I'm 6 weeks into a Cycling Coach plan, and I'm beyond frustrated.
The goal of my fitness plan was to raise FTP and improve Endurance. Should be simple. 3 to 4 base rides per week. 1 Threshold or VO2 ride per week. Rest days to recover.
To date, ALL of my scheduled workouts have been either Base or 10s sprint intervals. I have not been served a single Threshold or VO2 workout by the "Coach" in 6 weeks.
To add even more confusion, the Garmin Connect app on my phone, or on my computer, will tease me by scheduling a Threshold workout for the day. But for some inexplicable reason, as soon as I turn on my Garmin Edge computer to actually ride, the Threshold workout I was preparing for is gone. Replaced in my calendar by either a 10s sprint interval at too low a power output to make me work, or a Base / Endurance ride that is twice the time commitment of the Threshold workout I had scheduled for.
Why my Garmin Edge syncing zero (NONE) new information with Garmin Connect would completely change the calculus on my workout schedule, I can't begin to imagine. But this has happened 7 or 8 times in the last 6 weeks.
When I do conduct a ride which is at Threshold / VO2 efforts, Garmin Connect doesn't bother to adjust my training plan to account for the training stress. It doggedly continues to offer up rides that push me well into the "Overtraining" zone, leaving me with Jello legs while it recommends 2 hour endurance rides.
If I fail to complete a ride, because I'm excessively fatigued, Garmin Connect doesn't adjust my plan to include "rest". It assigns me a sprint session.
If I log a weight-training session in the Garmin Connect app, the Cycling Coach changes nothing about my plan. If I just do a ride, instead of following a proscribed session, Garmin Coach logs it as a Rest Day, and assigns me more training. My upcoming calendar has 10 days of riding. Zero rest days on the horizon. It's currently 8 days since my last scheduled rest.
I can't figure out if Garmin Cycling Coach is genuinely incapable of evaluating the data that it is receiving from my profile, or if it is actively trying to kill me. How can Garmin be so incapable compared to all of the other coaching apps out there?