Indoor Cycling: How to Prevent ERG Mode From Ruining Your Workouts (#292)

OVERVIEW
ERG Mode, or ergometer mode, is a feature on smart indoor cycling trainers that allows the trainer or connected app to set the resistance you experience as a rider. For interval workouts, for instance, ERG Mode will adjust the resistance so you stay at a constant target power output (e.g., 250 watts for 10 minutes). The downside to ERG Mode is that it can hinder your ability to conjure the internal motivation to achieve that power target, and if you can't maintain your cadence during an interval, you can end up in the "death spiral". In Episode 292 of "The Time-Crunched Cyclist Podcast", Coach Adam Pulford provides insights on when to use or not use ERG Mode, how to set up TrainingPeaks Virtual to avoid the death spiral, and other tips for maximizing the effectiveness of ERG Mode. 

TOPICS COVERED

• Pros and Cons of ERG Mode
• Innovations in ERG Mode functions
• Why you would want to use ERG Mode
• Sample data file from ERG Mode workout

RESOURCES

• CTS Article on ERG Mode
• IndieVelo to TPVirtual: 
  • Inside TrainingPeaks Virtual: Redefining Indoor Cycling and Training
  • TrainingPeaks acquires virtual cycling platform indieVelo, aims to add ‘credible racing and realistic riding’ to its training offerings
• Other ERG Mode Resources:
  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85d5wF6DNkc
  • https://www.highnorth.co.uk/articles/indoor-ftp-vs-outdoor-ftp

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HOST
Adam Pulford has been a CTS Coach for nearly two decades and holds a B.S. in Exercise Physiology. He's participated in and coached hundreds of athletes for endurance events all around the world.

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Transcript

The Erg Mode Problem Explained

TrainingPeaks Virtual Enters The Chat

Pros And Cons Of Erg Mode

The Spiral Of Doom Case Study

Why Non‑Erg Can Save Hard Intervals

TP Virtual Setup And Settings

Auto‑Release Erg Mode Best Practices

When To Use Erg Across Platforms

Key Takeaways And Closing

SPEAKER_00 0:06

From the team at CTS, this is the Time Crunch Cyclist Podcast, our show dedicated to answering your training questions and providing actionable advice to help you improve your performance, even if you're strapped for time. I'm your host, Coach Adam Pulford, and I'm one of the over 50 professional coaches who make up the team at CTS. In each episode, I draw on our team's collective knowledge, other coaches, and experts in the field to provide you with the practical ways to get the most out of your training and ultimately become the best cyclist that you can be. Now, on to our show. If you follow me on the gram, you've seen me throwing some shade at using erg mode for hard workouts on indoor training lately. I even posted a great article from my colleague Jim Rutberg, who talks about the pros and cons of erg mode and all the details about it. If if you want, you can find that link in our show notes, but the too long didn't read version of that is historically using erg mode at zone four and above usually makes the workout feel harder than it should be. And if you get bogged down in the cadence, it's hard to get back on top of the gearing and finish the workout. So you either slog through the interval at like 55 RPMs or you get caught in the spiral of doom and hope that it doesn't happen on the next interval. Either way, I've been a big fan of my athletes not using erg mode on hard interval days for better success and completion of the workout when they are training indoors. However, my good friends at Training Peaks reached out to me recently and suggested I quote try TP virtual again as we've made and updated our erg mode functionality better. So, as with any new update on techie things, I was game for that. What I found changed my opinion on the whole erg mode versus non-erg mode debate. And I'll admit I softened my stance. And now I would promote using erg mode so long as you check all the proper boxes ahead of time. So here's a few qualifiers before we get into the meat and potatoes of the show. First of all, I'm not an indoor expert. In fact, I don't ride inside very often, and I will admit that sometimes I'm a little slower to adopt on some of the latest tech on indoor training. I'm also terrible at indoor racing compared to my outdoor racing experiences. Uh, I don't really enjoy indoor riding, but I can't deny the benefits of it, especially when you live in a cold, icy environment or or you just can't get out during the time of day where you want in the light. So indoor training is a fantastic tool. Finally, there are problems with all indoor training platforms out there, but TP Virtual seems to be hitting the mark with improvements on making the indoor training experience more real or at least more tolerable to be inside. So let's take a look at some of these updates and what has led to the latest version of what I'm going to call Coach AP's erg mode best practices. Let's get into it. But first, just uh for those of you who may not know what TP Virtual is, if you haven't heard of it or haven't tried it, it's a new, relatively new, virtual riding platform created by Dr. George Gilbert. And it was known as Indivello. Training Peaks acquired Indivello and worked with Dr. Gilbert to make it into what it is today, TP Virtual. Dirk Freel, the chief evangelist over at Training Peaks, as well as a very good friend, encouraged me to ride the first beta version of TP Virtual back in 2024, claiming that the physics and the ride feel are way better. And I have to admit, they were, and they are compared to other platforms out there. I also enjoy that the workouts automatically sync from training peaks into TP virtual for my athletes. So as long as there's a workout there and coach did a good job of building the workout ahead of time. Okay. And that will automatically populate into TP virtual and speed up the whole process as well as like eliminate barriers to getting you to just get your training done. Additionally, all the training zones carry over perfectly. So there's no need to have to go into settings and reset training zones and make sure the percentage of FTP, power, or heart rate numbers are accurate. It's already taken care of for you underneath one umbrella. So you should know if you are a training peaks premium subscriber, you get TP virtual for free. So check it out. But even in early to mid 2025, as far as I know, erg mode could still bog you down if you are struggling on a workout. And many of my athletes who are on other platforms like Swift, Roe v, Trainer Road, or even the Wahoo System uh guided workouts were still having problems with erg mode. So that's why historically I've always been like, eh, let's skip the erg mode. Let's just go for it. So let's review the pros and cons of erg mode. Like, why would people want to use this in the first place? And then maybe just a few specifics on be careful of how you're using it. First of all, the benefits, it guides you through the workout in a very simple manner. Okay, so it lays the workout for you. You don't have to remember the title of the workout. And if it's a very complicated workout, it's right there and just guides you along. It has a countdown to the next interval, provides specific resistance to the workout on that interval. You have to think less, and it's very simple. So I do like it from that standpoint. And uh I think all of my athletes enjoy those aspects around it. Now, the cons of erg mode, like I said, traditionally it increases the rate of perceived effort for workouts and intervals because you're it's providing a resistant force for you to overcome versus producing your own force or power where the physics of the real world, like momentum, is in your favor. Now, if you don't stay on top of the gearing or the power, it becomes too hard and either completely changes the workout with too much intensity or you quit because it's just way too hard. I've had athletes have those experiences. Okay. So we'll look at a real world example of that here in just a minute. So let's take a real world example of what that could look like when an athlete is struggling and maybe didn't quit completely, but they definitely experienced the spiral of doom. All right, now you should see a real world example here of one of my athletes who had this workout. A threshold with surges, we did three by nine, and we threw in a finishing sprint here at the end. A few things that should point out to you is the first interval, it goes pretty smooth. Well, before we even get into that, first and foremost, you can see that power represented in this pink line is what the athlete actually did do. Red is the heart rate, the red squiggly line here. Okay, so we're just looking at power production in pink and heart rate in red. Additionally, in the background here, you can see what I prescribed in the way of power, with uh dark blue being the low end of the prescribed power and light blue being the upper end of the prescribed power. There's a warm-up, continued warm-up with endurance miles, a couple openers, and then some recovery period, and then we get into the main set of the interval, which is here in the title, okay, and then that finishing sprint at the end before a proper cooldown. So that's what the workout in structure is. You can see that when the pink line is solid like this, that that's a clear indicator of erg mode being used. So that's how I know, okay. The first interval, it goes well, right? But the R rate goes up pretty darn quickly. All good. That's what we want out of an interval. Second interval, he starts in at the same, but you can see here he gets bogged down in the middle. This is known as the spiral of doom. You just can't get back on top of it. And then erg mode on Zwift, as of this recording, erg mode does auto-disable so that you can get the power back up and running, but you can see that he wasn't able to achieve even the low end of the power, and the cadence was still very low. I don't have cadence described or prescribed here or displayed here, I should say. Uh, but you can still see he carried through and onward to the third interval. Now, this athlete is tough, uh type A driven person, right? So I'm gonna complete this. And he does, right? But it's at the low end of everything. Therefore, the third interval, he was on the struggle bus. Okay. Now, what my feedback to the athlete was if we take it off erg mode, you'll hit this first workout, you'll crush it, right? And if you're feeling good, you could hug the upper end of the range versus just mid or low end. And then what could happen is second and third interval, you complete it to a T, mid to upper end, and we get more work accomplished. We get more pedal strokes, we get more time in zone where it should be. We get more kilojoules achieved, and it's a better workout with either the same or even slightly lower cardiovascular response, and that's a good thing. Okay, you feel good because you complete the workout and you're ready for next day, as opposed to beating your head against a wall just to get it done. Now, the athlete will still get good benefit from this workout, especially cardiovascular benefit, because it is harder than it should. All right, but there's a better way to do it. So let's talk about training Peaks Virtual and what I think should be the kind of the gold standard for uh erg mode and best practices around it. Here I'm just gonna there's so much that you could talk about uh in the way of how to use this. I think for anybody curious, just know that if again, if you have uh a premium subscription to training peaks, this is here for you to use for free, or it's included within that membership itself. Okay, you just need to work uh with it, connect all your uh uh technology with it, and you'll start to see a home screen that looks like this. Okay, so I'm just gonna focus on the erg mode best practices in particular. So here I'm on the home screen. In order to get into the erg mode um or into the trainer settings, you go up here and you click settings. Okay, so I I highlighted this for you. So those who are just listening to me, uh, go over to YouTube in particular, and you'll see the visual of how to do this and how to get this thing set up. Okay. So you go to settings, you go to trainer settings, and you get into uh all the trainer settings that uh options that are available to you. Now there's a bunch of stuff I haven't played around in here yet, but you remember what Dirk told me originally, the physics are better, it has a better uh ride feel, and it's customizable. So the slope feel, the brake feel, the wind feel of everything that's going on within these virtual environments. You can customize this to what you want it to feel like. For me, the stock here, right down the middle, feels pretty good, feels pretty solid. I didn't have to do anything for that. Now, in particular, the workout resistance mode, you can put this in a few different options. Erg mode that matches the workout, that is traditionally erg mode. You can also have fixed matches a flat road. This would also be like level mode in uh the Wahoo system or free ride in Zwift, things like this, where it's just a flat road, you can produce your own power and uh make your own power like that, and it feels a lot like the road feel outside. Additionally, you can put it in terrain mode, which matches a real world. So if you hit a uh if you hit a hill, it will have more resistance. If you hit a downhill, it will have less resistance. Finally, there's external where you can control it with another app. So if you have a hammerhead or a Wahoo or a Garmin that's guiding your workout and you just want to ride on this virtual platform, that's what that means. In particular, let's focus on erg mode. That's what we're talking about here today. Put it in erg mode that matches the workout, that's really what we're talking about. Now, fixed, you can do workouts there too. It just doesn't guide you through it uh like erg mode does. Okay. So assuming we do that, the next step is to make sure that the auto release erg mode box is checked. Okay. Now in TP virtual, this is how it looks. In other platforms, it doesn't exist like this, as far as I know. Okay. In Zwift, this is not an option. So make sure that this box is checked for the auto release erg mode. You go back into your home settings, you click on whatever workout that you have for the day if that's what you want to do, and you're into the workout itself. Now I took a screenshot of one of my workouts as I was just going. So this is just a snapshot in the moment of time. And what you'll see here over on the left side is the main set of the workout as I was accomplishing it. Um, could have done a video to kind of like guide you through it. Maybe I will do that at some point, but overall, this is what you're looking at. And in general, what I found is if I were to slow my cadence, it would kind of slow down with me. If I wanted to push a little bit more power, it would allow me to do that. A couple things that go on with that is I had to, first of all, I had to shift a little bit, and I could ride a little bit above and a little bit below without getting bogged down. That's exactly how you do it outside. In traditional erg mode settings, the problems I find is that the athlete doesn't shift and they just have to stay like right at the prescribed plus or minus five, 10 watts, maybe. And if they don't, you get spun out or you get bogged down. That's just not the way it rolls in the real world and even the way your physiology works. On any given day, we could feel really good, hug the upper end, maybe do a little bit more because there's the my coaching style and philosophy is if, and I communicate this ahead uh to the athlete, is don't waste a good day if you got good legs. Let's roll. Okay. And in particular, if you're testing, if you're doing a 20-minute test and you and you put in the prescribed power and you really just want to crush it, traditional erg mode is gonna hold you back because you it's gonna keep you within a certain tight zone versus allow you to produce your own power. Okay. Additionally, if you had a bad night's sleep, you're just mentally you're clouded up and you're just struggling kind of hit the low end, but you can still do it and heart rates within zone. It's like, okay, I don't need anything else going against me in my life right now. So the auto-disable of erg mode kicks in a little sooner, okay, on TP virtual than other platforms to allow the rider to pedal as they wish based on their real feel of the day. Okay. So it just in simple, it works way better on TP virtual. That is my main point, and that is why I'm sharing this information with you. Now, I I will admit, when things change, you need to change with them. So, my view and my advice on Urb mode uh has evolved and has changed. However, it use it if you're using TP virtual, use it if you're on other platforms and maybe doing zone four and below, because zone four and above, you'll you'll get bogged down on other platforms. Okay, so keep all of that in mind. And I guess in summary, you know, I have been a hater of erg mode for for some time, but some of the latest advancements here on virtual platforms have improved it. Like the auto release option here on TP virtual that I just showed you, level mode on the Wahoo system, which isn't the same same, but better than full erg mode. And then on Zwift, like I talked about, the auto disable only happens free rides, crew prize races. And if you stop pedaling for several seconds and uh you can spin back up, but it's still not as good as what I just showed you on TP Virtual. Using these tools on intervals at zone four and above in particular can help enhance your indoor training experience by allowing you to hit more time in zone at the power prescribed, getting the workout achieved versus just doing a hard effort higher than needed and getting that cardiovascular response. So, in the end, if you get your workout done, you feel great about it versus being blown out, and you're ready the next day as well as motivated for the next session, that's a good training experience. So that's it. That's our show for today. Hope you liked it. If you want more or you want to take it to the next level, you know where to find us. Trainwrite.com. Thanks for joining us on the Time Crunch Cyclist podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show. If you want even more actionable training advice, head over to trainwright.com backslash newsletter and subscribe to our free weekly publication. Each week you'll get in depth training content that goes beyond what we cover here on the podcast that'll help you take your training to the next level. That's all for now. Until next time, train hard, train smart, train right.