I'd set my FTP to 229 before doing the Zwift FTP test (because that's what riding outside with my power meter gave it as) and as part of the warm-up for the FTP test I think it had me doing 300W for 5 minutes (which is pretty much me maxed out) with the end result being that my 20 minute average power during the warm-up was about 20W higher than in my FTP test. Not only that but normal riding since has pushed my estimated FTP in Zwift up by about 50W compared to the FTP test (and it's now a lot closer to what I do on outside rides).
To be honest I don't think I'd bother with the FTP test - just do an hours hard ride and let Zwift estimate it for you.
720 riders to GCN tonight, it's going to blow up! 😆
I'm currently last on Watopia's Figure 8 haha:
https://www.strava.com/segments/12118421
[b]Your PR 1:05:37
13196 /14041[/b]
Would love to join in, got to go out for a meal tonight though! Might log in & keep an eye on one of you though!
Cheers zilog6128 & epicsteve....
Yeah, I did wonder if there was any point in doing it, but am debating whether to do the 12 week FTP builder workout session, so thought it would give me a baseline to keep track of.
I don't have Strava Premium (I'm not paying any more monthly subscriptions than I do already!) so I guess I'll have to keep a note of the ftp results myself as they inevitably (ahem....) climb.....??
I'm up for tonight - "Alastair Graham STW KISS (D)"
Feeling pretty knackered and fatigued at the mo, combination of work and 6 month old toastling in the house. Should be able to get middling though with any luck. Definitely seem to be improving gradually.
Really not up for trying to reach new bounds tonight, always say that though then half kill myself 🙂
Did 45 mins of watopia flat, first lap at 2.0 then for lap 2 it was 2.4-2.5 and then some gentle stuff. Bit of a cool down and then did something I've been meaning to test for ages now.
Variable resistance! Set it as a controlable trainer in the menu and set off on the start of mountain course. First thing I noticed was how hard it is to keep the power in flat or slightly downhill sections. Usually I'm just plugging along at say 250w and that's me, flat, hills, etc. In variable it drops to 220w at say -2.0% and then hits 280w at a +2.0%
We then got to the climb and the resistance kicked in, oops, gear gear gear, click click click. Oh, that's weird, I've now got 320w on the power display. It does actually feel like you're climbing a hill, but power is arguably easier to maintain as your cadence drops down to say 70 from 90. Hmmm
I'm not sure at this stage which I prefer, dumb or smart. If my legs feel OK tomorrow after new saddle position, cleat position and floating cleats I will try a lap of watopia with both.
Edit. That's interesting, my segment times on flatfish sections were the quickest of 4 tries today when in variable. My sections on the mountain were fractionally down on my PRs, but only a few seconds and I wasn't pushing that hard. Could be interesting to see more results.
I am also doing the KISS race tonight. I will be in the C Race as 'J.Robinson BRT' It should be fun, the figure of 8 course also leads to some good racing. As the race is split into 4 seperate events I am sure Zwift will work fine.
I'm racing B's just to be involved but still resting my hip really.
Nath- you should soooooo knock 10kg offf your weight for tonight- think of the infamy when you're handing Si Richardson his arse on a plate 😀
Nath not sure that you can read much into comparing average power?
If you race on the Stages tonight it could be the perfect opportunity to get some data for ZADA approval 🙂
Hopefully see you on the start line
Weeksy- didn't Joe say the power figures weren't accurate when set as a controllable trainer??
.Weeksy- didn't Joe say the power figures weren't accurate when set as a controllable trainer
First time I ran it I was getting crazy figures in that mode but I dont know where the slider was set to. Today it seemed 'right' as when I got to a slight downhill, my output would drop to say 200w as the resistance eased, when on flat,240w seemed like my usual 240w effort and cadence.
As far as I know, Joe always ran it in full smart mode, but I'll throw him a pm on other forum later to check, curious to know.
@richP - no no I only averaged for comparing against the crit race, not the accuracy of the powermeter vs my tacx.
For that I did other tests 😆
See you there!
@Crosshair - nah I'd need to half my weight for that haha
Weeksy- might be worth checking. I thought he said it wasn't consistently accurate in that mode but could be wrong......
I can always bring the Triban+ Stages over for you to check it 😉
Usually I'm just plugging along at say 250w and that's me, flat, hills, etc. In variable it drops to 220w at say -2.0% and then hits 280w at a +2.0%
Not uncommon in real world either. Most people put out more power when they've got something to push against.
Variable resistance!
Only a few rides in with a properly smart trainer here and really liking it so far. As an alternative to getting out for a ride I think the need to change gears (with the associated variances in cadence and power) makes it more beneficial than a dumb trainer.
Weeksy- didn't Joe say the power figures weren't accurate when set as a controllable trainer??
Wonder why this would be?
I've compared the power readings from my powermeter (a 4iiii Precision) with the power readings on Zwift from the T2240 (I can chose whether to use the power meter or the turbo power readings) and they seemed reasonably close.
.I can always bring the Triban+ Stages over for you to check it
This is where I get confused, how would the stages know about the hills and virtual resistance via zwift? E.g when I go uphill, my wheel slows because of resistance, wouldn't the Stages get confused?
More than happy to know the answer via the Triban, at home all day Thurs and Fri.
not sure, first time I tried it I was putting out 900w everywhere and up out of the saddle. But not sure what settings I had there, so went dumb trainer mode for months, just fancied trying it today..Wonder why this would be?
Because the wattage on screen represents a calculation of what your legs are producing based on the flywheel speed of the Turbo at various research resistance setting. The Stages or Vectors or any sort of strain gauge PM measures what your legs are actually producing*. That's why you can use a PM on any old dumb Turbo- the resistance is irrelevant because whatever it is, the PM can measure it with no guess work.
MrBlobby- Weeksy is using another friends BKool and I'm sure he said it wasn't matching his Garmin Vectors when in Variable Resistance mode- it wasn't an issue with Zwift variable resistance per say.
*albeit in the case of the Stages by measuring your left leg power and x2ing it.
Double post
This is where I get confused, how would the stages know about the hills and virtual resistance via zwift? E.g when I go uphill, my wheel slows because of resistance, wouldn't the Stages get confused?
The power meter doesn't need to know - it just measures the power you're putting out (which Zwift then uses to work out a speed). If you have a smart trainer it'll still increase the resistance when you hit a hill, if you have a dumb trainer then you could manually increase the resistance if you want. If you increase your power output when you hit a hill then your speed in Zwift will decrease, even if your wheel speed on the trainer stays the same.
I'd be curious to know without doubt. I'm not convinced yet anyway I'd use full smart mode as I don't think it suits me, but nice to know how right or wrong it would be if I tried it.
Woohoo! I am currently wearing the green jersey!!
Not 100% sure how it works as, having beasted myself on the sprint, I was in 2nd by almost a second. Then the no.1 guy disappeared (do the times expire after 1 hr?) so I guess I inherited it!
Im in for KISS try Cat B / lookout for Ashraf
Crikey almost 1000 riders
Entered through GCN (D) race, STW is in my name
Good luck all
Going for a ride at 8, sounds like it's going to be busy round the island!
Zilog, great work 🙂
10 mins to go, A has 95 already!
Folk are struggling to get online already
I'm in cat B start pen but my hip isn't great so only goal is to finish the course. Will get a tow from some TFC team mates in C hopefully.
Will not load for me. Rookie error to load up so near to 8pm?
Go go go!
Hmmm, stuck at log in screen. :-/
Hah, mobile link has booted me out and can't get back in. Pc still OK fingers crossed
likewise....stuck on login screen, bad gateway.
We take your money, but forgot to buy the hardware shock.
130 in the c-pen. I'm three rows back and think I might get swamped a bit at the start.
Doesn't look like it's going to work.
Cant get on ... bad gateway gutted
Spent 15 mins here but not happening. Bad gateway etc.. 🙁
Can't get in 🙁 Wasn't even going to do the GCN ride. Going to have to go old skool for this session.
Arghh.......
Wow, the login server is dead, it's fine once you're in. Thought id forgotten my password :/
I got in early for a warm up, on the line now.
In Watopia riding around but it won't let me go to the pen
Back to Traineroad tonight then....
Got stuck on my own in the pen.
Even Si from GCN didn't get a ride!!!
yep, was just going on for a ride and can't even get in.
Bit of an own goal, running a big partner event without the infrastructure to support it?
Indeed a botnof an own goal - now sat on sofa, fire lit, crisps open.....
A little bit pee'd off about this event tonight as one of the few week nights I can get on the trainer to go on zwift and I can't even logon! Early start tomorrow I guess!
Yeah major balls up really. Couldn't even log in to spectate! Mobile Link not working either. Also unfair to those who just wanted to go for a normal ride, as mentioned
following their twitter and they're blaming their service provider; now looking to reschedule the GCN event.
https://twitter.com/GoZwift/status/821452035321040896
I mean how long can it take to hot switch over to the up-to-the minute log shipped DR servers? Unless...
ahh man I was gonna win Cat C??!?!? 😛
Bottom of KoM climb in a really good group and everyone vanished. Solo TT to the finish.....
Me too Jam-bo!!! What Cat??
Cat C. Got a really good start. Reverse KoM split the main group up a bit. Rode with 3-4 TFC riders for a bit and got caught by a larger group through the tunnels which was working well. Halfway up the KoM climb and working my way up through the group and it all went quiet.
Never mind. Don't think I'll bother with the re-run
Couldnt even log in so did a sufferfest instead. Feels like old tech in comparision now but still a good workout and beats staring into space.
And I somehow managed to pair my trainer as a dumb trainer which was irritating.
I'm spotting a theme here, I thought I won D, eheh. Mine didn't auto upload at the end either, had to manually upload the fit file and name it.
Such a shame, that was the most I've caned myself so far. Gutted it didn't seem to count.
they are either going to have to start capping numbers in races or seriously up their server capacity.
Was it total numbers or just hundreds of people leaving it until the last minute to login? Or a bit of both?
Both.
The login server died at the start, I managed to get in earlier, but couldnt connect via my mobile. The race seemd to start fine. About half way through people started vanishing. Evidentally everyone thought they won.
Well, they run their website on AWS so a fair chance the game runs on AWS too. I guess they didn't pay the extra charge for auto-scaling.
It lost my whole .fit file 🙁
.fit files are normally stored locally (on a PC anyway). In the Zwift directory.
I did the ZTR race and found it difficult to determine who I was racing against with so many riders on the island. Never seen that many before, think it was almost 4000, probably warming up for KISS.
I managed to start the KISS race but never intended to finish, a warm up followed by ZTR was enough, so backed off at the top of the first climb and climbed off by the pier.
Kinda sucks for everyone that had problems, but lets face it, they are hardly the first gaming company to have issues with large numbers.
Even the big software houses making AAA games have problems with login servers falling over and disconnects from main game servers.
sucks. i manually uploaded mine to strava. PR's all the way until everyone disappeared, and then kinda lost the impetus.
Beej, I will double check my pc but it's definitely not on my Zwift account rides- it's showing as a load of 0's.
check \Documents\Zwift\Activities
all activities save there on the PC version. I manually uploaded mine to strava
Should be in Document/Zwift/Activities . I had my internet connection go down once and was riding alone. Nothing recorded on the Zwift site but the .fit stored locally was fine.
Did my intervals with my garmin then logged in to Zwift about half nine for a cool down ride. Weirdly the turbo control thing was totally out of sync with the video, so you'd hit a hill and about 30 seconds later you'd feel the hill. Servers need a reboot!
I did the ZTR race tonight. Fortunately I didn't experience any issues! Very tough race, finished 14th out of 60 something in the A category. I'm chuffed with that. 5 laps of the flat course.
Hung on to the lead group for the first half, then got dropped and had a battle with a few guys along the way. Managed to stay ahead of the chasing pack so all good
Thankfully I was on earlier for a ride about and it was all fine. I was thinking about doing one of the races but glad I didn't now!
I logged in early and it was all going well for me. Although I guessed there would be problems when people started not being able to log in. I got a good start in the Cs, went over the reverse KOM in the lead group, we managed to increase the gap on the group behind on the middle flat sections, a few riders started disappearing as we made the left turn to the forward KOM, everyone then disappeared for me as I went over the bridge for the climb. I just rode solo to the finish. The riding solo to the finish was a bit like KISS races in the old days, when numbers were small and it often ended up as a TT effort.
My ride didn't upload to Strava either, and wasn't in my Zwift account. It was stored on my PC, so uploaded from there.
Hopefully Zwift can sort this out. I think this is the third time it has happened on big rides they have promoted.
Ah thanks everyone. I normally rescue it from Zwift.com in the bath in my iPhone lol
Found it locally on the Pc 🙂
I wasted butter, got sugar high on energy sweets and a energy gel for nothing this evening 😆
I so had this race in the bag, and that's where it will remain in my mind.
Hopefully they'll fix it for next time, sounds like they need to do some modernising before launching a new map. With the introduction of the iOS app I would have thought massive uplift in numbers, particularly in January, would have been inevitable.
there are some results on zwiftpower but most people are showing as DNF & unlinked.
It is funny that Russ Downing has a DQ from the As for not wearing a HRM.
I am not sure how many of the results are correct. I just looked at the Strava Flyb-by of my ride compared to a team mate and it looks like we started a couple of minutes apart, but we actually rode the first 10 minutes or so together.
I show as unlinked and it claims my time was 58 minutes, even though my Strava has it listed as 54 including cool down. Seems a bit broken.
Never mind, had fun 🙂
Strava isn't reliable- it depends on your PC clock time or something.... Back in ye olden days, people used time sync programs to make sure their data was worth comparing.
Zwiftpower made this unnecessary.....it's even more accurate than the Zwift generated table at the end of some races..... when it works 😉
Indeed, but its unlinked as its only got data from Strava, no data from Zwift. The extra 4 mins will be the slightly broken start times, for me the race didnt start until 20:10 or so. All a bit weird.
If they are indeed running on AWS servers they've certainly considered scaling up, Id assume they just need to pay a bit more!