What does the Focus mean beside Focus Type? Is this how long my workout needs to be?

Focus Type in the Adaptive Training Advisor provides guidance on what the Focus needs to be for the workout at this point in your training program.  It also factors in whether you are Tired or Very Tired.  The guidance is not meant to provide a workout structure but provide some simple guidelines you can apply when just riding and using the apps that show Focus and XSS. Training with Xert doesn’t need to be so precise since we’re capturing all your strain, even with semi-random power data. It is the reason why our workouts are not so repetitious and provide more interest. Following simple and rigid workouts is becoming a thing of the past.

The Athlete Type category is shown first.  In the above example, it is Endurance and this the general category for the workout/activity that is being suggested.

Focus is shown next. This is shown as a time value and represents the Focus Duration.  In the above example, it shows 24:06.  When using Xert Mobile, or the Focus and Strain Garmin CIQ app or if you have the Remote Player on screen during your workout, you’ll be able to see what this value is for your entire workout.  As your training nears your Target Event Date, the value will come closer and closer to that of your Target Athlete Type.

Note that his value does not represent the duration of the workout or intervals.  It represents that longest duration you would be able to sustain for the Interval Targets shown.  It should be used with our apps or in creating/choosing an Xert workout. 

The last value shown in your Interval Targets.  This value provides a rough estimate of the power target you should be looking to maintain during intervals, if you are planning on just riding and not following a workout.  The more time you spend at this intensity, the more you are training at the correct focus. Combining efforts above and below this intensity is also effective.

When performing unstructured workouts where you are looking to maintain your Focus, doing any intensity is likely going to put your Focus much lower. It’s quite strict. Note that if you are using the Garmin Focus field and the colour is black or yellow, it means that the Specificity Rating is polar which is mostly entirely low intensity work. To get the ideal high intensity focus you should be seeing blue or even green on the Focus field. To get that, you’ll need to be much more strict about hitting the focus power (or slightly higher), and only that power, i.e. high resting intensity intervals will increase the focus duration value.