WTRL TTT last night. Brutal one on the Jungle Circuit meant riding MTB's... Also with low numbers from 3R this week my usual 'Fall Out Boy' team hadn't got the numbers so we got split into some of the other groups. I got 'promoted' to '1Direction' who are generally the team FOB are chasing in results... So a B team with a couple of A riders... Me being only just promoted a month or so ago from C into B, it was always going to be tough! Was literally told 'see how long you can hold on for'! And this was a tricky course anyway, dirt roads, long descent, then climb and repeat for 3 laps.
https://www.strava.com/activities/3974802431
https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=1029016
The fast run in towards the Jungle saw me actually finding the pace ok,
my first 45s turn on the descent felt manageable - I actually found myself spinning out my 50*11 trying to move up the group and get towards the front! One
minor chase back on did demonstrate how much having 'Doubledraft' enabled meant as soon as anyone was dropped they where pretty much done for! Just before we started the climb I had
another brief chase. So had to ask to skip my 2nd turn to save it for the climb. Once we hit the climb it was brutal,
literally a test on how long and how hard I could go. I closed an early gap and then felt I was actually managing to pace it quite well and hang on... We caught a group on the climb (just before it eases in the middle) and in passing them I lost the wheel...
Dying a slow death at that point I had nothing left to surge back on. Dropped! I eased but still put some effort into the rest of the climb in the vain hope of them easing over the top and me getting back up. No chance.
I rode the following descent quite easy and recovering vowed to finish solo. I needed the volume and after some recovery my legs where going quite well. Climb 2 came and with it I was solo catching some other teams still riding up the road. I was unsure of the rules/etiquette of passing teams as a dropped rider but one of our 3R organisers just said go for it, just pass them as smoothly and quickly as I could! So I did! So that second climb I passed 2 other teams,
generally measured efforts on the climb, closing to them, recovering with a gap
then big efforts to pass and not easing until I had 5-10s lead over them. It was actually good fun and some good banter with them. Also I felt quite responsible for not splitting their teams as some of them where obviously on the limit with splits happening. On the flat afterwards the second of those teams (TVT) came back past me (
I eased to let them pass). I goaded them into putting an effort in to stay away from me on the climb, all in good fun and that gave me a nice carrot to chase. I let the gap open to 20s,
then went for it. Caught them quickly as they where split,
let them recover it and then
powered past. I eased in the middle but was catching another team,
I pressed on and maybe could've reeled them in at the top if I'd totally emptied myself but eased as didn't want to disrupt them over the bridge. I eased on the descent and run into the finish coming home at 1hr 1min 49s. The rest of 1 Direction had a storming ride coming home at 54mins 24s. Second 'Frappe' class team of the night in that time zone.
Good power curve for me, the
10 minute bang on and
20 minute numbers only 10W down where I was a month ago, before my 10 days holiday and 2 weeks of struggling to come back, so pleased with that, even though I was dropped horribly quickly!
Trainers are so stupid. Million USB extensions. Just make them Bluetooth/wireless and then stick a USB hard wired connection on them.
You have to plug most of them in anyway. And use next to the computer. Probably be cheaper and more reliable...
The new Kickr v5 has a RJ11 style port - the DCR review said there's meant to be a widget coming from Wahoo to turn it into an Ethernet port. Not that any apps will talk to a trainer over IP yet but it sounds promising...
Probably for gym/training base type setups. More and more 'studio' type setups for people riding bikes on trainers/smart bikes as alternatives to wattbikes/Peloton, so they'd be silly not to start to try and accommodate them in some way into their hardware, even if some of the platforms are not quite being developed as such. Some have had them for a while (think the Kinetic and Saris ones) although no platform to connect them to.
Did 40 mins and uploaded to zwiftaliser, showed 5 drops over the three channels (power, cadence, HR). Last night showed a lot more drops than this, maybe 20-25, so it’s an improvement I guess...
Wondering if an “active usb cable 3.0m“ would be better still, stops power/signal loss...
Weird it's that poor. Got a powered USB hub you could try to see if it's USB controller/voltage related from the ports?
Since lockdown I've gotten into Zwift quite heavily, bought myself a Kickr Core as soon as work started alternating working from home (and shut the gym), ended up receiving a full-fat Kickr instead, bonus \o/
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But, averaged 274W, 2.7W/kg, or with the 94% applied 2.533W/kg. Was tough, I'm now "D - Almost C" on ZwiftPower, kinda unsurprisingly, dunno if I'll take one more Cat D to get an 'easy' win before ZwiftPower makes me move up or not
Welcome! Awesome fun and amazing cardio isn't it!? Once bitten by the racing bug... Just be sure you're not overdoing it and taking time to recover... The recovery is more important - you're generally pushing yourself harder than other solo 'sports' or gym etc, but you only get stronger from recovering from the efforts. So recover = win more.
Good numbers too! Although you have noticed the difference a bit like Andy, there's so many riders and events these days that it can seem 'easy' at the pointy end sometimes. Then the class of riders in some of the popular events (like MAAP/Tour of Zwift etc/Race series) make the category so much harder and decisive you don't stand a chance. I came back from being a very competitive C in most races, to then riding some popular series and getting dropped hard. So pushed myself harder to work back into being competitive, then found myself promoted to B. Still making great gains now, but still a long way from the pointy end of these popular B races. Top20 is an achievement!
Anyway, maybe a race will keep me interested.
Chasing wheels, trying to be tactical and still aware to what else is going on around you in busy events like that should be enough to keep you engaged more?!
Great effort, don't read too much into the 'speed' on Zwift, that is so much down to the course and group, while also being quite a bit higher than most of us would see for similar conditions and efforts when out in the real world. But those power numbers and efforts are showing some good progress from you. Or good evidence of some! Keep it up!
