A little story about the evolution of Workout Reserve.
Some of you will know that @Andrea and I are currently working on the next evolutions of real time Workout Reserve.
When I first got approached about developing a real time version of Workout Reserve; I didn’t really understand it. I saw Workout Reserve in post session analysis but not what it was telling me.
When @Prof put me in touch with Andrea, there was a lot of information to absorb, how the Athletica servers calculated it post session, the equations involved, working out how to implement those in real time, what would be needed in the user profile for the calculations.
I got so busy implementing real time workout reserve, I didn’t query too much of what I was told about it. I was new to it and still learning. The first priority was to develop all the real time pieces and get all them all working in concert with the Athletica servers.
Now on the second evolution.
I understand workout reserve, I know what’s it’s doing, and how under the covers. I’ve used it for more than 6 months and know how it relates to how I feel, and what to expect during different workout types.
Andrea gave me an equation that will be necessary for the second evolution. But this time I questioned if the equation was right. Andrea insisted it was. But I had a feeling / hunch something was missing from it. We disagreed and on Wed agreed I’d spend Thu exploring my hunch. I could be wrong and if I hadn’t turned my hunch into a promising lead by the end of Thu, we’d proceed with his equation.
I spent yesterday with pen and paper scribbling away, and testing my occasional conclusions and theories in a spreadsheet. I looked at radioactive decay and half life, the limits of infinite series, geometric ratios, and applied differential equations and logarithms. I had my Eureka moment late yesterday and shared my output with Andrea this morning.
In response he said “ you know us engineers… I just care about it works somehow 
” and “ but this is a poetic touch 
.
You see my background is mathematics, it’s what my degree is. I care about maths and see patterns others maybe can’t. The maths we will be using borrows from stuff I learnt 40 years ago, and somehow dredged out of the archives.
These quotes some up maths well
“ Mathematics is not about numbers, equations, computations, or algorithms: it is about understanding.”
“ Mathematics is the study of patterns and relationships, which exist everywhere in the natural and human-made world
Finally
“Mathematics is not a careful march down a well-cleared highway, but a journey into a strange wilderness, where the explorers often get lost”
Andrea could have shut down my hunch, and I might have been wrong or not found the breakthrough. As it is we have some poetry to implement into WR.
It’s how collaboration should work, you should be allowed to disagree. Then set a timeframe to explore the source of the disagreement, a hunch, and see if it has merit.
Workout Reserve is exploratory and sometimes it requires an approach where you’re not sure if you’re going to end up in the wilderness with no answer or leap out the bath and run naked down the road shouting Eureka!
I hope you’ve enjoyed this story of how some of us are working behind the scenes to make Athletica better.
The results will be coming to real time some point later this year.
