Training Logs - Which do you prefer?

You might remember that one of my chosen blogs is Steve Stenzel’s “Steve in a Speedo?!“? Well he’s been doing a series called “Does it Work?” reviewing tools that triathletes use on a day-to-day basis. Yesterday’s entry was Steve’s review of four online training logs … Beginner Triathlete, Buckeye Outdoors, Daily Mile, and Training Peaks. Two were new to me, one I’d heard of but hadn’t used and of course, the defacto Training Peaks. Steve has graciously allowed me to repost his thought provoking review. We at LMS would love to hear what YOUR favourite online workout logs are. And why. Then head over to Steve’s and see what they’re saying over there too!

Does It Work: Beginner Triathlete, Buckeye Outdoors, Daily Mile, and Training Peaks

By Steve Stenzel

Note: Choosing an online workout log is a VERY personal choice. If I have bad things to say regarding your website of choice, it’s nothing personal against you. This whole process of finding an online log is really specific to one’s personality, and what works for me might not work for you, and vice versa. But here’s my 2 cents:

Back in August of last year, I put up a post asking for recommendations on different sites for tracking mileage. I had a “physical” day-planner that I had been using as a log, but wanted to try something new. I noted that I had a Wellsphere account, but didn’t like that for tracking miles. If I had to give Wellsphere a grade, it’d be this:

Wellsphere: Grade of F+. This may have changed since I deleted my account, but I had to round every workout to the nearest mile! REALLY?!? This site was horrible, and the layout made it really difficult to get around. Sucktastic.

Oh, and I DID consider just tracking everything in a spreadsheet file on my own computer. Some bloggers sent me some VERY COOL spreadsheets files all set up by day, month, and year. Everything was totaled up automatically, pie charts would appear at the bottom, etc, etc. They were pretty sweet. But I decided I wanted to work online. Plus, I was afraid that the file could suddenly go corrupt and I’d lose all my training info. (I guess I have more faith in unknown online companies to not lose my data…*gulp*)

Personal Spreadsheet: Grade of ??. You could make this as simple or as complex as you’d like, so it’s tough to give this a letter grade.

So in that post back in August, people were recommending some great sites. I listened to what people were saying, and in September of last year, I started 4 new accounts with Beginner Triathlete, Buckeye Outdoors, Daily Mile, and Training Peaks. I started tracking my workouts, mileage, and races with those sites. I QUICKLY found ones to work better for me than others.

Here’s my review of all 4 of those from worst to best (in my opinion):

Daily Mile: Cute design. It’s like Twitter (or a Facebook Group) where you can add workouts. That’s great, but I don’t need ANOTHER place to chat with “friends.” Great for runners only or people tracking their “workouts” (but not for people tracking their “training” [unless you’re a runner]). Not great for mulitsport athletes. Take a look at this screenshot:

2 main problems with this:
1. “5 months ago”? How about an actual date?
2. See the triathlon in the middle of that image? It’s labeled as a “fitness workout” (with no way to store my splits). That’s a little insulting. (But at least it got a bit smiley face! Sheesh.) You can’t add a triathlon, duathlon, or brick workout.

It’s “cutesy,” but a little unprofessional. When you enter a workout, you can give it varying degrees of a smiley face:

Trying to enter a triathlon or a duathlon nearly started the website on fire. Really. It’s like I was asking them to rearrange the stars. It’s FINE for tracking weight lifting routines, runs, etc., but it’s not for multisport athletes.

Daily Mile: Grade of D. (This is a little awkward because “Team Daily Mile” retweeted my tweet that linked to the “foam roller” post yesterday. Sorry.) Like I said, it’s fine for more casual athletes, or those that are runners only.

Training Peaks: Very professional. Many coaches like this because you can leave workouts in OTHER people’s log telling them what to do each day. Nice. You can track your equipment usage. It’s easy to get around, and easy to enter workouts (it’s all pretty intuitive). It totals your weekly mileage. Here’s a screenshot:

Some things I DON’T like about Training Peaks: The calendar (seen above) is a little “clunky” – it’s hard to glace at it and see what you’ve done recently. It’s also “tall,” so you can only see 2 weeks at a time (I like to see the whole month). It also takes a bit to load the calendar; I spent 5-9 seconds looking at this when I first logged in:

(that’s the actual picture – don’t sit here and wait for something to initialize)

Training Peaks: Grade of B-. It’s good for tracking workouts, mileage, and races (including multisport races), but the format didn’t quite fit for me. I wasn’t happy with the way the info is shown on the calendar. That’s just a personal preference, I know.

Buckeye Outdoors: The calendar was JUST was I was looking for, and it was super easy to add a workout. You can quickly see what you’ve done, and the little multi-colored symbols helps make it clear right away. Here’s a screenshot:

The calendar is “clean” and minimal. If you want to see more on a workout, you can scroll over it. Here I am with my mouse over the run workout on the 9th, and you can see the details of that workout on the far right:

Buckeye Outdoors really surprised me. I didn’t expect to like it THIS much. I’d never heard of it before people started recommending it, and it sounded like something for fans of Ohio State that liked to canoe (or something like that).

Buckeye Outdoors: Grade of B+. No major complaints. Tracked everything I wanted it to quite well (even intervals). It’s possible to print out “reports,” but the printout is a little awkward and not in that same calendar format.

Beginner Triathlete: I didn’t like the name; I don’t see myself as a “beginner” anymore. But I liked about everything else on their site. Here’s a screenshot from last month:

All the info is there that I want to see. Swim, bike, run, and strength workouts are all there in different colors. There are weekly totals at the end of the week, and monthly totals at the bottom. I can track my weight if I want to, and I have the power to make that invisible to other users if I’d like (you can see my weight on a few days when I weighed myself). If you want more info on a workout scroll over it, and more info will pop up. Here I am with my mouse over the 12 miler on the 16th, and you can see all my notes:

It easy to add races to your schedule, and then you can see who else is planned to do the race. (In fact, it was because I had the TC 10 Miler on my schedule last Oct that Emily [BikerGrrrl on Beginner Triathlete] knew I’d be running, and she snapped a photo of me that she sent to me.) You can read other people’s race reports if you find a race you’re thinking about doing. Here’s my race list:

At Beginner Triathlete, you can add equipment and note when you use it (Training Peaks has something like that too). I use it like most people: to track mileage on my running shoes. That info appears in your “blog” on Beginner Triathete. You can put whatever info you want in the header of your blog (I have my 2009 races listed, and I need to update it for 2010). Here’s my “blog” on BT, with a few things that I’ve noted:

A: Graph of my recent workouts by week (all run and swim right now…).
B: My “Equipment” list, showing that my main running shoes have exactly 251.55 miles on them (and 52.43 miles on my racing flats).
C: “Personal Bests” that link to my race where I set that PR.

You can add workouts much like you can at Training Peaks. And the calendar is nice and easy to use like at Buckeye Outdoors. So, for me, it’s the best of those 2 sites. But the forums are what sold me on Beginner Triathlete. The forums are SOO extensive. There is a LOT of good info in there, and it easy to add your own question. (There are forums for “triathlon talk,” “classifieds,” “strength training,” “IM specific,” state-specific forums, etc, etc, etc, and even a “cup of joe” forum for anything non-triathlon related.) Anyone can respond to any issue in any forum, so you have to take all advice with a grain of salt. But sometimes you’ll find the person responding is a 9:20 IM athlete (really, there are a few that I’ve “met” on BT, and that have offered me advice, and one of them is ALWAYS on BT).

I contacted the “owner” of BT and told him that I would be talking about what I liked about BT. I asked him what’s in the works at BT. He actually shared a special username and password with me so I could login as a beta tester and check out what’s on the way! Cool!! They’re planning to add more functions to each person’s “blog.” One of the biggest ones is a “Goals” page where you can add weight loss goals, speed goals, fitness goals, etc, and then track your way towards that. Thanks for letting me check that out, Mike!

Beginner Triathlete: Grade of A. It’s not 100% perfect, but I do really like it. And it’s possible to print out a weekly calendar with all your workout notes if you want a hard copy (similar to what Buckeye Outdoors can do, but easier to read). One downside to BT is that some of the settings take a bit to find when you first set up an account – it’s a little “clunky” and takes a moment to find what you’re looking for in the settings the first time or 2. (But entering workouts is a cinch.)

I’ve been using BT since I first checked it out in September of last year. I LOVE throwing my workouts up there ASAP after a workout – it makes me feel very accountable and it makes me want to work hard. That sounds stupid, but it’s true. It’s like some form of subconscious motivation.

Check out the sites I wrote about here, and maybe I’ll see you on BT!

Daily Mile: D. No thanks. Not for triathletes IMO.
Training Peaks: B-. Not bad. Good for working with a coach.
Buckeye Outdoors: B+. Nice calendar. Easy to use.
Beginner Triathlete: A. My site of choice.

What’s your preferred way to track your mileage? Do you use one of these methods? (And like I said at the top, I don’t mean any personal disrespect if you use one of the methods that I don’t care for as much. I hope we can still be friends.) And don’t forget to check back at 2 am and 2 pm every day this week for more “Does It Work” posts. Click on the “Does It Work” tag to see all posts in this mini-series.

Thanks Steve! So. What’s YOUR favourite online tracking/training log??