and 5 star workouts at a TP you think is reasonable for you – then yup, you’re an elite rider.

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What about “faster after 64” Ken?

I think you underestimate your own capabilities. My 5 minute peak power was sitting at 287. I had been thinking to attack this number. I am not a strong rider but since I have been training with Xert I definitely felt getting stronger. Well, the workouts are surely enough hard and very hard. To make a long story short, today I created a little workout and went for the 5 minutes resulting in 300 watts as a 5 minutes PP. I felt like there was still more in the tank. I would say, go for it mate.

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Ken,

I’m 55 years young, so I can relate.

Would you mind sharing your age & weight?

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71, 150 lbs.

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I’ll tag along to this post if you don’t mind. I too am reading ‘Fast after 50’ although i’m not yet there, 46. One of the other main recommendations is strength training. With lockdown being quite severe in France I can’t go to a gym or buy weight lifting equipment. Can anyone recommend any on the bike Xert strength workout please? Does the Training Advisor take age into account to recommend more strength workouts for oldies?

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