Xert only seems to count total elapsed time and not time spent moving. This is confusing when I stop for 20 minutes and then then ride again it throws off total volume. How do I fix this?
You canāt. Xertās math is based on continuous effort and anything without power - so also when youāre coasting downhill - is considered as rest/recovery. Which it actually is.
However, you will only see low(er) power numbers in the average, but TL- or XSS-wise, it doesnāt make a difference. If you really need to and have a FIT file, go to fifiletools.com and cut out the break.
I understand the thinking there, but why does the time continue when you arenāt moving and the Garmin auto stops when not moving? Xert even continues to elapse time if I turn off the Garmin and then turn on and resume later on? Iām just used to looking at total volume! 
I hear you, but Iām in the same boat 
The only remedy is to end your ride and start a new one after the breakā¦
(Donāt know which Edge you have, but pressing the power button doesnāt end the ride, it just goes into sleep mode.)
Dustin, I am assuming that your requirement is to monitor hours per week rather than miles ridden, which is quite natural.
Can I suggest that you also upload into either Strava and or TP as they both only capture moving time.
Not ideal I know but it is the best I can suggest.
Iām guessing Dustin already uploads to Garmin Connect, since he has a Garmin device, and from there to Xert. Garmin also makes a distinction between moving time and elapsed time and calculates averages based on moving time, unlike Xert.
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Hi Johnny - I do upload to Garmin and to Strava so I capture moving time. Seems like @xert should make a change here or provide an explanation.
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Iād certainly like to see my past weekly training time expressed as moving time. That way I can compare week to week training time.
That be two activities. You ended one, fully recovered, then started another.
Easy enough to stop the first activity on a Garmin or Xert mobile app and start another.
I often take quick breaks on outdoor rides, but 20 minutes isnāt a pause IMO.
Moving time can be totally gamed. Imagine being stopped at a stop light (time not counting). At the green light, sprinting at 700W to the next red light (stops counting) and repeat. You could end up with 700W for minutes continuously. But what happens when you are riding indoors? Should the timer stop when you stop pedalling too? Should some decision on whether that should count as ādownhillā be performed?
In Xert, MPA comes down when you stop. This is important to see. Also, if you have a longer stop, youāll see your Difficulty Score start to come down. Knowing what it is, even after a lengthly stop is important. This is why gaps are included.
If you have cycling shoes on, the timer should count whether youāre stopped or not is the way to look at things.
Sorry to resurrect an old thread here, but this issue of elapsed vs. ride time seems to have an impact on more areas than just entertaining ride stats. Iām noticing that the ATA seems to gauge my fitness and recommend workouts and time on bike based on elapsed time instead of ride time. This is problematic because during different phases of riding I have more ādownā time than other phases. For example, in the off season I will actually often log more elapsed time because I will ride someplace, eat lunch, call family and then finish 2nd half of ride. These are not high XSS rides, but they impact the amount of time the ATA thinks I should be on the bike and what the Adaptive Training Program settings think I should be logging in a given week. This is tough because when I get back to build and peak phase training I donāt take breaks on rides and my average elapsed time per week will easily drop 2-4 hours but my XSS will be higherā¦but according to the ATA metrics (Training Pacer, Recommended Workouts and the Training Status & Form) Iām always showing as behind schedule or barely on track. The result is that I can have done several very hard days on the bike and the ATA isnāt fully recognizing that and suggesting some pretty gnarly workouts when what I really need is rest. For example, right now my average ride time for 2021 is just under 9hrs/week but elapsed time is showing almost 11.8 hrs/week and for me to improve fitness Xert thinks I need to be logging at least 11.8 hours which is definitely not right. Thatās my argument for why ride time instead of elapsed time should be a more important metric and the primary reference point for training.
Hi Scott. Thanks for your comment and opportunity to clarify.
Although XATA accounts for time, it does so indirectly through XSS. If the target XSS is 120, for example, youāll most often get recommended something around the 2 hour mark because youāll generally do 60XSS / hour in a workout.
XATA looks at XSS and aligns workouts with similar XSS to the target XSS needed to maintain your improvement rate (progressive overload). This will most often result in workouts that are similar in duration to workouts youāve done in the past but if youāve been outdoor rides with lots of stops, as you describe, the workouts will be shorter in duration. In terms of advice, though, the target XSS and Focus will be the same and you can perform the recommended training in the form of an activity with one, two or more stops, for example, so long as you reach the recommended target XSS and Focus. Thatās whatās key, not the length of time you spend in your ride.
Hope this helps.
How often do you adjust IR to match your training schedule during the year?
If you are having a consistent problem keeping the pacer needle in the 11am-1pm zone consider lowering IR temporarily or Taper then Maintenance if youāve reached your max hours/week.
Seems like the easy solution for one hour+ breaks would be to stop and save the activity then start a new one later. Doesnāt that more accurately reflect what really happened? IE, two rides in one day.
I wouldnāt say hours alone are responsible for improving fitness. Itās the intensity distribution which can vary widely based on how you allocate your hours over the week plus factors like focus, phase, and indoor vs outdoor workouts.
If predicted form and recommendations donāt reflect what you feel up for today you should adjust the FF slider to change the recommendations.
Reference:
Beginnerās Guide: Improvement Rate ā Xert (baronbiosys.com)
Freshness Feedback ā Xert (baronbiosys.com)
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Thanks for the replies xertedbrain and ridgerider2.
If XSS is the primary variable that is going into the XATA recommendations and fitness gauges, then Iām comforted but still the results metrics and recommendations seem difficult to follow and Iām admittedly having a hard time seeing my way to effectively using this as my workout coaching and training plan tool.
I do almost all of my workouts outdoors. Even though they are almost all structured, thereās no way to get around some stoppage time on every ride and sometimes the stoppage time can be considerable even during build and peak phases. For example, today I went and rode to a practice race and racked up 100 XSS in an hour. Then I had to stop and take a work call that unexpectedly lasted over an hour before I rode the last 20 minutes home at a leisurely pace. Total ride time was about 1:30, but elapsed time was almost 3 hours. Yes, I couldāve stopped the computer and saved the ride right after the practice race, then recorded a separate ride when I went home. But does that seem like an odd way to trick the XATA to anyone else? Iām still not getting a good handle on the utility of elapsed time being a valuable metric on any of the displays instead of ride time and it does seem to be influencing some things. Right this very moment I can look at the ATP tile on my training page and it now says I need to target 12 hours/week to achieve the slow IR setting with FF at -5. So far this week Iāve logged 3 rides (one per day) for a total of 4:22 moving time and 302 XSS, with today being a hard race ride and yesterday being VO2 max intervals. A typical XSS/week for me ranges from 500-700. But at this very moment the XATA says I should get out and log another 115 XSS over 1.5hrs of riding and I know when I check it tomorrow it will recommend an even more strenuous ride. Basically, from observing the XATA for months now while Iāve had a human coach, Iāve decided that the XATA is trying to kill me. Sure I can ignore it, but isnāt the point of having it to serve as a guide for what you should be considering next?
Iām no pro, but I train a lot and enjoy putting in the work. I think what XERT has going here is very interesting and the art/science of picking workouts has intrigued me ever since Iāve had a coach. And as a guy who works in data for a living Iāve long thought that an algorithmic approach to a training plan and picking workouts must be possible and even optimal. But Iām having a hard time making sense of what I see here. Some of that is because I need to become a better user of XERT, but I also think thereās some room for system improvement and Iām hoping that me writing here isnāt perceived as complaining but as an attempt at providing feedback that might help improve the system.
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Thanks Scott. I may need more clarity on things to understand what the issue is youāre seeing.
XATA is fundamentally about XSS and Focus. It calculates your XSS deficit to maintain a set improvement rate. This is so inherently simple yet so perfectly suited for training. Secondly, it determines what focus the XSS should have. Again, so simple yet perfectly suited. The remainder - estimated hours, workouts, workout XSS are all just ways to put the deficit and focus into actionable workouts but thatās just a convenience. Ultimately if you keep the needle between 11-1 and hit your Focus, youāll be all set to improve at the improvement rate you set towards your athlete type goal. There are no ifs ands or buts. If things are too much, adjust FF or back off IR. Again so simple yet perfectly suited.
Elapsed vs. actual time has no influence in the advice but will need to be something that you will need to manage because everyone is different. Time management for training is an entirely other dimension that has little to do with training but more to do with scheduling. We havenāt attempted to solve the scheduling problems because frankly they are very difficult and the utility is questionable when 90% of athletes have varying schedules all the time. Giving you an XSS deficit and Focus frees you up to do what you can in any given day. Thatās always been the recommendation: if you have 2 hours to train, train for 2 hours. If you have 4 hours to train separated by a 1 hour break, then do that. Youāll need to use filters and plan things out if thatās what youāre wanting to achieve. Review XSS deficits beforehand and choose workouts that meet your needs both in terms of training value and time you need. We have many athletes now using XATA to get to 5 star Training Status and beyond. Some may find the training too much once they get to 5 stars and leave improvement rate at something like Aggressive-1. (We should probably add a warning for that choice.) but at 2 and 3 stars, you should be able to easily close the XSS deficits at improvement rates lower than Moderate-2. How long you ride on any given day will not affect your ability to do that.
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Sorry for long delay in reply here. Iām still really struggling to make sense of this. Maybe the elapsed time thing is ultimately acting as a red herring for some other issue, but at the core of what Iām getting at here is that the expected training time and corresponding stress (or stress and corresponding time?) just seem to be very high. As racing season is basically over I have been toying with IR settings between Maintenance and Taper to see what the XATA spits out. But the XSS expectations each day, and the resulting workout recommendations, are a little shocking to me. Iām no stranger to working hard. As of a couple months ago I was at 4 star training status. Iām truly not trying to brag (I get ego beatdowns regularly in races), I bring this up to prove that I know what it is to work at my limits, and sometimes over, for extended periods of time. Yet Iām finding what is getting generated out of the XATA every day to be hard to understand. Like right now Iām coming off 3 solid consecutive days of training right after a race Sunday that yielded an XERT breakthrough, and I know my body very much needs either a day off or a light recovery spin. But XATAās top recommendation today is āWe Got This - 90ā, which I am not afraid to admit is just far too hard for me today. The next several suggested workouts are also too much stress. I am concerned that if I followed the XATA religiously I would pretty quickly burn out. Iāll spend some more time watching/reading tutorials and picking through the forum here. But if anyone has an idea of where I am running afoul here and how I can better manage this, Iām very eager to find out how to become a better user of xert.
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Pre-base? Thatās going to give you a much less focused training suggestions. Once you get to Base, youāll likely see more targeted and less variation from the focus thatās used by XATA. Itās the reason why the Endurance focus suggested by XATA is resulting in workouts like We Got This and Iron Man. You can experiment by moving your target event date to something thatās just under 4 months away (so youād be in a proper base phase) to see how things will change.
But this does bring up a good point with how things work during pre-base and we may want to improve the advice so that youāre not offered workouts that are too challenging even if focus isnāt critical. Weāll have someone look into that.
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Thanks. I will play around with the target date some more.
Might there be a better way to understand the weekly XSS that the XATA is trying to get me to? The time goal is for me part of the confusion. The XATA seems to want me to crack out 110-140 XSS per day. The phrasing used in the dynamic text seems to suggest its starting with a weekly time goal of X (based on historical elapsed time), so X/7 is my daily time needed and then the XSS and resulting workouts appear to be some function of that X/7. If I follow it strictly it ends up being 770-980 XSS in a week which for me would be the kind of weekly stress at the very extreme end of a heavy build phase. Sorry for all the questions. I just think I must be missing some key concept(s) here in learning how to manage the recommendations of the XATA. Possible Iām just a hopeless case.
I left this reply sitting from awhile back and forgot to send it so here goes ā
I assume you have resolved the elapsed time issue by not relying on auto-pause to determine every activityās start/stop times. 
If you were swimming laps in a pool that might include short breaks in the pool as part of the workout. If you leave the pool, towel off, and hangout at the cabana for an hour then swim more laps later, thatās two workouts, not one.
If you were to run up a mountain at a ski resort in the summer, turn around and run back down, thatās one workout. Different strain efforts, but one activity nonetheless.
Next time you decide to eat lunch and hangout at the summit lodge for an hour before the downhill return. Thatās two distinct workouts.
The problem with cycling is momentum, gravity, and darn auto-pause. 
The deeper you dive into the logic of auto-pause and moving time the less sense it makes to track as a training metric. All short breaks are rests-in-between same as coasting downhill (0 watts, 0 cadence) or stopping at a red light. Any long breaks off the saddle and away from the bike are subject to stop/save and start another activity. Makes sense, no?
Perhaps one day head units will be smart enough to figure that out. Nix GPS movement as the only factor. How many minutes with no power/cadence activity constitutes auto stop and save logic? Jump back on the bike within that time frame and the recording continues as one activity. Jump on the bike beyond the limit and the initial activity is saved (without the end pause) and a new activity starts as cadence/power data is detected.
Those short breaks are legitimate RIBs. Moving time is irrelevant. What matters for training purposes is the elapsed time and strain accumulated during each activity.
I get why so many ask for moving time since theyāve grown accustomed to seeing it elsewhere, but the metric is really a false narrative. Auto-pause based strictly on GPS movement blurs the distinction between valid rest intervals/stops/breaks during activities.
Moving onā¦
As @xertedbrain mentions Pre-base (and Post-event) doesnāt follow any progression logic. XATA will generate a variety of workouts around your selected focus duration (athlete type).
See last line here: Program Phases ā Xert (baronbiosys.com)
In this scenario I suggest you consider an alternate workout depending on how you feel including selecting from the full list of twenty (Load More).
Yes, āenduranceā in Xert isnāt the same as old-school sub-LTP minutes/hours. Xertās hybrid 3 zone and high, low, peak strain model is quite different than a traditional 5/7 zone model.
Open up that workout in Workout Designer and note the Rating, Description and especially the XSS/KJ split. Itās a āmoderately difficult enduranceā workout including what I would call the gentler side of VO2 max intervals. If I was in Pre-base though and not feeling up to it, I would definitely be looking at the alternates list.
Sweet Spot, Threshold and Polarized Training ā¦ By the Numbers ā Xert (baronbiosys.com)
Focus duration and power targets for Endurance - Support - Xert Community Forum (xertonline.com)
You can kick TL down to a lower level at any time my changing IR to Off-Season. Also consider how the pacer needle in XATA works. It is a rolling 7 day average. If you suddenly decline this week and purposely let it lapse into the red, a week later the needle will reflect your new pattern/hours. TL in turn affects your stars status count and corresponding difficulty level for suggested workouts. This is most evident during a phased progression.
XATA - what does it say? - General - Xert Community Forum (xertonline.com)
Iāll assume your ā2 years of non-stop structured trainingā must have included some downtime. 
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