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Does it group the teams in green or anything on the list, or do we just have to look out for one another? Do we all wear the same kit to help with this?
@paino - don't worry I'll be using the climbs to recover from the flats :p It's the flat where I'm most likely to get dropped.
@benman you'll be the only team setting off at your defined start time.
So join the event as usual by 19:40. But when it says GO! you must NOT GO! You need to stay at zero watts for 4 minutes 30 at which point Phil will countdown. THEN you can go. Only STW go at that moment. Other teams have their own start delay (30 sec intervals).
The first 30-60 seconds will be spent assembling into a group on the road. Anyone leaving at that moment is 99% sure to be your teammate. But you can see their names (which are not necessarily team tagged but usually they make some sense) in the panel as usual on the right.
We usually dress as bumblebees but I think tonight it's christmas sweaters (choose) the grey zwift jersey. You'll be forced onto the buffalo bike but they've changed its characteristics so it rides well on this occasion.
On the climb, all organisation goes out the window. Just ride at the w/kg which you can all sustain together. Let the lower w/kg riders determine the pace. The rollers are hard to ride as a unit. Really hard. That means kms 10-20 and 30-40 really. Regroup into organised riding at km20 and km40 (or the nearest round number timing to that point).
The moments to transition are just after saddle springs, where the road bends right and begins to drag upwards and again after winding round the water following the rolling descent. The kms are very convenient round numbers for those points, which works well.
All clear. Good job you told me about the 0 watts bit!
You lot are at least less likely to run under my spinning pedals mid race.
I thought I had answered your earlier comment @robbo1234biking - it might indeed be a bit harsh to expect too much 2nd wheel on the flat from @trolo1234. Could team STW agree an approach to second wheel in the pen (even if it's "let's see how plan A goes an then improvise if necessary...")?
Hi there. I think I understand the aim. Can I ask for someone else to volunteer as road captain for STW. I’ve only done 2 TTs so far and feel rather unqualified. Further more my discord ability is v low. I can hear but it’s very difficult for me to speak due to how I need to have my phone placed near bike once we are riding and it’s too noisy to leave my microphone on. Any volunteers?
I can do it but can’t guarantee I won’t be blowing out of my arse and forget who is next!
Thanks Robbo. Appreciated greatly. I must also ensure I don’t prematurely exit the pen like my schoolboy error last week.
I'm coming off the back of two big races and a hilly night MTB ride, which is a lot for me, so if I start to do a Captain Oates off the back, don't come looking for me, its for the best.
Otherwise, I'm gonna be in the sleigh at the back with Santa if I get any say in it.
What time do we need to join?
@J-R join now, you can warm up till clock says 00:30. Get on MoreSTW voice though
Sorry I didn't make the pens folks.
Well that was a bit of a nightmare technically tonight. Lost @trolo1234 before we even started as he couldn’t join the pen. @zilog6128 had a crash waiting in the pen. So 5 of us set of. I think the first 10k went really well taking it in turns to take pulls. When we hit the forest I think we went to hot and burned out @drew. We managed to regroup but I think we had done the damage. When we got back on the flats drew rested a couple of turns and then out in a couple of big pulls before pulling the plug. Thanks for doing that :-). We then lost @munkeymadness due to a drop out I think just before the forest. @haloric, @yanboss and I then pushed through the forest as best we could and then tried to regoranise before the line but I think we just did what we could to get over the line.
We passed 3 teams I think without getting stuck and staying in formation so we didn’t all have to push. That bit seemed to work really well so I assume we had a really good speed differential.
Despite all the issues I enjoyed that. The first 10k taking it in turns went really well. The second time round when we were more fatigued there were a few more sticky drafts but overall I think it worked well and def something to pursue once we get better at it. I think 45 second pulls might be better perhaps but that may be because we only had 5 dropping down to 3! Well done all - I have really enjoyed the TTT and looking forward to getting back to it in the New Year!
you missed something remarkable Brian - I think Phil's microphone went down and nobody told us off ! 🤣
I think Phil’s microphone went down and nobody told us off ! 🤣
Thought it was just that we were doing so well!
Well I had no idea who I was supposed to be following, so just went to front when it suited, sorry if I cocked it up! That was difficult, so kudos to @benman and @J-R for their performance-we held it together nicely and some lovely clean passes.
The problem with having 6/7 other guys wearing the same is I lose who I’m supposed to be following. Maybe everyone wearing a different kit may help!
Sorry I missed that. I was looking forward to it this evening, really felt like I needed the run out. Zwift crashed out 3 times before I got into the pens, the one time it stayed up long enough to get there it didn't give me the invite. Even whilst it was up I couldn't seem to get it to play nicely with my turbo.
Not a successful evening 🙁
I think Phil’s microphone went down and nobody told us off !
I've got images of a teacherless classroom in my head. I'm surprised some of you didn't go the wrong way.
Well done to the STW finishers, it must have been hard ending up as a threesome. Great debut as road captain Rob, you did a great job there in difficult circumstances. Sorry to pull the plug when I did but I just couldn’t see me surviving the forest without slowing to a crawl. I’m not sure why I found it so hard but I think I’m not quite at the level where I can put a regular pull on the front in at this pace and have enough time to recover at the back.
I got a message at the end saying my FTP had gone up from "poor" to "mediocre"
I've never seen my FTP anywhere on zwift other than the overoptimistic one I typed in myself when I was fit a few years ago
Does it matter?
How do I see/use it? (sure as hell can't remember what it said, while I was still trying not to fall off the bike)
I thought that went really well! Everyone taking a turn when the pace dropped, and we kept it together over the rollers and up the hill, and then a big push at the end 👍🏻
To be fair drew you should have had another minute rest before each pull! Through the desert everyone should have done 3 x 30 second. Instead everyone has to do an extra pull have less rest and work harder to stay on the pack.
That was horrendous. I think I did a bit too much too early. I didn’t expect it to be over an hour, I do need to do some background in future.
I also struggled with doing a pull on the front. I’d have to be doing over 70 watts over my FTP to get to the front and stay there. As we were blobbing rather than riding in order it was hard to work out when was my turn to go back to the front, I think I did a few turns when I should have been resting. On lap 2 I could only just about hang on, looked at the distance to go when it said 17kms and almost stepped off the bike, I was dying!!
When I got dropped on the climb, I think my sweat dropped on the iPad and changed my app to Netflix as that came on, the screen was soaking so wouldn’t let me change back to zwift wothout wiping away the sweat....nice! Managed to get back on thanks to a couple of guys dropping back but I was completely done in.
No FTP bump for me, Zwift companion says 1 hour 8 minutes and 264 watts, my FTP is 263 according to the last test I did.
That was tough - I’m impressed by you guys doing this week after week. My experience was very much like @w00dster - I managed a couple of pulls at the start but they were so much above FTP it was soon all I could do to hold to the group.
So I’m sorry I didn’t manage to contribute much but hopefully having a slightly bigger blob helped a tiny bit.
Yeah there is no way I could have done that after a Tuesday race!
I've just watched that video talking about the art of dropping off the front and I think it's probably useful but potentially quite a ballache (interesting that team STW tried and quite liked it though !) - I found the same as ^ you, that you have to batter it to get onto the front or else get stuck in 2nd place. Then again, maybe that somehow "pushes" the lead rider on a bit but if it doesn't then we're all burning watts to no real effect, just to stall behind number 1.
I suppose a team that took things really seriously might call the changes and get the front man to deliberately drop the power at the same time as someone's coming through but I bet you could get nearly all the way to the same result if the lead rider just came on & said "dropping" which meant "I'm cutting my power in 5 seconds" and the next rider then knows to kick on from a bit further back.
That way you'd avoid trying to pass a strong rider before they're ready to drop off (and not feel guilty about sitting in while they're still happy)
??
1:03:51 for MoreSTW. Belter!
Couple of times I tried the 0 watt sink to the back, and it worked nicely. But you’ve really got to learn when to put the power back and smooth enough to not come sailing back through the pack as I did a few times. Then I got stuck mid pack, not resting properly and end up blobbing the team up.
I guess though there is a big discrepancy between our power, for example, I’m 69kgs and only 263 ftp. On the flat I’m at 330 to 340 watts. Then I was having to average 250 watts to stay in the pack (on lap 1).
I think it will work, just needs more thought and agreement in the order and how we move through the pack. I do like the sound of the front rider advising he is about to drop, but the second place rider needs to be defined, so they know it is their turn. Even if they are only putting out 290 or 4.1 w/kg, the other riders would need to stay behind and not come through.
I don't think the optimum is for #2 to take over, woodster - they seem to think that someone coming from further back works best (they get up to higher speed for the same "push" I suppose, before they hit the front). Wouldn't matter though - if I knew I was after you I could be "lazing" at #4 or so and then kick on just before you dropped your power as long as you gave 5 secs or so notice
TBH, I'm a bit "meh" about it - I like the workout probably more than the result (suppose that might change if we suddenly became brilliant but I've said before, a mid-pack B like me is not a part of a winning team). I'd happily do it though - wouldn't make me enjoy it any less
A mixed experience then?! I think technical issues were pretty widespread last night. Keep those verdicts coming...The next two weeks are double novelties anyway (bologna, the alpe; on christmas eve and nye) so I think progress of any kind is on hold for a bit...after that there's a good run of nice courses where we can mix and match our approach and see what people prefer.
About those next 2 weeks: can people give me some idea of their probable availability/interest? I won't hold you to it. And I'll enter team(s) for both. But I'm anticipating 1 team might be more likely than 2 but also that time slot might make a difference for these 2.
I’m out for both unfortunately. Work/family commitments. Must admit, Bologna & the Alpe as a TTT sounds more like an FTP test than anything!
For us I think (not sure what the others thought) it worked quite well. I just called the next person up for their pull every 30 seconds. Everyone knew who they were going after so it gave you a 30 second warning for your own pull. The second time around Drew and Ant missed a couple of pulls but let me know on the comms so I just skipped them out.
Next week (xmas eve) I think could do the 8.15am time slot but no other times.
On New Years Eve I could do the 8.15am or the 10.20am time slot. The evening slots will be spent eating more food and drinking more beer!
I didn't watch the video before the race, but definitely got stuck in that #2 spot a few times, pushing 320W+ and not making any progress towards the front...
I'll give Xmas Eve and NYE a miss, but should be up for some TTT's in 2021. I guess it depends how the Tues races go!!
This is the data from the first section through the flats. You can see the pulls better on the 30sec power graph but shows then quite clearly through the dessert section. Would definitely work well on the flatter courses.
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So tired.
I think 1:09:50 for the STW survivors ?. I was on my limit from about half way, so thanks for pulling those last few K, and it sucks to fail for a technical.
Zwift seems to be getting worse with respect to not getting in the pen these days. As soon as the invite appears I get in now, rather than wait for the last few minutes which we used to be able to do.
As per technique, I think it worked well, although we were not fading to the back quickly in some cases and that made it awkward. I would prefer to keep the line order and the front rider drops off much harder, so second wheel is already in place, but its good to try different things.
Gutted to have missed it, would have been easier without the technical hiccups as more peeps in the rotation means a longer rest for everyone! Zwift has never frozen like that for me before (on iPad) - everything was fine until I switched to the bloody Chrimbo jumper!!! Great work by all those who rode!
About those next 2 weeks: can people give me some idea of their probable availability/interest?
I'm unavailable for both of those ttt's. Late shift and an early shift. I also think I need to do some training before entering. 😭
@savoyad I can't commit to the next few TTTs.
My main Thursday night activity is MTB night riding, so I'm only be available when that's cancelled for some reason, like yesterday. But I did "enjoy" the pain in a strictly type two way and I think it's great training. But my participation will only ever be ad hoc, if there is still a place available at the last minute.
@robbo1234biking - where did you get that nice looking graph of your data?
@j-r I use intervals.icu. It pulls the data from strava. It is free to use as well and really good.
I thought the rotation system worked well too. Disappointed not to have been able to last the course but really couldn’t carry on without significantly dropping the pace until the finish. I normally warm down but just had to stop. On a flat course I may have been ok but taking turns on the front and pushing higher power numbers on the lumpy bits just put me into too much of a deficit I think. It’s also possible I was pushing myself too much on my turns at the front as I was focusing on maintaining speed which was about 41 km/hr rather than on a more sustainable output for me.
I didn't really think the turns worked so well, at least from my point of view. @robbo1234biking called it flawlessly for us, I'm just not sure it is the best approach with quite a mixed team.
I found 30s too short, it was too easy to pop off the front at the start of a pull, have to ease off and then only end up usefully on the front for the last 10 seconds before the next persons pull.
I think my first TTT was that course when I was one of the slowest in the fast group. Back then I used the flat to go as easy as possible in the draft. Then barely hang on through the rollers at max effort before another recovery on the flat. With the rotations I think we end up exhausting the smaller and slower riders on the flat before we even get to the hills. And if there is a bit of a split caused by the dropping back the higher wattage riders cant get everyone settled in behind them before their pull is over.
I would definitely go along with @yanboss on that. I was really referring to the calling of the turns rather than the allocation/duration/ intensity.
Yes, ditto, the mechanism of calling rather than the general melee. On the flat I found I would go off the front too hard and then slow to allow catch up, but then too late accelerate again, and then turn would be over, and could have gone for longer, but when on the hills I was all over the place due to being too heavy.
Because comms is so flaky would it work just to be called to the front, until you feel you;ve done enough then drop hard to the back, and its clear 2nd wheel is up. If you are the next rider you have to make sure you are in position at 2nd wheel ? That way you can do as long as you like.
Sound like everyone could have pulled longer. I did think about increasing the length of pulls the second time through the dessert but I was aware yanboss and munkeymadness couldn’t always easily speak to say if that is ok so didn’t want to change it. Prob need to try it again then with longer pulls on the front on a flat course. Nothing stopping us doing a meet up to try some different things out though and work out the best way to do stuff!
I was one of the victims to technology. A few trainer drop outs which reconnected and then a terminal one. It’s the iPad to Apple TV which seems flakey so I just lose power. I would agree that longer turns would be better certainly for the stronger riders. And maybe rather than try for a line you relax into a blob behind the lead 2. But all good fun. Xmas eve and New Year’s Eve unlikely