Searching around it comes out that we shold do 1 max 2 Zwift races per week.
Normaly i do more Z2 rides outdoors and in the last 2 weeks was doing some Zwift races only and my TSS per week decreased significanlty.
after each race, i feel very well however , next day, next race i can feel that the muscles are not 100% ready. However by looking at the training score, it suggests " Fresh". im aware that the calculation is an average of the last days TSS but somehow it should relates to the real feel, or not? by doing long rides in Z2 (100km) the Fitness level goes up more significantly compared to a Zwift race.
what confuses me is that the Zwift race feels much more demanding (during the race) compared to the Z2 100km. So the time variable in the equation is so strong that we can get much more from “easy” rides rather then short punchy ones?
how many races you do per week?
The TSS and “fitness” graphs are a tool, not the goal on their own. You can’t stay in “Productive” (as the ZC fitness tracker uses) forever, you will absolutely fail.
The increased intensity will give you much higher TSS/hr, and far more muscle fatigue - but you won’t be able to do as many hours, which will often end up in lower TSS / week. I’ve made a habit of doing long Z1/Z2 rides as the cool down from Zwift races when I can.
Without trendlines and RPE to track things, it’s safe to ignore the state of training, especially in Companion, which is as basic as it comes, and gives no real world meaning.
Craig pretty much hits the nail on the head here, all of these things like Fitness Fatigue Form etc. are all just tool values, and can’t necessarily be used to define from the top.
This is where things like TrainerRoad and Garmin are of superior quality in terms of training readiness. Garmin specifically in this case, because it can also take your sleep and day-long stresses into account to better state where you are likely to be / what you should do.
I don’t think TR takes in sleep data but I could be wrong; it will however begin to show when you should have an easy day however.
But you can read through forums about this stuff going back decades; you can rack up 100TSS on a race, or 100TSS doing Z2. Guess which is going to have less impact on your physical fatigue?.. Both are 100TSS!
This is why it’s common to hear people constantly recommend Z2 so much, because you can “gain fitness” (by the calculations), for very low impact.
Doing 6 hours of Z2 a day though won’t make you any better at a 30 minute race on Zwift though.
I think TrainerRoad puts it something like this:
Train for Base
Train for Intensity
Train for Specificity
Meaning:
You need a base to begin with; you can’t do a 1 hour race if you can’t even hold your Z2 for an hour (this is a bad example, but should get across that if you can’t last an hour on a bike doing any amount of pedalling, you certainly can’t do it with higher efforts).
Intensity = pulling from the top your shorter effort power; above CP/FTP. So Vo2 efforts in general, sprints once in a while but not totally required (still good to do!).
Specificity = if you know you’re going into an event with 10 minute climbs, train for high effort 10 minutes period. Not 5 minutes, not 15 minutes… 10 minutes. Train for your goal with precision, no matter what the goal actually is, focus training towards it. If it’s sprints, do more sprints, etc.
This is a topic you can read all about though, and a lot of on the Intervals and TR forums, even books.
If I’ve started to learn anything from TR recently as I’m diving back into training, it’s to take easy days easier, and harder days harder.
And a good tip for what to do with the time on rest days, it can be filled with other useful things such as yoga; not being literally a couch potato.
TLDR: yes, TSS is not exactly the most useful data point, as it doesn’t correlate to recovery or feel.
Companion’s Status is useless and can [should] be ignored.
TrainerRoad can use RPE and feel to adjust your workouts, making better use of how a workout went; high RPE and poor feel? the newer “AI” system will back you down for recovery.
Garmin uses HRV and sleep data to adjust workout intensity on the fly; have a super demanding day at work? A high intensity workout might get dropped to endurance, or even base/recovery.
As they say
“All TSS are not equal”