This discussion has been locked.

You can no longer post new replies to this discussion. If you have a question you can start a new discussion

Multiple trainings per day

It seems that the total training effect for a single day is the mean of all activities if you do multiple sessions. (Not the sum, or even maximum, which is what I would expect). Can someone please explain, confirm or contradict?
Not that I care much about Garmins diagrams for training effect and training status but this seems like an error to me.

For instance, this friday evening I recorded two runs.
The first one gave anaerobic: 0.0 and aerobic:0.6
The second one gave anaerobic: 2.0 and aerobic: 4.8
Both recordings seem reasonable but here comes the strange thing:
The total training effect in Garmin Connect -> Reports, by hoovering with the mouse over the bars I get anaerobic: 1.0 and aerobic 2.7 (The mean value of individual activities)

0 AllanOlesen67 over 6 years ago

I looked into my trainings, and it seems you are correct. Some developer at Garmin has misunderstood the Training Effect metric.

But I think the average is somehow weighted - perhaps time weighted - though this detail doesn't make it any less wrong to make an average. Today I had a lot of short sessions and one long, and the "total" for the day is closest to the training effect of the long session.

0 Makkas-CIQ over 6 years ago

In Help of Training Effect page in mobile app it is explicitly said that only the highest TE values are shown if more than one activities exist. And that is the case.
Looks like Connect Online is just wrong.

0 AllanOlesen67 over 6 years ago

Same here. The Garmin Connect Mobile app for IOS shows the maximum, not the average.

0 Former Member over 6 years ago

In Help of Training Effect page in mobile app it is explicitly said that only the highest TE values are shown if more than one activities exist. And that is the case.
Looks like Connect Online is just wrong.

I just read that this week, but couldn't remember where. I've been searching the forum until I saw your post and remembered where I saw it. So, now the question is why Connect is showing data for tombom which appears to be an average.

0 AllanOlesen67 over 6 years ago

So, now the question is why Connect is showing data for tombom which appears to be an average.

It is not just for tombom. It is also for me. Are you sure it isn't showing an average for you too?

To be clear:
In my case, Garmin Connect Mobile is showing the max. for all sessions of the day. But Garmin Connect Web is showing some kind of average for all sessions of the day.

0 Former Member over 6 years ago

You're right Allan. It's been about two weeks since I had my last multi workout day. I just looked back in my history on Connect online and I'm seeing the same also. Mobile is showing the max for the same day. It's good to know there's a difference now. I wish Garmin would stay on the same sheet of music when using Connect online vs mobile, or at least inform the user of the difference. I'm a little confused on why there's a difference in the first place. In my case I had a light weight lifting workout and a run. I'd rather see the data for each workout rather than an daily average or daily max. I'm certain my weight lifting didn't result in any anaerobic time though the average says otherwise.

0 tombom over 6 years ago

Good to know it's not just me. Actually, in Garmin Connect Android, it looks like it is the first workout of the day that is shown.

0 afarnedi over 6 years ago

IMHO the avg or the maximun training load of a multiple training doesn't make any sense...Training load it's supposed to scale the load of your sport efforts; what's the sense of measuring only the highest load? taking this talk to the limit, If I run a marathon in the morning and a half marathon in the evening how could be the training load the same of just running the morning marathon? I don't think so...at the end of the day I'd be shuttered and that's not the case; running a total of almost 63 km is not the same if I just run a marathon...

0 AllanOlesen67 over 6 years ago

afarnedi, average doesn't make sense. We all agree on that.

But you can't sum the training loads either. They are not linear and "stackable". If you imagine that you did your marathon and half marathon in one session, keeping the logging going the pause between the runs, you would probably see a training load which is only slightly higher than the one you would get from the marathon alone.

So a daily max. is as close to the truth as you can get with simple methods.

0 WillNorthYork over 6 years ago

I think training effect (not training load) is based on peak EPOC for an activity (hopefully I got that right). If that's the case, then it might make sense to take the max training effect for multiple activities in one day, since you'd be taking the max of a bunch of maxes. I mean, it's not like you ever see anywhere near double the training effect for an easy 10k run as opposed to an easy 5k run. But yeah, I agree that taking the average does not make sense, it's inconsistent and it sounds like a bug.

OTOH, I think training load should absolutely be stackable (as it's based on intensity and duration, like TRIMP), but we can't directly see the training load for an individual activity.