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Daily suggested workout- Poor algorithm?

I own a FR 945 and an Edge 830. Overall I like both products and believe they enhance my cycling and overall fitness experience. I'm a cyclist, not a runner. Ive been wearing the 945 24/7 for several months.

Im a 52 yr old male in pretty good shape having been a keen cyclist for the last several years. I workout on the turbo trainer using Zwift on average 3-4 times a week. Recently, having retired from full time work I signed up for the 'Active off season' training plan on Zwift but sacked it off during the second week due to the boredom of 3 hr workouts on the bike, my Vo2 max dropping from 49 to 46 and a suspicion that this was due to over training. I thought I'd take advantage of the 'daily suggested workout' feature of my 945, thinking the watch is aware of all my workouts, my health and performance stats...it must know what I need.

My GC training status was telling me that I was currently unproductive and it recommended an anaerobic activity so I decided to do it today. The watch recommended this:

As you can see, a 57 min workout with a few sprints thrown in but crucially note the estimated Anaerobic gain of 2.5

I found the workout really easy and was disappointed to note that it didn't give me the anaerobic gain estimated- it gave me a gain of 1.0- AND the primary ride benefit was Base! See next pic.

Am I missing something here then? Im lacking in anaerobic activity, the watch recommends an anaerobic workout, I follow the watches suggestion but the end result is that the main benefit achieved is BASE not anaerobic! Yes I appreciate the gain of 2.5 was estimated but its out by quite a bit. Clearly the workout suggested by the watch wasn't taxing enough leading me to believe that the algorithm used isn't fit for purpose?

Thoughts?

Thanks, Pete

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0 Dan.Boilermaker over 3 years ago

I have recently started following the Daily Suggested Workouts (running) coming off of three Garmin Coach guided training plans. I have similar types of sprint workouts that are meant to increase the anaerobic load. I've found that the sprint distance isn't long enough to get my heart rate high enough to "score" any anaerobic points. I haven't run the workouts long enough to know if the suggestions will adjust to my fitness. If they don't, then I'll just need to sprint longer than the suggested period to increase my heart rate. I assume that you would need to do the same during a bike sprint.

0 Pete1336 over 3 years ago in reply to Dan.Boilermaker

Thanks for your reply. Yes, I agree and have already adjusted the workout..making the sprint sections slightly longer, the rest periods slightly shorter and also increasing the watts during the rest period so HR stays a little higher.

Still..having said that I remain to be convinced that the algorithm is not poor.

0 Dan.Boilermaker over 3 years ago in reply to Pete1336

I think it would be great if the workout to automatically adjust during the workout to meet the intended objectives. The watch already knows the heart rate targets needed meet the goal. Maybe too much to ask.

I'll give it a chance for a couple weeks.

0 DPSK over 3 years ago

Yeah I created another thread on how poor the AI is for daily suggested workout for my running.

Despite countless of activities, Garmin did not truly understand my fitness.

It recommended me a base run at 5:20 min/km which in actual fact is not a pace for my base.

0 Christian999999 over 3 years ago

I am a 52 year old runner and I have the same problem. The suggested workout shows an unrealistic high anaerobic estimated TE. If I follow the workout my anaerobis TE usually is 0. Even if I run the intervalls faster and longer it is way below the estimated value. For me the suggested workout is more or less useless. I'm in the Garmin ecosystem for several years (Fenix 3HR, Forerunn 945, Edge 530), so they should know enough about me.

0 DPSK over 3 years ago

Pete just wondering if you set your max HR correctly.

Also, are you using a chest strap?

0 Pete1336 over 3 years ago in reply to DPSK

Yes, I always wear a chest HR monitor and I believe my max HR is between 181 and 184. The latter is something I've long kept a close eye on.

0 DPSK over 3 years ago in reply to Pete1336

I hope you input a max HR based on past max effort runs or you followed some recommended test to obtain max HR.

If the max HR is too high, you won't be getting enough anaerobic load.

0 Pete1336 over 3 years ago in reply to DPSK

I think I have..I'd recently altered it to 180 and this morning, when doing a hard Anaerobic zwift workout which I went to failure on, I noted my HR said 181..so I've changed it to that now. I think within the last 12 months when going up a monster hill on an outdoors ride i saw it at 184 but I cant really recall it being higher than that.

0 DPSK over 3 years ago

I notice the Suggested Workout was based on power. Sorry I don't train with power so I am not really familiar. Was the recommended power for cycling or running? So did you cycle or run hitting the recommended power?

If you hit the recommended power during your sprint and Garmin doesn't assign you the anaerobic load, then the AI of Suggested Workout is rubbish.

This was what happened for my recommended base run. ie Garmin recommended me to run at 5:20 min/km. In real life, this pace is too fast for my HR zone 2. I tried the run once. I ended up 90% of my run in zone 3 and 4.

By the way, I attach a link below in case you are interested to learn about the training load.