Has Garmin completely lost the plot? - FTP and Training Status are nonsense on 23.00

My watch seems to be very confused. First a little background....

This year (2022) I wanted to focus on running instead of cycling. I was running almost exclusively indoors, so no VO2max data from Garmin. Unfortunately I developed some back problems and had to quit the running and return to cycling for my fitness. I only logged two "proper" outdoor runs this year, the last being in February. I resumed cycling in May and have been gradually restoring my lost fitness on the bike. Cycling VO2max had been rising steadily for the last several weeks.

Training Status has been consistently productive until training was interrupted by a short holiday at the end of August, then it switched to peaking or recovering.

That's fine, except now I appear to be stuck in "Recovery", regardless of what I do on the bike. My training status says it's based on my running VO2max trend.

Why? I haven't run since February, yet I cycle almost every day. Checking VO2max values in my fit files they are continuing to rise and my training load is increasing. So why is my status "Recovery" and not "Productive"? At a guess it's because Garmin is looking at my irrelevant running history instead of my more pertinent cycling performance.

Today I rode in a TT on Zwift with power meter and chest strap. I warmed up with a nice power ramp and held steady power throughout the TT. It was my best 20 minute and 30 minute power this year.

At the start of the ride my FTP was set to my Garmin FTP value of 232W in both the watch and in Zwift. Here's how the TT looked in Zwift (warm-up is not shown)....

    

Due to Garmin's low assessment of my FTP it was Z5 power from beginning to end and my 20 minute power was 262W.

Zwift gave me an FTP bump to 249W.

intervals.icu gave me an FTP bump to 254W.

Strava has estimated my FTP at 252W.

What did Garmin do? Absolutely nothing. Garmin FTP remains at 232W.

Furthermore, despite smashing the VO2 power zone and Threshold heart rate zone....

The watch thinks it was a Recovery ride. Are they insane?

And apparently I don't have any fitness....

And despite my VO2max being updated by this ride....

I don't have a VO2max trend. Well that's not true.

 .  

But they appear to be looking at my non existent running stats instead of my up to date cycling stats.

It's a complete shambles. WTF are they looking at running instead of cycling? Please don't tell me it's because of a Walk I recorded at the end of August. How stupid would that be?!?!

And what's up with the FTP stuff? I know they look at HRV behaviour, but are they blind? I had a lovely warm-up ramp and reached threshold heart rate shortly before the end of the effort (that ought to be a hint that my FTP is higher than 232W), but DFA-Alpha1 never got anywhere near 0.75, never mind 0.5, if that's the metric they use.

So, have they lost the plot entirely, or have I, because something sure as hell isn't right?

  • I use an edge 830 and a fenix. 
    training status just doesn’t work reliably when using both devices and recording a mix of activities. Like a lot of the Garmin ecosystem, it’s just a confused mess - most likely caused by their basing everything around devices rather than bodies, with each device processing differently metrics differently and rounding differently. 
    my status just disappears for weeks / months at a time and only comes back (sometimes) if I remove a device from my profile. 

    honestly I’ve pretty much given up on Garmin. Hardware ok. Usability average. Ecosystem poor - full of stuff you don’t need or half-baked ideas and zero configurability. 

    Thank goodness have found intervals.icu. Just a much cleverer and more reliable way to evaluate data and fitness. Looks complex but at least doesn’t try to simplify everything so much that nothing works or is even that useful. Sure we all like simple petty graphs but if they’re not useful/accurate what’s the point. 

    and rest assured when something goes wrong with your hardware you’ll get next to zero support. Same for anything broken in the ecosystem. No, correction, for that you will get EXACTLY ZERO support!