Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!

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2009-06-24 4:14 PM

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Subject: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!

I made a training sheet to help me see if my easy weeks were actually easy.  I'm trying to build at a pace and not overtrain.  I know BT has a log, but I dont have internet at house, only at school, so its easier for me to do it in excel.

The sheet works by giving each workout a score as you can see the green table at top.  I made this to be changable because I assume others may want to vary.  The distance is divided by the number in the green table then multiplied by PER (Percieved Effort Rating).  I have it set to where a "normal" swim, bike, or run day would come out with an equal score.  It will take a few weeks before I determine a good easy, medium, hard score for each week but as of now they are conditionally formatted for green easy, yellow med, red hard. Time is not needed for the score, but is a column just incase I ever decide to log it.

There are also 2 other sheets to serve as charts.  I like the percentage chart.  I need to be working on running and biking more than swimming and as you can see is not the case.  I'm slacking in the running category.

If anybody has any comments on suggestions on how to make it better I would appreciate it.  I think you can figure it out with a small amount of effort.  Also, I made the workout score to come out considerably lower on purpose.  It should get points, but not near as many as the others imo





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Tri Scorecard.xls (97KB - 118 downloads)

2009-06-24 4:36 PM
in reply to: #2240819

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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!

I don't even know what to say about that.  Seriously, not trying to be snarky.  I'm kinda conflicted as I'm a spreadsheet junkie and that's kinda cool, but I'm pretty minimalist on my training and that makes my head explode.

I'm gonna have to digest this thing for a little and get back to ya, but I really am looking at it.

2009-06-24 4:39 PM
in reply to: #2240879

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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
I'm sorry... is it me or is the download not working?
2009-06-24 4:41 PM
in reply to: #2240819

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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
lol thanks for looking.  Im an engineering student and Ive never actually had an excel class, just picked stuff up here and there.  So maybe I think the sheet is only easy to use because Im the one who made it lol
2009-06-24 4:44 PM
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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
tehbry - 2009-06-24 5:39 PM I'm sorry... is it me or is the download not working?


Ummmm....It's office 2007 so if you don't have that it won't open, otherwise I'm not sure.
2009-06-24 4:52 PM
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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
djallen22 - 2009-06-24 2:44 PM
tehbry - 2009-06-24 5:39 PM I'm sorry... is it me or is the download not working?


Ummmm....It's office 2007 so if you don't have that it won't open, otherwise I'm not sure.


Basic excel formulas, etc. are backwards compatible. I have office 95 and it opens fine. You can also use openoffice, a much better solution.

John

2009-06-24 6:46 PM
in reply to: #2240819

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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
Tried to check it out but can't get the file to work on my Mac.
2009-06-24 6:49 PM
in reply to: #2240819

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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
When I downloaded it, it didn't have an extension.  Had to add .xls to get it to open.

I think the spreadsheet is really complicated.  I don't understand the scoring system or what the purpose for that is.  Why not get a book with training plans and use that?  It'll tell you what to do for what your goals are.
2009-06-24 7:14 PM
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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
I think it is a good start that you are trying to find a way to quantify load in order to determine how much training are you doing and how much can handle. Currently there are already softwares to do so if you have a power meter for biking, a GPS for running and a watch for swimming.

It is kinda hard to tell much about your data because your RPE (or PER as you call it) can something something different to everyone, as long as it means something for you I think it can be helpful. You should do a Google search about TRIMPS; it might give you a better idea about some of the work done by sports scientists/physiologists about this topic.
2009-06-24 7:23 PM
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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!

sesh - 2009-06-24 5:36 PM

I don't even know what to say about that.  Seriously, not trying to be snarky.  I'm kinda conflicted as I'm a spreadsheet junkie and that's kinda cool, but I'm pretty minimalist on my training and that makes my head explode.

I'm gonna have to digest this thing for a little and get back to ya, but I really am looking at it.

I guess I'm the other side of the coin - it's pretty simple actually.

And like Jorge said, it's a good attempt at tracking training load.

Looks good to me! (but I've a spreadsheet-driven brain)

2009-06-24 7:42 PM
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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
Changing the percentage chart to a pie graph would probably be a good idea.

The only other comment I'd have is that once you get to the point where you want to track your performance in terms of time, as opposed to just exertion/effort, this spreadsheet doesn't support that... but I suspect that if you stick with training, you won't need this sort of tool to know if you've really had "easy" weeks or not.  So maybe you'll use this for a while, and then move onto something else.

It's interesting.  Not what everyone would use, but that doesn't matter so much.  Good luck with your training.

2009-06-24 8:22 PM
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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
JorgeM - 2009-06-24 8:14 PM I think it is a good start that you are trying to find a way to quantify load in order to determine how much training are you doing and how much can handle. Currently there are already softwares to do so if you have a power meter for biking, a GPS for running and a watch for swimming.

It is kinda hard to tell much about your data because your RPE (or PER as you call it) can something something different to everyone, as long as it means something for you I think it can be helpful. You should do a Google search about TRIMPS; it might give you a better idea about some of the work done by sports scientists/physiologists about this topic.


Ok I had never heard of TRIMPS before.  It seems like I have done a similar thing but used distance and perceived effort instead of time and heart rate.  I have a 305 so I could prob switch to the time and heart rate method, but I'm gonna give this a go for a few weeks and see how it works out.  Maybe tweak it along the way. Thanks for the feedback everybody. I like the pie chart idea and that is a good point about the time.  Maybe I'll make a TRIMPS chart and do this in parallel just to see how effective it is in comparison.
2009-06-24 8:54 PM
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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!
djallen22 - 2009-06-24 8:22 PM
JorgeM - 2009-06-24 8:14 PM I think it is a good start that you are trying to find a way to quantify load in order to determine how much training are you doing and how much can handle. Currently there are already softwares to do so if you have a power meter for biking, a GPS for running and a watch for swimming.

It is kinda hard to tell much about your data because your RPE (or PER as you call it) can something something different to everyone, as long as it means something for you I think it can be helpful. You should do a Google search about TRIMPS; it might give you a better idea about some of the work done by sports scientists/physiologists about this topic.


Ok I had never heard of TRIMPS before.  It seems like I have done a similar thing but used distance and perceived effort instead of time and heart rate.  I have a 305 so I could prob switch to the time and heart rate method, but I'm gonna give this a go for a few weeks and see how it works out.  Maybe tweak it along the way. Thanks for the feedback everybody. I like the pie chart idea and that is a good point about the time.  Maybe I'll make a TRIMPS chart and do this in parallel just to see how effective it is in comparison.


check out Philip Skiba's RaceDay software and the papers about it where he talks about TRIMPS and the model he uses to quantify load in his RaceDay software called Bikescore, Runscore (or GOVSS) and swimscore.

Have fun!
2009-06-24 9:16 PM
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Subject: RE: Excel Sheet to help with training. Any input appreciated!

newleaf - 2009-06-24 7:42 PM Changing the percentage chart to a pie graph would probably be a good idea.

The only other comment I'd have is that once you get to the point where you want to track your performance in terms of time, as opposed to just exertion/effort, this spreadsheet doesn't support that... but I suspect that if you stick with training, you won't need this sort of tool to know if you've really had "easy" weeks or not.  So maybe you'll use this for a while, and then move onto something else.

It's interesting.  Not what everyone would use, but that doesn't matter so much.  Good luck with your training.

This is along the lines of what I was starting to think.  Duration didn't seem to play a big part, and that can be a very helpful guide in longer distance tri training.  And I agree, once you get into it more, you're not going to need this spreadsheet to track what's recovery and what's not.  You'll know.

It's a totally different approach than what I would take (WAY to close to what I do on a daily basis at work), but different things motivate different people.  If it gets you out there and training and helps you figure out where you're headed with it, then it's all good.

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