Zwift, my journey, my weight and my fitness.

@wilbert, check out recent studies into polarised training. Results show that not only has volume of easy riding in winter not been discredited, but suggests we should also be doing it throughout the rest of the year.

And apologies for the mini novel - came out longer than intended 😕

Well, let's see what happens tonight guys.

Maybe we should add an STW tag to our names too

I couldn't keep up with you on the flat the other day so I'd leave it on that setting if you're racing C or turn it down one for D 😀 /Bantermode

Lol I'm bemused by that as I didn't think we were going that fast on the flat dude.

I guess this layout tonight is about my best circuit though with only the one small hill.

Richmond Flat is even better than this. I miss Richmond 🙁

Yeah possibly so based upon profile but I've never ridden that one.

I noticed the other day on this course if I can put off 300w or so on the small hill it can make a huge difference on gapping someone. Question is, can I then come back to 2.6 without being destroyed.

Right. Sign in time

Tonights race was tough but fun as usual, 7 places better than last week, and really pleased with 16th especially as I missed a break and had to chase back for the last lap, did anyone else who uses a dumb trainer find there was a section where suddenly everyone disappeared into the distance? I was consistently in the bunch doing about 320w then at the same point every lap, everyone shoots off and I have to up it to 350w just to keep up. weird.

97th overall. Trying not to puke now

No mate, my dumb was fine.

http://www.zwiftpower.com/v2/race.php?id=1782

Last night was 4 min quicker than previous week. So got to be happy with that

Got Zwift set up last night & had a quick half hour blast this morning. Haha, it is awesome. Nice one weeksy. Why didn't you start this thread a couple of years ago?! As someone who habitually fails to get the most out of TR every winter I reckon straight away this will work better for me. The free ride mode is basically a mass game of Silly Commuter Racing! Will give a proper race a crack in the week.

I've ordered the speed cadence sensor and a USB doodah and looking forward to setting this myself. Wish I'd known about zwift before.

Zilog, I was a cynic for a long time after taking the mick out of Crosshair for his nerdiness.

Mountain route last night. It's a long way to the top.

Still toying with the idea of a smart trainer and whether I need it. At the moment just shifting up into the big ring to drop the cadence on climbs and seems to be working ok. Be nice if they built a roll down calibration for the kinetic inride into the app.

Indeed it is mate yeah. Climb climb, plod plod. Repeat a squillion times to the top.

The ride to work is covered in wet leaves and mud meaning from a maintaining fitness POV it's pointless. Last winter I was falling off almost weekly. Zwift looks good. I've got an old mtb frame that will take a 700cc wheel so if I buy the £199 smart trainer from Halfords and the zwift subscription that's all I need? Any reason a mtb with 135mm axle width wouldn't fit in this?
http://www.halfords.com/cycling/turbo-trainers/trainers/tacx-flow-t2240-smart-turbo-trainer?cm_mmc=Google+PLA-_-Turbo+Trainers-_-Trainers-_-212818&_$ja=tsid:60494%7Ccgn:GoogleShopping%7Ckw:212818&istCompanyId=b8708c57-7a02-4cf6-b2c0-dc36b54a327e&istItemId=atqpqlpqw&istBid=tztl&_$ja=tsid:35522%7Ccid:344520484%7Cagid:24344824324%7Ctid:pla-231148712404%7Ccrid:83794506724%7Cnw:g%7Crnd:13343305182099623860%7Cdvc:m%7Cadp:1o3&gclid=CMbo6YKut9ACFQmeGwod6vgDXA

Also mrs is burning the baby weight at moment - does zwift have a spinning class equivalent? And does a turbo bike need brakes?

turbo bike does not need brakes - most turbos have a caution not to brake as it can damage the resistance unit.
You should be fine with 135mm spacing.
Only problem using a mtb is you might not have a tall enough gear for hard efforts.

Thanks. It's a frame only at moment so I'll probs stick a road crankset on. Do i need gears?

I've just dug out my ANT+ and given Zwift another go. I quite like it and really need to get back into things as I've put a little weight on and need to strengthen my lower back.

The only issue I have is that with my setup (Elite Crono Fluid + Garmin speed sensor) Zwift seems to think I'm a lot better than I *know* I am - just pedalling along it says I'm doing 45mph! I've put my weight in OK and the right set-up. Any ideas?

I don't want to hook strava into this and blast a lot of hard working people KOMs out of the water.

I am tempted by a Wahoo Kickr SNAP though... 🙂

@Adam, check your wheel size setting. Should be around 2096mm for 700x23c

Have you got the variable resistance turned up ? Slider in settings.

When mine was turned up i was easily sticking out 700w... which is knew of course wasn't possible.

After getting snowed off @ Peaslake this morning, I wanted to do some extra mileage today, so entered my first race, a 3 lap thing this afternoon.

It was tough. Absolute sh*t show of basically an hour of chasing down attacks, whilst trying to wheelsuck others to recover.

Absolutely no structure to it, mostly just chaos. To be honest, it's much more appealing to me than a 'structured' training programme of watching a graph on a screen for an hour & trying to hit a line.

It's much more reflective on the reality of racing longer stage enduro too IMO. So, i'm going to at least try & do 2/3 a week, and see where I end up. I have a base FTP result now, i'll test again over Xmas, then at the end of Jan & Feb.

I have no doubt with the 'appliance of science' I could achieve better results by spring time, but chances are I would probably jump out of the window trying to top myself before the gains happened. If I can get most of the way this way, then i'm happy.

Weeksy- that's not what the slider is supposed to do (I know Joe said it kind of does with yours), it's actually more of a gear selector. So at 50%, a 10% Zwift climb will feel like a 5% real climb and at 100% like a 10% climb etc etc.

On a normal variable resistance smart trainer it doesn't alter the watts you are putting out or how fast your Avatar goes for a given wattage.

http://zwiftblog.com/using-the-trainer-difficulty-setting-in-zwift/

have no doubt with the 'appliance of science' I could achieve better results by spring time, but chances are I would probably jump out of the window trying to top myself before the gains happened. If I can get most of the way this way, then i'm happy.

Exactly this. Zwift may not be the perfect training tool for serious racers, but I've done over 500km each of the last 2 months now, lots at race pace. My riding speed, climbing and stamina is just better

So I got a Taxc Flow today, dead excited, but I thought it would be possible to connect to the PC via Bluetooth....seems it's not the case. It will connect to the phone fine, both Zwift and Tacx apps, but it won't connect to the PC. Am I missing something? Do I need the dongle after all?

Does your PC do Bluetooth 4?

Guuuuurrrr, dunno. Maybe not?

Managed to get the trainer to connect via the phone app, after a bit of faffing. Will it be able to change the resistance automatically, as on the pairing screen it pairs as power source and cadence, rather than the controllable trainer option?

Will probably just get a dongle.

Re training effectiveness.
Mathew Haymen this years Paris Roubaix winner accredited his form to Zwift after breaking his arm shortly before the race and being forced to spend the prep time on Watopia. He made the comment in the mud covered interview directly after the race so it didnt appear sponsored comment. He also a rode a rim braked aero bike which probably further upset the marketers.

@AdamW is the elite listed in zwift and youve got the resistance on whatever they advise?
@andeh you need a dongle.

We have another new Zwifter jumping in today.... Mrs Weeksy is going to give it a whirl. She's just in the process of creating logins for Zwift and Strava and will be coming head hunting soon.

I'll be most curious to see if she gets on with it, she's done a few turbo sessions in the past and never really gelled massively.

edit...

Just ordered these.... Crosshair will find it particularly amusing as he was laughing at my super shiny SPD's the other day.

[url] http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/gaerne-aurora-road-shoes/rp-prod87099 [/url]

Re training effectiveness.

It's not the tool, it's how you use it.

Anyone in for the D rated kiss first base race 8pm?

Its probably about the best new racer type race to get a feel for it.

8pm is usually a bit late for me..possibly.

Are you going to use two PC's to run two sessions?
Not sure if ot possible to run both from one machine but it would be useful.

oops wrong thread

We'll use 2 PCs but you can run different users on one machine. Obviously not at same time though as we only have 1 turbo.

Well I'm a complete idiot. I chose the wrong turbo: Elite Red Fluid as opposed to the real one: Elite Crono Fluid. It now reads as a much more accurate snail-like speed! 🙂

Hee hee. Easy done mate.

See you at 8! I may not come last then if you're that slow!

I was gonna give that a go.

Go for it ! You'll easily work out which my username is lol.

Don't forget the 2.49 limit average. I'm pretty much ignoring the average and if I get DQd then moved to C, so be it. I'll actually be quite proud if I can. But it will be tight.

It's all right. I know what sort of wattage to aim for now. I was planning on a ride anyway so it'll be another chance to see what's what.

Cool. See you out there. I'm on the front row. Just chilling now watching TV with the family until 7.50

ooops. disqualified again i think. although so should half the field by the looks of the board at the end.

strava or zwift being slow to upload.

Ouch ! 12th out of 83 on road. Expecting to be bumped to C now. Short race but a killer!

Still waiting on my ant dongle! What are the recommendations for a cheap cadence sensor?

25th ish or so I think. Mine still hasn't uploaded and zwiftpower hasn't updated either.

Did my first zwift session. Ftp of 2.4 ... it's a start!

I bought a bontrager interchange dual sensor and it's been perfect so far.

I have ordered an ant dangle but it's not arrived. I did discover that my Samsung phone can see the ant sensors and will feed the data to zwift on the computer by using the zwift mobile app. It works extremely well if you don't yet have a usb dongle.

Yep did that Kiss D race tonight as my first race! Enjoyed it, hard work though. How long does that bloody ZwiftPower website take to update?! Can see me getting into this, just gotta decide what smart trainer to go for now! Any BF deals on a Neo?!

I think it's broken for that race Zilo 🙁

It's usually within 30 mins for provisional and an hour or so for verified results 🙁

You do get your actual finish position over the line on the screen, but the data/modified results usually take a little while.

I've never seen this though with the next morning the results not being up.

Real shame as i was curious to see a few figures and stuff, i tried really hard and was putting out 2.8 w/kg almost constantly, only dropping into 2.4 for a quick rest when conditions allowed. Really went for it and thought i'd sacrifice the result and possible DQ from race to actually see what i could manage.

Looking on zwift.com at my results my power was 274w.... My previous best, again in a short First Base race was 259w.
So the great thing from my perspective that current week on week, i'm still getting faster, which in theory means fitter... but faster is fine too 🙂
I'm currently staying off the scales until next Thurs as you can get a little disheartened if they don't come down, so once every 3 weeks or so will do me for now.

results up.

2.79w/kg 291w

Got to be happy with that... despite nearly 50% of the field being DQ'd

🙂

Well I bought a fancy pants smart trainer and had my first shake down few kms last night. Previously a trainerroad user but I think it will be zwift for me to start with (though I'll miss TR and a netflix film as a combo a bit but maybe not enough to have both subscriptions). It makes my 2010 Macbook pro strain though; maybe time for a new laptop but I've spent all my pocket money for the foreseeable so will have to do.

My trainer (tacx neo) compensates for descents as well as ascents and thinking about it that has to be a disadvantage in a zwift race when racing against folk on traditional trainers when you go over the top and drop down the other side. I'll be spinning out whilst they are still in the sweet spot of power and cadence.

I'll be spinning out whilst they are still in the sweet spot of power and cadence.

Your speed will still maintain ..... So that's your rest time ! That's where you have the advantage over the dumb trainers as you can rest for a while. We can't.