I flippin knew it wouldnt work.

No Zwifting for me last night as the weather here in Wales was dry and bright for the first time in for ever. I am fortunate to live on a road that leads to the highest surfaced pass in Wales so I arraged with a mate from the other side that we would do a loop. He would come up and oper the pass and I would leave it a while and ride up to meet him before turning around, doing the loop and returning via the pass from the other side on my own. Not sure if my mate left late but I was almost on top of the pass before I met him, then turned tail, back down the valley, back up the other valley and after parting ways I went back over the top and down again and back home.

My missus had asked how lon I would be. Couple of hours at most I had said, its only about 30km. Hmmm, I did 66 km and 1000m of climbing 🙂

Felt strong and good on the bike, especially on the short punchy climbs. Seems this Turbo lark is starting to pay dividends. And as a bonus I weighed in back at base on return and was bang on 85kg which is my Corpulent Collective target weight. Result. Just need to keep at it so it sticks. Might have a day off today though

I had a social ride on zwift today and i ended up sweeping for a bit. After a while the stragglers either jacked in or just ground to a halt but i realised i was nearly a minute behind the group so i decided to try and catch up. Oh man it was torture, i spent about 6 minutes at 350w (approx 4.5w/kg) with hr at 175w and ended up with 2 PR’S,it was meant to be a social ride!!

Just had my annual health assessment with work, signs are looking good since I’ve been zwifting.

Finally below 80kg, now @ 78kg, at least now i can change this on Zwift, think its at 84kg

Lost 6% body fat and BMI has reduced to 20.68 from 24ish last year.

On a side note, we worked out that to maintain my weight, with the exercise I’m doing, i need to eat around 3800-4200 calories a day.  No wonder I’m constantly eating and hungry!

@welshfarmer You lucky so and so, I take it Bwlch y Groes is on your doorstep?

Ooh I’m going to bet on Gospel Pass

less dramatic but technically higher I think

Another 2 x Sweet Spot on the London Loop another climbers jersey.  Again, no idea how, as it appeared when I was on my cool down at 140w, but hey ho.

If you were second fastest up a climb and then the leaders hour expired- you would inherit the jersey.

In have spent the last couple of months just riding hills to try and get stronger.  It seems to be working. I am aiming to do that for the rest of this month and then try some races.

I also have the problem that I generally ride first thing in the morning before work and at the moment there don’t seem to be any races on that work for me time wise.

I have also been doing a bit outside including one 55km ride around some hills on my mountain bike. My son and I are doing a team duathlon at the end of May. He running, me on the bike.  I’ve never ridden in a race before and I am a bit nervous as it is a tough course.

Race report from the 19:00hrs WBR Chop Race:

Hold, Hold , Hold, panic a bit, hold some more, wind it up……..GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was a good fun ride…..not really a race though.

Much like mos I’m working through the 4wk ftp booster. Just finished week 3 workout 3 – Spiked tempo.

Not too stressed afterwards, but have developed knee pain just behind and to the left of my left kneecap. Will have to look at fit again. Not sure if I’m sitting too far forwards, or have an it band issue.

Also on the quest to find a (more) comfortable saddle. Currently on a Fizik Antares, but may need something a bit wider. Tried a fabric scoop, an older specialized, and most of the Selle Italia range (cutouts just gave me two pressure points instead of one).

Going to move things around for the rest of the week as I’m taking part in the Zwift Fondo on Sunday, so that I can get my name in the draw for a Canyon bike.

Have a place in RideLondon in July, so will be starting the 16wk training plan (when they put it up) on 2nd April. Should start to lose weight again during an endurance plan.

Still haven’t tried a race properly yet.

@ttp – wk 4 was fairly hard as I remember.  Watch that you don’t cause damage; might well unearth odd technique as it ramps up.

Tiger has it. Gospel Pass.

Debating taking part in the Everesting challenge later in the year. 16 times from Hay to the top of the Gospel Pass and back, all within 24 hours. 8800 m of climbing. I have only done it once from that side and it seems to be approximately an hour round trip (45 mins up and 15 down). Something to aim for perhaps.

@scaredypants – guess I’m fairly lucky that my wife is a physio. Sports is not her speciality, but plenty of our friends are in that area.

Going to have a proper bike fit at some point, so that may help.

The two workouts I’m not looking forwards to are wk3 Day 7 Max Aerobic Finale and the wk4 FTP test itself.

Fairly sure I could raise my ftp already. I set it in the last Zwift Fondo on the mountain climb, but may just take it a bit easier this week and wait for the test.

Actually interested to see what the maximum ftp value I can attain with training. Maybe a few cycles of the 4wk booster with rest in between?

It seems there is no end to my mastery of tactics.

I did the ZHR 3 laps of greater london flat this morning and i wasnt really in the mood for it as i have done 110 miles on zwift since Monday. I adjusted my cleats last night so i thought i might as well check positioning so did the race.

Thankfully the pace wasnt very high,in fact i didnt get over 150 bpm on hr until we had done 9.5 miles. We were still going fast though as we caught the C group a long way from the finish, i guess it was having a large group that made it feel easy. Anyway the pace picked up about 2/3rds the way round but we were still a group of about 15-20 with a few C riders who tagged on. Heading on to the finish straight for a big bunch sprint i decided to delay mine as i knew my legs were pretty shot. Everyone went with 0.3m to go but i decided to give it a few more secs and try and go with 0.2 to go. Quite a few passed me but i then opened up the taps and hit the aero PU, next time i looked up i was hitting 723w and about to catch the front rider who was a zp user. I passed him with 50 meters to go and cruised over the line for GOLD. I actually had over a second to spare so not sure what really happened to everyone in that last 300m as my sprint is pretty rubbish in terms of wattage.

https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=48382&sid=354f43d9683dcf8367ed61e1f819d91c

🙁 seems my zwifting is over for a while. Not sure if something has updated but I am now having constant problem with my graphics crashing out. Got about 2 mins into a race tonight, going well at front of the C group holding 300+ W to try and get a good lead and bang. All shuts down with GPU issues. Tried 4 more times to get on and each time it crashed out shortly after I got riding along. Ah well, that old PC has been working on borrowed time for a while now so I guess it is time to upgrade.

I was seeing pauses last night too, especially in London itself. Not seen that before. I’m on a 2013 13″ Macbook Pro. When/If I get the garage cleared I’ll invest in an Apple TV, a decent size TV + better fans. Looks like the cheapest way to get running reliably. Need to use the mobile app depending on number of sensors.

Gentle Pilgrims of Zwift for a 45km ride today… Nothing too stressful but wanted some calories rather than flat out.

Scales showing 14st 5 today… Which makes me very happy… Still got hopes of a 14st 0 at some stage and even if just for 1 day…. a 13 !

Back with a vengeance tonight after yesterdays fiasco 🙂

Needed to push the boundaries so went for a 3 lap hilly race. Well, one hell of a tempo at the front of the group c and I fair flew up the fist hill, knocking 20 seconds of my pb. Couldn’t catch the chaps in front but managed to hold my own for the whole lap until 2 others pulled me in after the sprint. Somehow couldn’t keep the pace up the hill the second time and got dropped by my 2 new buddies and picked up another couple who I had a great ride with for the whole of lap 2. Unfortunately the one rider pulled up after the finish of that lap and I once again got dropped up the climb while watching some fast approachers from the rear. Cleared the climb with a bout 2 seconds in hand and managed to maintain about 5-6 secs lead all the way to the last climb following the sprint where I got hauled in by 2 more and we played cat and mouse to the end. I had an Aero to play at 300m from the finish and managed to hold 450+W all the way to the line to beat the 2 followers by 1 & 2 secs respectively. Was 6th on the board but Zwift power has bumped 3 of my fellow C riders up to Group B (I thought they were going well!) meaning I had a Bronze for 3rd. I also saw FTP increase from 265 to 275. At this rate I fear I am soon to be a very low ranking Group B rider rather than normally near the top of Group C.

Great riding!

For a moment I thought we were in the same race but no I did a 3 lapper a couple of hours later.

Decent effort off the line but not silly but maintained it all the way up the KOM to tag onto the back of a group running about 20th.

2nd lap got dropped up the KOM for maybe 10 seconds and ended up with 2 others and 2 of us pulled hard to try and get them back. Big effort up the hill before the esses got us within 5 seconds and then some superhero passed us on the flat and dragged us to them after the finish line. (He was 30 seconds up by the top of the KOM)

My finish line for the day was the top of the KOM so went to the front of the group on the steep corner as went as hard as I could maintain (300watts/3.8w/kg) to the top which kept me in the group. Regrouped and kept myself near the front of a group of about 8 to ensure anybody suffering more then me didn’t get a rest.

Smashed it up the climb after the sprint before the esses with 1 other who had the same idea at 400 to 600watts and ended up with 3 of us left and the rest 5 seconds adrift. Worked together to maintain it and hit the front along the finish and went at a hard pace from 600m to make sure nobody came back but didn’t dislodge the other 2. I should really use the rear facing camera at this point! They both outsprinted me easily but I’d made sure of a better placing on the KOM and the short climb.

19th overall currently up to 13th in the probably finalised results.

https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=48655

I’m suprised at my low w/kg compared to others as I deliberatley spent more time at the front than a lot of other races I’ve done. When the pace wained especially on the flat I try and bring the power requirement of everyone back up to ensure no real rest and to make sure groups behind can’t catch us.

That’s a big difference since my first races back in November. I can now recover from hard efforts relatively quickly to get back to the front of a group to try and shell out anyone who used to be like me :0)

I’ve tried the same tactic a few times of pushing on hard, but rarely has it worked

Not sure it worked but then only 2 of 8 could follow up the little climb or get back to me so it might have worked.

Well that was not as bad as I thought.

4wk FTP Builder – Wk 3 Day 7 Max Aerobic Finale.

Felt comfortable all through the lead up to the 6 minute free ride effort, so decided to see what I could do.

Dragged 5 minute watts up from about 325 to 460 (4.89w/kg). I’ve never really targeted this before, so happy with that. Spent the last minute at over 500w. Next time I’ll pick a fairly level course, rather than the Mountain route as there were a lot of resistance variations that interrupted the effort a bit.

Upped 1s and 5s to 1239w (13.18w/kg) and 1191w (12.67w/kg) respectively.

Zwift Fondo tomorrow (Pretzel route), but may ride it a little slower than before to recover ready for next weeks efforts building to the FTP test.

Level 14 gained too.

According to Stravistics I’m back to the fitness level that I was last July.

See there are rumours that an Alpe d’Huez like route is about to be added (From Zwift facebook page). Hopefully the start of many famous routes to come (not all mountains either).

I’m suprised at my low w/kg compared to others as I deliberatley spent more time at the front than a lot of other races I’ve done.

Isn’t that all going to be relative to the profile of the course. The Zwift fixation on w/kg as its dominant metric – in the sense that it’s the one which is permanently displayed – tends to mean that people forget that on flat roads, outright wattage is the main determinant of speed regardless of weight. Throw in drafting effects and it’s more complicated than just power relative to weight.

It’s the reason why you can be putting out, say, 3 w/kg and someone much heavier who puts out the same w/kg will simply ride away from you, or will ride away from you putting out a lower w/kg value. Obviously on steep ups where gravity is the main limiter, w/kg is a far more useful metric, but mostly rides don’t consist entirely of steep ups.

At its worst, you get the situation where a group ride leader calls for, say, 2.5 w/kg and is then bemused that the group explodes. Of course it does, not everybody weighs the same. Anyway…

I’d never noticed the Mega Pretzel route before! Has anyone tried it??

https://zwiftinsider.com/mega-pretzel/

Decided to give my rusty road skills a test on the Zwift Donut Bicicletta race at 1pm.    That should be fun!

I’m struggling with decisions today, despite not pushing that hard at Swinley yesterday my legs are feeling it today. I was planning on Zwifting by now on the gentle DBR bimble, but ended up spannering the bikes earlier instead.

Oops, went a lot faster than I intended and increased my ftp from 320 to 346. That’s not what I intended. Mind you the training must be paying off because I felt much better for longer.

Held one of the sprint jerseys for an hour too, and had a cheeky sprint off at the end to gain a few places. 23rd? out of 400 and I’m happy with that. Targeted top 60.

I do like the fondos.

Now fingers crossed for that Canyon Endurace.

FTP of 346, by Eck!

FTP of 346, by Eck!

He’s 9ft 3 though (hopefully 😳😆 )

That’s a HUGE ftp increase! Well done that man.

I’m feeling proper time crunched at the moment, I’ve not done any riding the last couple of weekends and i’m really starting to struggle squeezing enough* time in during the week. Even then i’m only spending time in the garage it still counts as ‘out’ really and we’ve got a load of stuff to do before this baby arrives… I might have a crack at one of the training programs to give me a bit of structure, since Jan everything has been focused around 10pm Tuesday nights for the CVR races. Unfortunately didn’t end up in the playoffs in the post season then had my network connection drop in the last race. I’m just rambling but I’ve just lost my mojo a bit, meh.

*I’ve no idea what constitutes enough time 😀

Wow, big numbers Paul. I am targeting a 300 ftp for this year. Should be doable as I have gone from 230 to 275 in the last 2 months. I have also lost 8 kilos and would love to continue to lose another 5 and get weight down to 80. Should give me a good chance in the Group B races then. Reckon that would be the best I can hope for with my physiology (small lungs and age are against me here 🙂 )

@scaled Know the feeling with babies. I’ve found the 1 hour format of many of the training rides to work very well for me. Kids in bed by 8pm, dad in the garage for an hour, then about an hour with my wife after.

Also alcohol helps ;-P

He’s 9ft 3 though (hopefully )

6ft 4 and a half (the half is important) actually, and getting closer (in a good way) to 93kg.

I just concentrated on maintaining 360w up Watopia mountain. I was surprised myself that I could maintain that. Ended up with an average over the 2 hours of just over 343w according to Strava. I’ll see how this week goes, but if I feel like this morning I reckon that I could bump that figure even higher. It’s become a bit of a game now.

Another nice figure to be presented is calories burnt 2879kcal. I know it’s unlikely to be accurate, but it explains why I’m damn hungry now.

Bumping the ftp may bite me this week though with wk 4 of the ftp booster. May leave a day of rest before I tackle that one, then a week of no structure, before starting the 16wk programme for RideLondon.

Hey guys. After first summer of road riding here in Oz the nights are starting to draw in, and I think in order to keep up the fitness gain I’m ready to Zwift. As I gather my 7 year old MacBook Air won’t have the grunt, wondering if the AppleTV interface works well?

Moving house shortly and should have space in our new garage to set things up. Will the Apple TV deal with HRM as well as the smart trainer and associated sensors?

I have been assured that Apple TV is one of the best options (if you have a good internet I assume). I run the programme reasonably well (if a bit low on graphic quality and a few glitches) on my old Pentium 4 machine from 2005. I did have to get more ram and a better GPU in there and change the OS to Win7 to get it to run

@zokes I’m happy to be corrected, but from what I understand you will need the 4k Apple TV, and only two Bluetooth (not sure about ANT+) sensors can be linked at a time. To get round that you need the Zwift companion app on a phone and link the additional sensors to that.

Looking to go down this route too.

I’m on a 2013 MacBook Pro 13″ and it runs OK at Medium resolution, but goes to pieces on high.

Just did a cheeky little recovery race, well thought it would be a recovery after keeping up with Weeksy yesterday at Swinley so thought I’ll go steady and run in Cat D legs are surprising heavy after yesterday.

3 lap hilly reverse 28k

Plan failed!!  I got into a group and I just can’t sit if they are going too slow so kangaroo’d a few groups and some came with until it was a full race with Cs & Bs stretch and pull back, test and regroup

Until a sprint for the finish, felt bad being a D but genuinely didn’t enter to go mad.

Deserve to be DQ’d 🙂   https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=48972

New FTP though of 298w (nearly there)

@Tiger6791 – It’s always when you least expect/plan it.