Yeah 25th well pleased with that, I got dropped by the group on the boxhill descent and had 10 seconds to make up I managed to wind them in and overtake them on the next climb

Well the great news is that after yesterdays first test ride of 45 mins on the Snap, i don’t have any negative side effects on the legs. I can just about feel they’ve done some work… but nothing more than that. There’s no pain, no aching, no problems.

I’m still taking today as a rest day as i’m going to spend this week going ‘easy’ and alternate days only… but even an easy ride day is 1000 times better than no ride day at all. Made me feel a lot better about the world yesterday just pootling round and having a bit of fun. It was funny to see the gym mat at the end… it’s normally a massive pool of water.. i had about 10 drips yesterday… But i’m not injured, so that can only be a good thing.

I’m a long way from getting back to racing with you guys i think… but i’m back on the course and next weekend will be back out at FoD i hope… just need patience.

Today should have been my first road ride back after coming off 6 weeks ago on slippery roads and fracturing a finger. This morning I promptly slid off again on black ice after 1 mile, I walked home vowing to stay off the roads til spring.
Whilst the adrenaline was still flowing I thought I utilise Zwift preferences to have an attack on box hill, it worked, 9.12 smashing my only other attempt of 10.28. I was hyperventilating at the end, I don’t think I can try any harder than that.

Wow, that’s good/great.

Cheers, it helped that someone had been up and set the best time of the day of 9.14. I need a defined target to motivate me

I need a defined target to motivate me

that is quite impressive up there – I always fall off from my projected time, dropping seconds all the way up. Couldn’t possibly use a target time as I know I’d just fall away

Hope you’re still OK after the fall – you’ll be aching eventually I guess but it sounds like no major damage

Only a couple of grazes this time, not a bad fall like last months. I also did my back in on Thursday (fine on the bike but cant bend down when standing) so the fall is actually providing some welcome pain relocation.
I guess the projected time works for me as I’m fairly steady on climbs and attack the crest, if you attack at the bottom you’re the projected is always going to be slipping away

I was all excited about going for a ride on the CX bike today. Decided to tinker with the brakes as the rotor was rubbing slightly on the pads before setting off.

At that point I decided to stick my finger in the spinning rotor.

Darwins theory springs to mind.

My left index is now a little shorter than it was this morning. Bollocks

You daft s0d! Ouch!
Well I bonked big time this morning on zwift 10 laps of the volcano …

Darwins theory springs to mind.

No, that’s stoner’s law you’re thinking of – looking at spinning metalwork will inevitably result in partial loss of a digit, most particularly when the observer is fully aware of the likelihood

Had another play so I could then take tomorrow off and ride Tues Thurs and Sat. Mostly due to the earlier post and thought I’d have a pop at sub 10 on box hill. I was most shocked to find out it was Watopia not London when I signed in.

I ended up trying to ride with Nath but I don’t think he saw me. We were pootling round the volcano. I then ended up at the bottom of the Hilly loop climb. My PR according to the screen was 3 min 20. Gave it a decent effort up there and rolled over at 2min 40. That’s quite a chunk quicker than previously. How much of that improvement is down to the Bkool reading incorrectly or the Smart trainer aspect is hard to say, but its a fair bit faster.

I cruised round s bit more and found myself at the village sprint and thought, why not. So wound up the power and destroyed my best putting myself in 7th on today’s leaderboard and 4s quicker than I’d previously done it. I think it was 23.4s or so

Bit more cruising then had to stop, both to keep my legs happy due to getting over excitable and as I had to wander round to the village shop before it closed.

behave yourself weeksy !

Hopefully I’ll be able to do a gentle spin on Zwift later. Once my finger stops bleeding :-s

Thinking of doing a (B) race this evening – 7.30 BRS or 8.05 KISS

anyone in already ?

Sorry Weeksy, I was watching the grand tour just doing laps of the volcano for the achievements. It’s the only way I could manage a zone 1 spin!

I’m not loving the volcano loop…. don’t know why it’s just a bit meh!

I think it’s a stop-gap crit racing course really – not for interesting ridng

scaredypants – Member

I think it’s a stop-gap crit racing course really

What’s not to like about that… a full on assault of staying in a group with a flat out sprint at the end.

You’ve got to remember, their job is to cater for all needs, all wants and all requirements of Zwifters. Some people want short sharp Crit racing, some want epic climbs up the mountains, some want to fly round central London, it’s an impossible task to please everyone with the new sections.

Me, i didn’t ride that much of the Volcano, but it was a little spooky and therefore interesting. I like it when you have different bits of terrain, different places to hold, to attack, to pin it and of course to hang on as long as you can because you’re about to die !

I like it.

I can see it as being a very good crit racing simulator without the shouting and broken carbon/bones.

Been lurking this thread for a while now. Took the plunge and got a tacx smart trainer and cheap road bike. I think I have it all set up properly now and had a couple of rides.

First impressions are good, I love the techy stuff (though I don’t pretend to understand a lot of it). I did the ftp test earlier today. Seems I’m starting well on the bottom rung (according to the chart posted early on in the thread anyway) 1.83w/kg.

Hopefully I’ll stick with it and be able to at least wave to a few of you as you fly past a fat lad. 😀

Nuts, I started not far from that, as have many others, we’ve all worked our way up to mid/high 2s. So just be patient and enjoy it and its benefits.

What’s not to like about that… a full on assault of staying in a group with a flat out sprint at the end

agree absolutely weeksy, on both sides – I’ve only done a few races but “interefering” riders on the course made my races more confused then they need to be. Similarly, a nice gentle ride when there’s a bunch lapping you at 30mph is also weird

by stop-gap I mean that eventually I bet there’ll be climbing up & around it but also I reckon eventually they’ll have 2 different live venues at once, one for racing and one for “rides”

I think the terrain/view really only matters to people with a smart trainer as they have a vested interest in the lay of the land so they know whats coming up. For me with a dumb trainer i very rarely look at the scenery as it has no impact on me so i only ever look at who i am riding with so i know i am still in touch. I guess this makes zwift less emmersive for me which is a shame but i still love it as its motivating to be riding against people.

We should have a day where non smart owners go round to smart owners and try it.

I’m between Newbury and Didcot if anyone wants to try a wahoo snap.

Drivo between Southampton and Salisbury

… but my family tell me I look a bit like a mass murderer and you’d have to go upstairs into my garage attic

Welcome to come try my neo – Thames ditton
Be good to see pictures of setups – I’ll post mine when I get a moment

I would hazard a guess that it would be an entirely different experience on a smart trainer and probably more beneficial when it come to real riding fitness. When i start gainful employment again i think a smart trainer might be high up on my shopping list.

They teased this photo the other day, so hopefully more routes coming

7km route apparently

Did a session earlier and have started getting intermittent wi-fi which is a pain in the arse…

I lost all other riders etc. although everything else worked…
I ended up connecting my phone as a hotspot, it connected and I definitely had internet connection as I checked with Chrome but the other riders didn’t re-appear so I ended up riding on my own for over half my ride. Not the end of the world but definitely not as interesting as seeing other riders to catch or stay ahead of…

I can see it as being a very good crit racing simulator without the shouting and broken carbon/bones.

A race on zwift i’ll sit between the middle 3 power zones (so tempo, threshold and vo2) however in a a crit the biggest couple of zones are often 1 and 6. Not sure how they could recreate that with how the cornering and drafting works.

I realised I was getting dropped a little on the corners last night as I was easing off the power into corners without thinking about it.

KISS- Watopia Fig8

Hillingdon Cat4.

I don’t see how Zwift can recreate the constant accelerations as you never have to slow down for corners/others.

Not a million miles away though….

Did a race tonight round the fig 8 – as a B. Very much mid-pack (14/27 I think) and much the same 20min power as last time, but loads of variability this time – lots of kicks and slowing of the pack

MAde an interesting discovery (well, it’s obvious really but does work) that you can get off the bike completely when your avatar’s in a tuck down hill (pile of boxes collapsed next to me and was fouling the pedals so had to move it). Think I actually improved my position while doing that 😆

Ordered kickr snap today, been using a dumb trainer but not on Zwift. Next weekend straight on it !! Weeksy made my mind up…..he doesn’t know that but he did

stonecoldhhh – Member

Ordered kickr snap today, been using a dumb trainer but not on Zwift. Next weekend straight on it !! Weeksy made my mind up…..he doesn’t know that but he did

I’ll be very interested to hear/see your reaction fella… IT’s certainly made my riding (limited at the moment i admit) a bit more interesting. Some of that coming from the fact i can now put out better numbers as it’s a calibrated turbo, but also the fact that i’m changing gears, tactics, plans and ways of riding/attacking.

Going uphill on a section yesterday i actually got out of the saddle into a sprint as i was putting out 500w+… I also got into a Sagan tuck on the way down for the first time ever ! I didn’t even know you could do that.
Getting 7th (at the time anyway) on the Village sprint was a highlight as my Bkool never allowed me to have a kick/sprint, but the Wahoo gives me the ability to have a burst of power when i need it.

There’s been times in races where i think “if i kick off the front here i’ll leave these 2 riders behind floundering”… but the Bkool taking 30-40s to actually build up the power means it just looks to them like i’m taking a turn on the front and leading for a bit, rather than me kicking off the front and gapping them.

In a slightly unrelated but also closely related discussion i had on another forum with CH. I was thinking about my training and realising i need to concentrate on my actual goals for the years riding rather than what i think they may be. Realistically i still don’t believe i’m good/fast/effective enough for Crit races, so it’s more likely to be an odd XC race, along with the SDW 100 and the White roads 100, along with the 7 days in Andalucia, they’re more my targets than anything else that i may ride on a whim.

So my next few sessions/months are going to focus on longer, slower and a bit less worrying about putting in records on Strava and concentrate on putting the hours in on the pedals. Getting the weight down, getting the miles in etc. With that, the odd Gorick/Southern won’t be blown out of the water as we know the training on Zwift seems to work OK for that too.. but the extra calories and longer efforts will prepare me better for the things that are important for the year.

I was actually thinking of something a bit random that you guys may have some thoughts on which was putting the Hybrid tyre on the spare 29er wheel for a few rides on it, riding the PArkwood which will be my 100 miler event bike, whilst it makes sense to use the road bike for training, i’m guessing it also makes sense to use the bike i’ll actually be riding…

Interesting regarding the new London route, around green park area is a nightmare.

Bit surprised they haven’t done this loop yet, the TOB one:

^^most fun I’ve ever had cycling in central 😆

@weeksy – should totally try and get a spot either at Hillingdon or Abingdon – I really think that benchmark versus when you sign up to do Hillingdon at the end of the year ( 😉 ) would be a good en!

@weeksy have you done the White roads before? Having ridden the MTB a lot in that area I gave it a go last year. Took 3 or 4 punctures before i realised how much care you have to take descending on 23c tyres when you weigh > 14st. Good fun though.

@Nath, maybe mate, maybe… i just don’t want to waste my time at the moment riding it and being blown out in 1 lap… The segment i tried on yesterday and the time associated shows me i still have a lot to work on
https://www.strava.com/segments/9719730?filter=overall
Sure, i can sit here and get hung up on power, stats, times and figures and they don’t actually matter… of course, i get that… But the times i can do are indicative of my actual speed/abilty…so of course, they’re directly related to my ability to ride quickly.

@Mossimus, No, but i live about 200m from one of the main routes they take, not a million miles from Streatley. So plenty of their roads/sections are 100% my day to day riding and usual terrain. I won’t be riding it on a narrow wheel/tyre bike. I’m likely to do it on the Parkwood running Rapid Robs. I’ll be riding with a mate assuming he goes, so will be a nice day out, rather than flat out.

weeksy – Member

I was actually thinking of something a bit random that you guys may have some thoughts on which was putting the Hybrid tyre on the spare 29er wheel for a few rides on it, riding the PArkwood which will be my 100 miler event bike, whilst it makes sense to use the road bike for training, i’m guessing it also makes sense to use the bike i’ll actually be riding…

Certainly try it, but it might not fit. How big is the tyre?
I mentioned the other day setting my Wife’s mtb up on my old trainer.
I bought a new tyre to stick on the back of it – can’t remember the size of it, but it’s a 26″ almost slick commuter style tyre….I couldn’t get the bike into the trainer with that tyre on – the roller wouldn’t move out of the way far enough – even with it ‘released’ and unwound as far as it would go….
I ended up swapping the tyre to a 1.5 City Jet. That fits, but there is a small amount of tyre compression even when the roller is released from the wheel….

I don’t know if the Kickr Snap has a wider range of adjustment, but it’s something to bear in mind.
You could always buy a cheap tyre to get you running with it – just make sure it’s a small size.

MAde an interesting discovery (well, it’s obvious really but does work) that you can get off the bike completely when your avatar’s in a tuck down hill

I also got into a Sagan tuck on the way down for the first time ever ! I didn’t even know you could do that.

Supertuck innit http://zwiftblog.com/supertuck/