WKO vs TP vs Other Solutions?

jkorossy

I could not find the answer easily, i am sure it's out there but ...

What's the diff. between TP (free, paid version), WKO, etc? and what technology options do i have to track/train using power?

Do i need to buy anything? or could I calculate avg power and all the other stats manually?

I have a wireless Powertap/LYC + Timex Global Trainer.  Unless I am going to calculate manually -- I Would prefer a cloud/internet based solution over one installed on a PC.

Any suggestions?  Or links to other Forum/Wiki postings would be appreciated...

tia

Kevin Walter

The paid version of training peaks and WKO are now pretty close in terms of functionality. Both will let you calculate NP, TSS, IF, etc. You do need the paid version of TP to use power metrics. WKO works off a computer while TP is on the net. FWIW I use a paid TP account to track everything. Others here are big fans of Golden Cheetah or other power programs. Others stick with WKO as their tried and true solution. In the end, its all what you prefer and there is no official right answer. I think Rich stresses that the key is to do the work first and then who cares how you track it. I think he just uses an Excel spreadsheet or something similar.

Dino Sarti

The biggest difference I see between WKO an TP is that WKO allows you to slice and dice the workout to make ranges. You can basically select areas of the ride and slice them together like you are editing a movie. You can even splice together sections from rides done on different days. I like the slice and dice because you can highlight areas of work and then run the metrics on those new route sections. Very help when dissecting various testing protocols.

Al Truscott

I basically use WKO. I don't trust the cloud. Companies may seem stable, but have you ever heard of Polaroid or Eastman Kodak - tech firms bite the dust all the time. When I started doing tri training in 1999, I used an online service for my training diary. It disappeared in 2001, and now my early years of training times and distance are just a cloudy memory. I don't even trust Google or Apple with my data; in the end they have their interests at heart, not mine.

If you don't care whether or not you can retain your data over time, then a web-based system is OK. But if you are obsessive about storage and retaining information, then use what you can control, is what I believe.

Kevin Walter

@Dino, you can do the slice and dice online with TP too.

@Al, I hear you (especially the part about Kodak since I'm here in Rochester). I wish they would upgrade WKO to offer the rest of the functionality of TP then I would definitely go standalone. As it is, I do retain all the original data files (Garmin, PowerTap, SRM) that form the basis of my TP account so I shouldn't be completely out of luck.

Coach Rich

TP is a monthly subscription vs WKO which is one purchase, done.

Coach Rich

That said, I don't know what features TP.com has, other than the ability to pay them a monthly to track a ton of stuff that just doesn't matter.

Shaughn Simmons

I am strictly a WK0+ guy because I need to be able to clearly analyse the hard data whereas, comparably speaking TP looks to have more of a bells and whistles, cool graphs approach for which I get to spend a monthly fee for.......

MattAaronson

Starting this season I have stopped using WKO in favor of the paid version of TrainingPeaks. All the key power metrics are now in TP, so aside from some of the finer binning options, etc, I can get everying via TP. It appears as though support for WKO is waning and I expect it to be obsolete over time. As to TP being cloud based, that is one of the issues. I keep all of my workout files in TCX and/or FIT formats on my hard drive (backed-up for course). I can always upload them to SportTracks if TP folds!

Also I use TP for a ton of other functions beyond power analysis, so that is another reason I was eager to consolidate away from WKO.

Shaughn Simmons

I have been using WK0+ to manage my overall TSS, TSB, etc including my swims and runs as well to see the whole picture.......

William Jenks

WKO requires a windows platform. TP doesn't. If you're on Windows already, it's not clear that there's any advantage for an EN athlete to use TP instead unless you prefer the cloud inherently. If you're a Mac doode, then TP is a legit alternative.

kurshing

Am I crazy for not really tracking much? I upload my runs and bikes to Garmin, look at them for a minute or two, hoping for an ooooo or aaahhhh when I see my average pace/power, and then I move on.

I put in my swims manually and really only eyeball my total training time each week.

Am I alone in this?

jkorossy

thanks to everyone for the replies.  i'm experimenting w golden cheetah. seems pretty good so far.  i did a bike test outdoors yesterday so i have some baseline #'s to work with.

one question - is 'normalized power' the same as average power?  I'm sure i have my college statistics book in the basement and could look up the definition ... but thought this would be more fun to ask here.

thanks

Al Truscott

Normalized Power is not the same as Avg power. From Andrew Coggin's explanation on TrainingPeaks.com:

"This algorithm [Normalized Power] is somewhat complicated, but importantly it incorporates two key pieces of information: 1) the physiological responses to rapid changes in exercise intensity are not instantaneous, but follow a predictable time course, and 2) many critical physiological responses (e.g., glycogen utilization, lactate production, stress hormone levels) are curvilinearly, rather than linearly, related to exercise intensity, By taking these factors into account, normalized power provides a better measure of the true physiological demands of a given training session - in essence, it is an estimate of the power that you could have maintained for the same physiological "cost" if your power output had been perfectly constant (e.g., as on a stationary cycle ergometer), rather than variable. Keeping track of normalized power is therefore a more accurate way of quantifying the actual intensity of training sessions, or even races." 

In other words, Normalized Power is a calculated number which purports to take into account the variation in power output which nomally occurs during a bike ride. If one is putting out power at a steady rate on a trainer for a specific period of time (like an FTP interval), NP should be just about equal to avg power. On an outdoor ride with lots of turns, hills, stops, etc, the two will be different.

jkorossy

That makes a lot of sense Al, thanks.  I noticed on my outdoor bike test yesterday that i had several points where I needed to turn, slow for cars, etc., which I'm sure impacted my power at those distinct points in time.  Had i been on a trainer, assuming i had enough gas in the tank, my power would have been higher for those time slices. 

i guess if i keep the course consistent for testing - i can accept the lower power readings on those course sections, as long as i see FTP improvements over time (ie, all other things being 'relative').

Golden Cheetah calculates a a 'critical power' which i am using for now as my FTP value.  this may be off a bit, but closer to what i had before training w/power.

if the cheetah CP is not as accurate a calculation as the normalized power from WKO (or TP) maybe i will switch tools.  I'm still getting a feeling for the power training and testing tools, processes, and methodologies.

 

tuckerm

Posted By Stephen Anderson on 31 Jan 2012 05:58 PM

Am I crazy for not really tracking much? I upload my runs and bikes to Garmin, look at them for a minute or two, hoping for an ooooo or aaahhhh when I see my average pace/power, and then I move on.



I put in my swims manually and really only eyeball my total training time each week.



Am I alone in this?

No you are not alone. Especially during the OS, I may go months without downloading to WKO. I see my lap averages on my Garmin so really no need to see a pretty graph. Plus with my Edge 500 getting power metrics in about a week I really won't need to be anal about downloading. It doesn't help that the PC I keep everything on is slow as all hell too. 

Not to say there is no value in looking at it. I'm sure I will be more diligent about it come time to ride outside. 

William Jenks

@ John

Re Golden Cheetah:

"xPower" is the NP equivalent. They are the same calculation, except that they do the moving average differently. As a result, xPower is almost always a little lower than NP (just a few W in most cases).

The "Critical Power" that Golden Cheetah calculates is a fundamentally different thing than FTP. It's based on a fit of your performance data on the critical power chart, as you know. However, there IS a very strong correspondence that has been noted by multiple authors (including the guys from WKO) between CP and FTP. In my experience, the CP is a handful of W slower than my FTP, as measured by an EN 42 minute test (like 5 W or so). So it's a great guide in between tests. (I won't go into the theory of the CP, but it's based on that idea of how high you can hold a power depends on the length of time and that there is a predictable fall off.)

However, there is one caveat that is an artifact of the way the fitting is done. If you have a good data set that gives you a good/accurate CP, you can "mess it up" with a good workout, which is counterintuitive. For example, my CP was sitting at 261 from this off-season, and I did some very good 3-5 minute work, raising that part of the curve. Because it's out-season, I don't have any good 90-minute (the "right" side) power data, so that make the apparent falloff of my power look "worse" to the fit....and my CP went from 261 to 245 in one day because I had a best-ever workout! OK, so this obviously is meaningless... But if you rely on CP, you do need to fill in the "right side" of the fitting zone a bit.

The good news on GC is that version 3 is on its way, and it will have NP (etc). I don't know that NP is any more valid than xPower, but since we all speak in NP, it's nice to have.

rkling

I am too cheap to pay monthly for TP, so I just use the free TP as a training log. I use WKO for logging in my run and bike information. I know you can use WKO as a log, but it is not as easy to look at in my opinion. But the functionality of WKO is better. And, way back when I first got my PM, I was advised to use WKO to look at my data, rather than the software that came with my PM, so it has been WKO ever since.

I'm kind of a numbers geek, so I like to look at the data. When I'm actually doing the training, though, I try not to be fixated on the measuring devices or the numbers, but glance at them occasionally. What I try to do is equate RPE with the raw numbers. So, I've found that, right now, FTP for me is when I'm pedaling in 53 x 16 at 88-90 RPM, VO2 intervals are done at 53 x 14 (on the trainer). So, if I want to push to higher numbers, I know that I need to change my gearing (or the cadence). If I finish a workout and my RPE is different from the data, then something is amiss.

For those who have used Golden Cheetah and WKO, do you have a pro/con list for the platforms? I used Sport Tracks for a little while, but I didn't like it as much as WKO/TP.

Robert Sabo

Anyone know how to copy the data from one WKO or TP workout to another day? My Computrainer data was lost on attempted saving. Tuesday and Thursday workouts werre the same and I'd like to have the TSS etc.

Al Truscott

@ Robert: I think this will work. Import into WKO  the file you want to "copy". It will probably then appear in your calendar on the day you did the workout, and thus you may see two workouts on the same day looking the same. Open one of them in WKO. Choose the Journal view. In the upper left corner are "Workout Settings". You can modify the date there. Then Save or Save as via the File menu.

kkiefer

@William, thanks for the lead to GC V3.0,



I use SportsTracks to collect and log my all my work-outs. I played with the trails of TP/WKO but they did convince me either.

ST is much broader here, but there non of the plugins can analyze bike power like WKO,

GC V3 closes that gap for me - just downloaded the last developer GC 3.0 version for Mac and I can now analyze files from my Tacx Bushido on the Bike FTP Tests i did,

very cool and simple to get now NP/IF/TSS and VI and stuff for each interval. Very Cool and for free, let's see how stable the dev version is

William Jenks

Gooe to hear it's made progress. (GC 3) Last time I downloaded it, it was obvious where they were going but it wasn't really usable yet. :-)