Yep, saw that on FB this am. Have done the Opt-in thing so now waiting for it to come back on line

I did two laps of greater London loop up Fox hill on Sunday. For the first time managed to stay with the A’s for a reasonable stint of the climb (before the inevitable). Spent the rest of Lap one in a reasonable sized group with a mix of an A, Bs and Cs. This held together till the second time up Fox hill when three of us broke away. The A with us started attacking as we cross back over the Thames and by the time they started the fourth of fifth attack at the end of the Mall I was broken! He got away leaving two of us to duke it out from B bronze. I tried to go for it with a feather from the underpass but legs didn’t have it and was recaptured rather too quickly. Came down to a sprint which again I didn’t have the legs left to really go for it. Wife is away at the moment so for a bit of fun I added a third lap afterwards to give a 60km ride.

Back on it tonight, can’t decide between trying two laps of the radio tower climb or a race. Have just discovered that Alp Du Zwift is not the same as the radio tower and now want to have a go at that, shame I’m only level 9 at the moment!

Hopefully the new opt ins mean zwift power will be back soon :D.

Fun volcano flat race today, 4 laps CCW.

Got dragged round with the lead group for the intro lap and lap 1, we were flying along and i set a new best ever lap at 5:39 which was 4s quicker than my best. Until then i was comfortable and we were a group of 15, my HR was sitting nicely at only about 160-162 mostly… but when the crunch came, as always on the hill up to the start/finish, i was lacking, they pulled about 6w/kg and gapped me and 4 others… Damn.

I let them guys lead mostly as it was keeping us well ahead of the next bunch and pulling out a small lead… but i was still working hard. With 1.3km to go i hit the Aero i had, mostly because it would have been a waste not to use it… but even though i pulled 15m lead, i knew it wouldn’t last.

It was very nice that one of the lads chucked me a message and told me to pin it. “got nothing mate, i’m all out…”

I left them to it and watching their battle unfold in the last 400m to the line and both pulling 600+w i was happy to have done so 🙂

I claimed 11th out of 31, which was 2nd C and a new FTP of 280w… a massive increase of 2w !lol. However thats an FTP increase of 5 w in the last 2 weeks.

Nice work. I failed to get online last night (non sleeping children). Signed onto the chop race at 9 currently but planning to do a bit of cruising around before that.

I did my first retest on Trainerroad last night and am down a massive 4watts so happy with that considering some time off and few easyish weeks too. Now we’ll see if I can get my FTP up to that on Zwift during use.

If I can find the time hoping to get my first Zwift race for quite a while on Friday night at Richmond. Ideally a single UCI lap.

The chop race (6 laps volcano) was brutal for me last night, maybe 35 minutes of warm up was a bit much and I spent too long on the front! The A group were way more organised (well at least one of them was handing out the orders)! They split in two with the lead group catching us at the start of lap 5. That fractured the B group as some tried to go with the A’s (who made short work of breaking away). I stuck with the main B group and was in the front three in the last 500m but had hardly any sprint in me. Was fun though and time went very quickly, I spent a surprising amount of time watching the map on the companion app to see who we would catch next and where the A group was.

My FTP has not changed for a while now, though my weight has started to drop a bit (1.5 KG, should update my profile for the benefit up the hills :D). Planning to try an epic KOM race as soon as there is one that fits my free time.

22degC is not the ideal indoor temperature for racing.

1 UCI lap and first race for a while.

Only 15 in it. Not too mad at the start but 2 floated off the front by a few seconds so left them to it. Just before the slight incline as you turn onto the cobbles others went after them and a new 1min 10sec ;0) power record to get onto the split. A few bumps in power along the way but generally just a constant effort until Libby hill. As expected all hell broke loose and I couldn’t hold the back end of the group so it was a painful solo effort to the end with the next rider a minute back anyway.

8th I think and bottom end of the B bracket as ususal on w/kg.

Zwift FTP bumped to 245w.

Time restricted today due to being my lads 10th birthday and Sportsday at school. So i’m likley to jump on the CHOP race at 9:15am

It’s a handicap format and rewards drafting/helping eachother along etc. If nothing else, it will be a decent workout with some like powered Cs. Until we get swamped by the As etc… That said… The C group is the bigger of the groups currently so could potentially suit us.

Joined a random race earlier, 3 laps London Classique. LOTS of riders.

Started off near front of Cs, but a LOT of A/B had wasted us in the initial split/ramps and they were gone ! So we went over the start line on entry in about 84th out of 160… The group we were in was from about 75th to 90th overall.
After the warm up and starting lap 1, the front of our group had claimed some riders and high point was 75th now, but we were flying along well. The first time up Horseguards was OK, i settled in about 4.3w/kg which is 375w or so for the hill and that was all well and good 🙂 It saw in the top couple of places in our group. We were now into the high 60s for placings…. closing on riders well, we ploughed on into lap 2… I just sat in the group trying to sit near the front so as not to miss any moves. We were again picking riders up and the front of group was now 58th or so… Onto lap 3, this is where it usually goes nuts and people hit 4+ and break for it.. But i was feeling OK and sitting in there, again we had picked up riders, some slowing and some stopping…

I had an Aero PU and i thought “If i can just save this… ” but as we hit Horseguards for the final time i was tempted to hit the PU, but stayed off it, dropping a couple of places on thee hill as people went 5.5w/kg+ and i was sitting at high 4’s… But I got slightly lucky that as it flattened out a guy passed me and was at 4w/kg closing on the 4 guys ahead of me. So i jumped on his wheel and next thing i was on them… With the 6 of us we pulled in the next few riders and as we passed under the 1km kite we were from 50th-65th overall…. I was mid-bunch. 800m to go just after the roundabout i hit 400w and the Aero PU…. BOOM ! i took off like a scalded cat. There was a guy behind me hitting 10w/kg on 400m but the rest we’d gapped and i was 500w or so… power power… I lost out to him for 50th, but finished 51st and ahead of the bunch we were in up to 64th… MORE than happy with that as i very very rarely have anything in the tank or the legs in the last KM and am usually blown away.

275w weighted average, i’m happy with that. 166bpm average shows that i wasn’t exactly on my limit…. I can usually get another 5-6 on top of that in a properly tough one…

I did six laps of Classique on Tuesday evening. Very hot up in our loft conversion even with the big fan going. I was happily sitting with the lead group during the warm up when I had a trainer dropout just before the roundabout. This left me 15-20s down on the main B group. I bust my gut for the next 5 minutes (setting a new best 5 minute power output) and had just got back with them when I had another dropout. This left me in no mans lands. Has to go a bit easier for about half a lap at that point (my HR went to around 180 during the earlier effort!) after that tried to up the power a bit. Ended up collecting a good few B’s that couldn’t hack the pace at the front resulting in a group of around six. I managed to put in some small attacks that dropped us down to three (2xB and 1 C). Then towards the last 3k the other B went for it. I didn’t have the energy left by that point so left them to it. Used my aero power-up from about 400m to drop the C. No idea where I finished overall but was seriously knackered!

Need to work out why the dropouts were occurring though as they were very annoying. I do have a usb extension cable not being used so maybe time to get that out.

Anyone got the new android beta version to work? Mine crashes straight after the zwift splash screen

Not tried it nemesis, where did you get it?

It’s in the app store. Search Zwift App.

Graphics card hungry so not many phone can run it apparently.

Mine gets to the ride scree and you can see everything except the road/scenary.

🙂 zwiftpower is back.

Perfect timing ! :Faceplant:

My Snap is going back to Evans and is currently sitting in a box in the garage to be dropped off tomorrow morning. LOL. Tempted to take it out for a race ! But plenty of riders will need to sign something again, change their Zwift preferences etc.. So no rush.

4 flat laps with about 20 starters. Wasn’t expecting anything amazing as not been feeling 100% this week. Didn’t quite put enough effort off the line in so had to dig a bit harder to get onto the front group.

First proper lap Mr Burton went off the front (who was meant to be in the earlier bigger race but had trainer issues it turned out) who went off the front (strange racing against someone who is about 5 miles away). I sat tight and the group hauled him back at the end of the lap.

I missed a bump in the power and did what I could to get back and Mr B dropped off to offer me a wheel until he realised it was terminal and got back on.

2 and a bit laps now to stay ahead of another B who had dropped off earlier and a couple of Cs he been caught by. Decided I needed 30 seconds by the turn onto the climb on the cobbles which I just managed and was able to sit up with 100m to go. Horrible horrible last lap.

3rd B on the road and a silver in ZP although there are only 5 finishers listed.

https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=70128

FTP up to 250w on Zwift now and don’t eat Pizza 45 minutes before a race!

Some good race reports there guys.

I had my first go on zwift for a while and it seems all the mileage i have been doing on yorkshires hills seems to have benefited my zwift racing. Did the tour de Oz and finished 7th out of 201 though its not a race but we all raced it. I avg’d 295w for the race which is great but what i did notice was that i was able to put down long stretches of big pace and not suffer for it. I lost 15s on the climb to the likes of J Kriel and M Yankow due to not knowing the course but i managed to bring them back on the flat with a very big effort which felt far easier than i was expecting. Due to bad pacing by me i had to do the same again about 5 mins later but that hurt a little bit more. It seems zwift helps you ride better outside and riding outside helps you race faster inside, long may this good weather continue.

Great ride Blader. I have been finding the lure of the great (sunny) outdoors too much! Still do at least one a week, when I am looking after my daughter.

Feeling under par, I went for a ‘true 2w/kg’ training session (around and hour). It was really well organised and everyone stayed in a ‘blob’. I struggled on the hills as some ‘organising’ in the garage by my other half had resulted in my bike being knocked out of the trainer, ending up halfway across the room. 5 minutes before the session, I only had time to put the chain back on and stick it on the trainer (failure to prepare etc.). Every time I put higher pressure the pedals the tyre slipped, so I found myself going backwards on the hills and TTing at close to 300W on the flats to catch the group. Instead of an easy zone 1/2 ride it turned into extended sprint intervals. Fortunately i actually felt better after than I did before I started.

So glad to see zwiftpower is back!

Matt

I did a race on friday and it was hell on earth. Only 11 of us so i knew sticking with the A group was gonna be impossible. 3 laps of flat route so slightly shorter than normal race, it was full on from the start. There were multiple attacks on every lap as the field mainly made of A’s all started to go at each other. I was hanging on and had to draft an A to get back in at one point. I got dropped on the sprint home as i was cooked and ended up silver in B and 6th overall. I actually finished with an avg 304w for the race which is my highest ever.

Short race up the volcano for me last night. Not a massive field so the one A stuck with the n,c and some d group. Pace was relaxed till the volcano. I put in a few bursts on slight ramps just to test who had what. We were all still together when the climb proper started. Unsurprisingly the A suddenly woke up. I went with them (which I don’t think they were expecting). Managed to hang on to them for about 30s before I couldn’t sustain the power any longer. By this point there was a comfortable gap behind me so I settled down to holding that. The volcano climb seems to be just the right length for a high power climb for me. Was second over the line however the A isn’t on ZP so I get the B and overall gold ;). Now to replicate that in bigger groups. https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=73087

Excuses first.

Over 20degC still in the room.

Threshold efforts outside yesterday afternoon.

Too early.

No breakfast.

Compute winding me up.

No warm up.

2 laps of London Loop which I’ve never raced. Couldn’t hold the power from the start and got popped out the back of every group and went backwards up the first half of Box Hill. Started picking riders off and then a big effort up the final ramp to get onto a few riders for the descent. Worked until Box again with the group but well down on power. Upped the power and took the front on the first hairpin then again after the second to drop my companions and try to bridge to the next 2. Managed to drop the 3 I was with but couldn’t quite make the 30 second gap back. Got to within 10 seconds but I knew I had to recover on the way down. Last couple of km torture maintaing the gap to those behind. Last in B on ZP and didn’t even beat the top legitiamte C which is the first for a while.

212 watt average. WTF needed yesterdays tailwind up the hills.

https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=74540

So now I know what kind of sprint I can manage, short and not very powerful!

Good battle with another D around the WBR London classic x 3. They basically sat on my wheel for 2.9 laps while I made tentative moves to try and drop them. The closest I got was about 8-9 metres on the first go up ‘horseguards’, but I was dragged back over the top.

Last lap I decided I was going to jump first, but was too ambitious and went with about 500 to go! The 5 metre gap didn’t last long and I was easily overtaken with about 200 to go, live and learn!

Good to be back racing though. Matt

Three loops.long race last night. I’m starting to really like that route. Started steady with the pack splitting in a/B and C/D quickly. The A/B stuck together for around 10 minutes then the as and a few Bs got a few seconds in the rest. I was slow to respond thinking it would all close up again as there were still As in the back half. Closing the gap was painful, took around 5 minutes of high effort to close the 6-7s. Was worth the effort though as the lead group quickly pulled the gap out. There was one A Vet who put in a few attacks to split it up a bit. I managed to hang in while the other two Bs were dropped. Managed to stay with them till the big hill and which point they sailed off into the sunset (as I expected). I had the best part of two minutes on the trailing group which I managed to increase. The climbing was painful over Leith (I think) hill but not so bad up box hill. I was suffering now the the bridging effort. Good result though, first B in the road and on ZP. Not that far from the last A (1min) as well.

https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=74473

Great ride that Nixie, really close to that last A, next time!

Hanging on to the faster group is something I need to work on, it’s really seems to pay dividends, especially on the flatter section like the start of your race.

Matt

Great to see a few back Zwifting…. I’m picking my new Snap up today after a longish debate with Wahoo regarding it’s failure…. Happily they’ve now agreed and it’s been in Evans for a few days but i was away this weekend, so collecting the new one today…

Starting to race again on Zwift due to Zwiftpower returning, cooler garage temperatures and too many outdoor TT’s being cancelled with roadworks. Aiming for the 13:30 hilly today, and getting ready for Innsbruck on Saturday.

Thanks Matt, shame the while feild didn’t finish. From the unfiltered list looks like a lot of people dropped out during the race.

Hopefully yiuyou be back online soon weeksy.

So Innsbruck is live on Saturday, cool.

Change of approach for me.

Since the restart since GDPR I’ve dropped back to C and will see what happens with skill points to be upgraded or maybe upgrade myself again if it’s becomes silly.

Also planning on trying to race people rather than just clinging onto one of the front groups which basically makes the entire race a high threshold effort but yields good results. Will try and find a group I can influence and sprint against. Generally this will mean losing the C race as someone will always cling onto one of the stronger groups but hopefully it’ll mean I get better at competing for when I can actually ride with those groups while having something in reserve.

6 laps of Richmond Flat (think I’m bored of this bit of race route now) and legs still a bit knackered from the weekend so a sensible effort found me a group and after 2 laps my legs came around from lack of warmup. Whenever I found my way to the front I added a little bump in power to add some stress onto the rest and a couple of bigger digs up the little incline to make everyone work hard. Along with similar from a couple of other riders nobody dropped. A couple hit out early at about 800m to go for the sprint and I wrongly assumed we’d get them back in the last 300m but misjudged it and was just tagging onto the back of the leaders by the line. Looking at the riders profiles we were all reasonably matched.

https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=75058

Nice plan Tom, it’s always much better when you get interesting racing and not just burying yourself. I’m not sure if i’ve got any legs for today, but if i do, the 15:05 WBR 3 lap Volcano flat is likely to be getting me out there to ride….  Although it also depends on number of entrants as well as the legs.. I won’t be joining if less than 30 setting out.

I am hooked on the WBR chop races. Not sure if it the new Wahoo Kickr or something viral but my ears are popping and I have lost 30 Watts somewhere.

Suspect the former to be the culprit if I am honest. Still, all the gains I made over the last two months might not be as high as I though they should still be comparative to where I was. If you get what I mean.

I’m quite optimistic in that context, i calibrated my Snap and 300w didn’t seem that much of a problem… Which is good as it puts me right in the mix for C at the pointy end. Whether i can sustain that for a race distance is VERY much open to debate… but hopefully i won’t be far off my 267w i seem to average on many races.

I’m aiming for the 1pm hilly figure 8 today (taking advantage of school holidays).

Right signed up for the ‘Gravel’ 12 week training program. Sick of being fat (story of my adult life)

Got a chunky race/challenge in October (that isn’t a race) that will mean I have to shed the lbs and work on my fitness.

Tried TrainerRoad but have cancelled that as I find that Zwift is a better platform for me so we’ll see how these new structured training programs work.

FTP test later today to benchmark

In addition to my last post. Offspring has now claimed my old setup and signed up to the free trial. Doubly irritating as not only is he faster than me anyway he is now going to get a 30 Watt boost from the hardware.

Looking on the bright side, he is unlikely to want to stump up the monthly fee so I will only have to watch him go up the virtual road for a few days.

Interestingly (or not) I was faster for 20 less watts over the first 4 laps of this race than the 4 lap race I did a 4 weeks ago where I clung onto the front group until halfway and then held off 2 chasers. I may not have beaten the 2 who were chasing me then if I’d been with them though but this was certainly more enjoyable/interesting.

Urrrghhh, I feel sick. Sprinted too hard. Second placed B today though I did out sprint the fourth placed A (hence sick). Literally got him on the line. A/B group split into two on the first climb and then the lead group fractured again. I managed to jump from group three to group two on the downhill taking two others with me. We stuck together till the KOM forward climb at which point the A started to pull away. I managed the drop the other Bs and go with the A. Tried to stay on their wheel till the end. I wasn’t going to sprint but they didn’t go till 250m so I went for it. Nearly gave up but as above just overhauled them on the line. Quite a way behind lead B though who seems to have stuck with the As.

https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=75168

Just signed up for Zwift in an attempt to get some fitness up after injury, loving reading all these posts and looking forward to getting the bike on the tacx tonight for the first time!   Is there a section on Zwift for unfit blokes over 40 looking to increase fitness?

can you pick the track yet on zwift or does it still work on rotation?

Rotation but there is a ‘hack’ to allow choice on startup. Think choice is there for events now.

Keyboard99

Are you planning to race or just train? There are pleanp of non fast groups and Also training tailored for all levels