Have either of you considered stretching your rides out. If your always doing stuff at max pace and max (for example) 25km distance then you’ll be use to doing 25km and being done. If you did say another 10-15km on top of that (at a lower pace) you should find that its easier to produce the same effort you are now over the 25km. I got my best running half time using this approach. I was training with a neighbour that was expecting to take around two hours. We were doing training runs under distance but for up to 1:45 at a time. The only fast running I was doing was parkrun each week. When it came to the event my target was 1:30 which even though I was going faster was well within the time my body was used to moving for.

I’m trying to apply this is zwift by joining some of the big WBR group rides and doing extra distance after races finish. Current aim is to do at least 50km per session where I can.

@lyrikal, not surprised you got DQ’d in that race. You’ve clearly got the power to be in B even if your not as competitive as you’d like and hills tend to bring out a higher average. FWIW even in A I get dropped like a stone on most climbs (even though I quite like climbing).

@Weeksey I agree with Phil56, you’ve easily got the potential to be a competitive B. Yours stats still show an upward trend to me. If you combined this with a small weight loss* then you’d be right in the mix. You clearly know the tactics while many don’t.

* yeah this is easy to chuck out there but harder to achieve, especially at this time of year. I’ve spent the best part of 10 years getting down from just over 100Kg to my current 78Kg in small steps.

That aint happening in my world, i don’t have the desire or willpower to ride like that

I know but I thought I’d pick up the slack ;0)

I’ll tell you what you could get to in about 8 weeks when I finish the 2nd 6 week block. Starting FTP 269 5 weeks ago and I’ve followed the first plan fairly consistently with some odd races. It helps me that I’m targeting outdoor stuff in Spring rather than racing on Zwift which is fun but not something I want to do more than once a week and in reality is more like every other week.

But as Kryten says there are other benefits from training other than the actual watts gained.

I struggle with extending the time of rides, not pysically but mentally… When i did the 50km race the other day that was 1hr 10 mins and there was no drop-off from the start to the end as such. But if doing it myself outside of a race then i’m struggling for putting the effort in.

Competitive B…. depends on course and distance and field 🙂

Anyone ever feel they have reached a plateau or possibly your genetic limit. I did an FTP test last week and just gained 1w. It’s been a lot of training for very little gain.

As Kryton says, there’s more to fitness / performance than just ftp. Someone with a respectable ftp, for example, could theoretically ride at that level for an hour TT style, but if you have the same ftp, but are able, for example, to make repeated efforts up into VO2Max territory and recover at that pace again and again and they can’t, you will break them. Ditto if you can out-sprint them at the end.

If you’re a mountain biker, having a high ftp is a small part of if. I used to ride with a mate who had a background of iron man triathlon training. On a mountain bike you could kill him by dragging him over threshold on short, sharp, technical climbs because he never trained to recover from hard efforts above threshold.

The Sufferfest 4DP thing where they measure 5 sec, 1 min, 5 min and 20 min efforts to gauge what type of rider you reflects this. You can then choose to do workouts / plan that address your weaknesses and also adjusts your power targets in workouts to reflect your profile.

It’s a little basic compared to having a personalised coaching plan with ongoing feedback, but it’s arguably a sharper tool than just working from ftp alone. Of course you can address your weaknesses without doing all that, but it gives you a framework and more than just educated guesses to go on.

Also, more generally, if you’re repeatedly doing the same sort of training, try mixing things up to shock your body into responding is the obvious advice.

In my case I’ve done the trainer road thing yeah. My power output for 15s is up at cat 1, 20mins not so good hence trying to push up my FTP. I guess it’s not bad at 3.5wkg. I’ve been mountain biking for years and I guess thats where explosive power comes from, concentrating on recovering at threshold is the key for me I think.

Long distance stuff I’m ok with. Did a 200 mile ride earlier in the year at 19mph and club runs every weekend end up around 75 miles. I want to make A4 races as easy as possible I think!!!

They’ll be the odd enduro race in there too. The road and zwift fitness helps big time with that. I can still concentrate when it gets technical.

Zwift has been great though. My trainer used to be neglected and now I look forward to it.

Did the old WBR one lapper last night, god i take ages to warm up!  It feels almost as if it’s the turbo that takes half an hour to ease up but that’s not possible with a magnetic turbo is it?

The race was largely uneventful, seems that someone got off the front by a few seconds, it must have been round the hairpin before the flamme rouge, i didn’t notice anyway. Won the sprint but was 3 secs down on the winner. Didn’t feel great, didn’t feel terrible.

After that though i just did a few freeride ramps, grabbed a few wheels and kept zipped round the classique course while watching walking dead on netflix. I started to feel progressively stronger (and knew that the Mrs was watching Made in Chelsea, so wasn’t in a rush to get back indoors) changed direction and headed towards fox hill and did a nice steady time up there and bagged myself a spotty jumper, almost enjoyed it! then the loop took me round to leith hill, definitely didn’t enjoy that one as much but picked up another jersey.

I had the daft idea that I should work out how to get to box hill and do that but naaaah, i had 60k in the bank by then and it was getting late. Good ride though, first time i’ve really enjoyed something other than racing.

Did a 200 mile ride earlier in the year at 19mph

Bloody hell, solo?

Not solo no, 6 of us and on a route with no big climbs.

I did one last year with 200 miles and 14000ft of climbing. That was a different matter. I don’t think I managed 14mph

Checking in. Not raced in ages!

Apologies if I don’t respond to anyone on Zwift, I’m usually running TrainerRoad at the same time as I use Zwift as a visual distraction/log the “miles”.

I just did an ftp test: 310w @ 75kg, 6w less than my previous test a couple of months ago. I’ve barely been doing any cycling but I’ve been religiously going to the gym mon-fri (hoping the 5kg is upper body muscle ready for mtb’ing Haha) so I’m happy at that, if I do any racing on Zwift though it’ll be TTs as I’m not sure I have any top end…

New one tonight, I actually got away from a group and stayed away. Been struggling with a dodgy back so didn’t kill myself trying to stay with the front group on the WBR 3 lap flat race. Was in the 2nd group, a few fellow B’s but mostly C’s. Pootled along at a very sedate pace, then a break went with 10km left, nearly missed it but sprinted across the gap. Pace was higher from that point forward, but still fairly comfortable. I had an aero boost which I’d kept all race so decided I’d not wait for the sprint and have a go at 2k to go. Pace was quite high at 2km so waited til about 1.5km to go, used the aero boost and just went as hard as I could for the rest. Before I knew it I had a decent gap and even managed to freewheel over the line. And then as is normal for WBR I got disqualified.

Think I’ve slipped into a habit of hanging round at the back cos it’s more fun. Must put more effort in at the start to stay with the front group 🙂

Hey Dazh, I was in the same race it seems. I was also disqualified for racing as a C while it appears ZP have bumped me up to a B! I hadn’t realised that they had done this and that you don’t automatically get reassigned in a WBR race. Ah well, you live and learn. I purposely took it a bit steady so as not to be pushed up into B again and was a pretty steady race all told with a nice tight bunch from about 34-50th place. It all stayed together with only a couple of minor short breaks, right up till the final sprint. Managed to come in in about 4th-5th in the bunch sprint which would have placed me around 2nd/3rd in the Cat C group I thought I was racing. Was 46 seconds down on Daz! Will try harder next time 🙂

If you’re purposely holding back to stay in cat C shouldn’t you just race in cat B??

@Dazh, seems your on a classic trainer. That means you have to use a HR monitor to avoid DQ. Do you use the companion app? If yes does your phone support Bluetooth 4 ble?

If you’re purposely holding back to stay in cat C shouldn’t you just race in cat B??

This, definitely. Embrace the upgrade.

I’m actually on a trainer with a power meter but it keeps reading as ZP which is a bit weird so think it might be on the blink.Either that or the ant+ dongle is knackered. But yes I do need a HRM. Anyone recommend one? I’m not mad keen on chest straps but needs must I suppose.

Recommended by DCRainmaker but not cheap. I just bought another Garmin strap for £25 instead.

https://www.scosche.com/rhythm-plus-heart-rate-monitor-armband

I’m using one of the decathlon ones https://www.decathlon.co.uk/ant-bluetooth-smart-hrm-id_8334795.html . Could not find any non chest strap ones at a sensible price.

What trainer? When you pair does it appear in the top left as a power meter? Could be advertising itself as more than one device and the game is locking onto the wrong one.

I raced in the KISS greater London hilly loop last night. Most of the big guns were in the earlier GCN race so was hopefully for a good result. There was also a good team turnout. The catch was I did an 8 mile run over the weekend (on no run training) and my legs were seriously stiff.

Pace was easy till the hill, really easy. HR was barely above 140! A stayed in mostly a big blob. Leith hill sorted that out and fractured the whole lot apart. I ended up in a group of four with one other BRT rider. We had a virtual team car running on discord which really helped me on the climb. Couple of times I thought I was done and the encouragement spurred me on. The group of four held till the top and I collected a feather from the banner.

The other two riders seemed to be coasting down the other side so I out in some power spikes to wake them up :D. There was a fiat bit of tactical chat on the way down. I was pretty sure I had no sprint from leg tiredness. The stiff bits weren’t effecting my spinning but bigger efforts they made themselves known. Having the feather gave me one chance, go for broke on the ramp out of the underground. I think this caught the others napping and I managed a 10s gap on them by the time I was on the bridge. This opened to 15s before I had to calm it down. Just a matter of holding on for the last km now. One of them tried to come back but Instill had a 5s gap at the finish.

https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=107197

Firmly mid pack but PR for the route and Leith hill. Also first time I kept up with any As on that climb. Very good event all considered.

still beat all the Bs though 🙂  Good one.

Did the morning grind race which has all my nemesis in the race so its super competitive and also brutally hard. I think Scaled was in the race but he seemed to be going backwards so i assume his recent efforts took there toll. I sent him a ride on when we caught him hoping he might drag me along but he slowly slipped out of the back of our group. Anyway it was a brutal race and ended up in a big bunch finish, i ended up 7th i think but we were all seperated by only 2s. The A group race must have been a cracker as i think the first dozen riders were all within 1s.

Ahh thanks for the Ride On, Blader.

Monday took it out of me I suppose, then had a load of people on Teams messaging me, I really need to book that time out so it looks like i’m in a meeting 😀

Just watched the video from the race this morning and after about 45s i am actually in 2nd place,it didnt last very long. The race was faster than i thought as i had 26 acheivements according to strava. I hadnt realised just how much wattage i was putting out, holding 425w for a minute in the middle of the race i think did the damage to my legs. The first lap i avgd 307w which is probably why i seemed to spend the rest of the race trying to get my legs and breath bsck.

“mate, we have a server/cluster/farm down”

Is the message i dread when i’m cycling…. Jabber pops up… “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO”

I hadnt realised just how much wattage i was putting out, holding 425w for a minute in the middle of the race i think did the damage to my legs. The first lap i avgd 307w which is probably why i seemed to spend the rest of the race trying to get my legs and breath bsck.

That’s big boy numbers there !

Scaled, you were right in the mix at the end of lap 2 as i saw your name on the video.

Weeksy, sadly big boys numbers in the middle of races means little boys numbers at the end of races. I just never have enough left in the tank for a good sprint,something to work on over the winter.

Nah, I got shelled out the back on the second time up the KOM climb – nowt in the legs for that, averaged 4.3w/kg up to the point i was dropped. I thought that was a doubledraft race but apparently not :/

Anyone noticed the effects of the DD ?

I’ve only done 1 race with it and apart from a larger group it didn’t seem any easier/quicker really.

I only notice it if you drop off the back,anything more than a few seconds and you will have to turn yourself inside out to get back on, it is horrendous. To me all it seems to have done is reduce the amount of attacks off the front as it is simply too hard to drop a group now.

Doing a few Zwift events we’ve been having a few dropouts where everyone else vanishes. Is this likely a problem with our limited internet or is it a known zwift issue? We have a wifi extender due to stone walls etc which is slightly weak/slow compared to our main router but not really poor. The dropout is a bit annoying as you seem to lose the draught meaning you’re dropped by the time it comes back. Are the power line extenders a better solution than a plug-in wifi thingy?

It can happen when it’s really busy, evenings etc with 7000+ riding but i’ve barely ever suffered with it myself

To me all it seems to have done is reduce the amount of attacks off the front as it is simply too hard to drop a group now

That was the case in our race yes… 3 laps of Volcano flat and starting the 3rd lap we still had 30+ in the lead group, which is VERY unusual, especially as it was a long race and high power..

DD has a big effect. It allows the rider on your wheel to shelter a lot more and is much harder to drop someone. I had a wheel sucker on a race earlier. When I was sitting at 3.6 he seemed to be able to hold my wheel at 2.2. Every time I sat up, he did the same to stay on my wheel. Did this for the whole race until the last 2k when he held out 6wkg the whole way to the line.

It was frustrating but adds another element to racing that I think is a good thing, though if you lose a wheel that’s you finished.

Thecaptain, i would say its 99% likely down to your internet, i have had it a few times and its always due to a dropout. Like Weeksy said there is the odd rare occassion when zwift just doesnt cope due to massive numbers.

I’ve not sat on a bike for DAYS !

Tweaked back on Fri, thought “it wil be OK….” so raced Sat…. made it worse….

So i’ve not sat on the bike since Sat !. Won’t be tonight, possibly tomorrow depending on hangover so may be a very gentle one.

Anyone noticed the effects of the DD ?

I’ve only done 1 race with it and apart from a larger group it didn’t seem any easier/quicker really.

Pretty marked I’d say – It makes being right in the bunch an absolute must.  Most noticeable when not concentrating (or when going up a short hill) and you drop a couple of metres.  There’s almost no getting back on.  Arguably more realistic (I don’t do group rides outdoors so can’t really say) but I think it penalises the larger rider, since mashing out (relatively) high power on the flat gets you nowhere once the tiny folk get on your wheel 🙁

Too tired at moment to have motivation to race – so gonna do a bit of strength work completing the Wahoo Climb Mission in 6 days … anyone else thinking of entering? chance of prizes added motivation I guess ..

no races i could fit in today, so up the alpe, new PR of 51:56:57 (helped by a 1.9kg weight drop to 80.8kg, when i weighed in on 2/12/18, not actively trying to lose any weight, so ill assume it was a blip and it will be back on in a couple of weeks when i weigh again, to keep everything accurate)  and a 1w increase on FTP to 302w

ill take that

I had a little ride up the Alpe as my warm up for the MGCC race this morning. I was coasting at 280w (3.6w/kg) and my heart rate never went above 145bpm so i thought my legs might be in good form for the race. Pretty much the first 80% of the race was so easy i thought i could be on for a win here. Err no,yet again i was beaten in the sprint although this time i had at least a little bit in the tank to make them work for it. I did the last 300m at avg 654w which just isnt enough for a sprint, i was 3rd and just 0.77s off the winner.

well done blader, or it would’ve been for me anyway

I’ve just quit the hare&hounds thing due to constant dropouts with the entire bunch disappearing every couple of minutes and individuals flickering in & out all the time. Anybody else getting the same today ? (not sure if it’s zwift or my connection)

Hi all, i did my first race in a while last night (wbr 1 lapper) but for some reason ZP isn’t showing my results? Even though it shows results from previous races.