Yeah. And since I bet a lot of people ride longer outside while mostly doing shorter HIT rides on the trainer, so then it seems like all their trainer rides get labeled as lighter efforts based purely off of relative TSS rather than actual training efficiency and improvements.
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You can change how much of the start and end is hidden for individual rides retrospectively but only via the app and not through the website. In the app you go to the activity in question, then the three dots top right then “edit map visibility”
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Do it! Do it! Do it!
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AHHHH! It worked! (joint) QOM officially recorded! Thank you, @JohnK!
I will still try to shave a second off for a solo QOM if the conditions feel fine and I have good legs when I’m coming home after a ride, but it’s a pleasure to know the QOM is already there.
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Yep, i just unsubscribed as a premium user for this reason, finished a 6hr mtb ride (the big peak) and now starting a 12 week 100mile plan with wahoo and absolutely crushing it and it reckons im going backwards fitness wise 
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I only use Strava for the social aspect…
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RGT calculates 1.3 MPH faster than SYSTM!
Intervals.icu is the same. Do a 2hour steady ride and your fitness flies up. Do a short HiiT session on SYSTM, which most are and your apparent fitness takes a dive. I just use the free version of Strava to record my rides but that’s about it.
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So, I’m curious. What do people use to keep an eye on their fitness? I combine running with my cycling activity but I’ve had a history of over-training and then crashing hard which only takes me backward. I watch ICU and Garmin leaning toward my fitness trend on ICU to plan my workouts so that I stay at a healthy and productive training level. Am I making a mistake? Is there a better way?
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Tl:dr;
I go by feel.
So, my original post was really in jest. Just wanted to point out that Fitness apps/sites like Garmin and Strava ought to consider the lay user, i.e. the general public when using language that describes progress/plateau/decline and also consider that IF the goal is to encourage people to be active (in any form), then positive language ought to be used.
I am in no way genuinely bothered by the lack of it. Just amused.
To answer your question though, I’ve been using intervals.icu for awhile now as a general guide to monitor my fitness but even MORE importantly, I use how I feel.
That is, if I am able to go out on a route/ride that I usually do and put in longer or harder efforts, or, if while doing some SUF workouts, I find I am able to increase intensity in some or all of the metrics, I KNOW I am getting fitter (and by fitter I just mean stronger and able to suffer more/better).
At my age I have learned the importance of balance and recovery and am quite intentional in my training so as not to overtrain. I will work in off days or light days and ALWAYS feel stronger for it. If I have erred over the past few years it is in not training at all or in training so little that it takes me awhile to get back to a comfortable level of fitness where I can do my share in a group, or go on a solo grind of varying distances/terrain.
I think the overall fitness/fatigue/form thing on intervals.icu is good enough for my purposes but I do recognize the limitations of the calculations and its skew toward longer efforts over HIIT.
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Exactly. There’s no substitute.
I had to learn this from a season spent working with the personal trainer. She started every session with, " how does your body feel? " I was so accustomed to ignoring my physical condition that, for months, my answer was simply, " fine. "
I have slowly learned to pay attention to whether I feel rested, cheerful, strong, and motivated, or not. And when I feel tired, irritable, weak, and unmotivated, that is a sign not of my mental or moral weakness but of my need for rest. It is still hard to mess with the plan and not progress the way I thought I would. But I’m getting better at it.
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Thanks, that is helpful!
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You know where the flogging stations are #justsayin 
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Every. Last. One.
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I always find it less than amusing when I smash a work out and get greeted with “unproductive” on my Garmin. Choice words revolving around telling said Garmin device to have relations with itself are usually spoken.
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Same here! That irritable feeling set in just after seeing that “Unproductive” prompt on the screen.
But I learnt not to bother too much about the training status because like what Sir Glen and Dame Cristy mentioned, going by feel is much better in this sense.
As for me, if I really don’t feel like I am up a ride on that particular day, I don’t force myself to get on the bike just for the sake of keeping the calendar green but just take the day off to rest. At least for me, sometimes it’s not just the body feeling tired but the mind too…
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I dd a recovery level group ride tonight. I don’t expect to be productive. Friday, I’m climbing the local mountain. I better be productive as everything.
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Totally agree with these sentiments! Those of us who are… um… EXPERIENCED! have more basis for comparisons, and hopefully have learned to know ourselves and our bodies a little better than we did when we were… up… less used? 
So I personally still appreciate the Strava Fitness and Freshness numbers.
I TOTALLY GET the aggravation toward Strava and more so (to me) Garmin for their OVER-use of “UNPRODUCTIVE” as a “motivator.” It just ISN’T!
But I don’t look at the Strava Fitness Freshness graph as anything more than a general idea of overall fitness, and a few points up or down is just VERY SMALL potatoes.
My chart over the last year will be attached below, and it is pretty darn correct over the span.
Just because you drop a few points doesn’t mean you’ve lost significant fitness that will take eons to regain. It MAY just mean you’ve slacked a tiny bit, or been less than consistent lately compared to other times, or done fewer BIG rides (runs, or whatever), or your sleep has been terrible, or you’ve been fighting allergies or some respiratory symptoms, or…
All these things DO impact our fitness, even though they seem less important to us at the time.
My Strava Fitness “number” dropped from 101 only 2 weeks ago to 85 today. Guess what? My sleep has been pretty poor, had some long traveling days, not sleeping in my own wonderful bed a few nights, had some lazy days, some “chores come first” days, and just generally didn’t follow the smartest training regimen even when I could have been wiser about it.
So the numbers don’t lie very much, at least in my case.
I rode a 55 mile ride today, about 4K’ of climbing, pushed some hard effort descents too, and also decided to try spinning a much higher cadence than I usually do, after riding this past Friday with a college classmate from 40 years ago and his cadence was CRAZY fast. He spun my legs off.
So today, I thought I’d force the cadence throughout. It killed me. I NEVER average 89rpm on anything with long climbs (like 6 to 7 miles each) involved, but today I made it happen.
And it WIPED ME OUT. My brpm was also up, at 36, and my HR average was 145bpm. Haven’t averaged that on a ride in the last year, from what I could find.
I would have called my wife to come pick me up 12 miles from home if I’d had the heart, but it would have ruined her evening time outside, so I plodded on back when I totally felt like taking a long nap.
Strava can only guess at my fatigue, based on what I’ve done lately, which has been less distance than usual but higher intensity, and I’ve had some earlier rides in the last 7-10 days that I also felt weak, unmotivated, just tired.
(BTW, my Garmin TONIGHT said my training status is PRODUCTIVE! First time it’s changed from MAINTAINING for about a month, other than 1 day of RECOVERY.)
I AM less fit, I DO need some rest, and I WILL find some time for Zone2 miles soon… maybe! 
Bottom line is, all these things are just taking what (little) they know about your training history and feeding back some preprogrammed result based on that history.
You can take all those things into account, but only you know all the OTHER stuff that they know NOTHING about, and you can use their ideas to plug into YOUR understanding, and over time, you will learn what is and is not helpful about their perspectives.
It IS OKAY to foul up and miss the mark. That may be the only way you can learn what works best for YOU.
(edited: here’s the chart I referenced earlier.)
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