So I’m not able to get outside on my bike much these days and have been using zwift and BigringVr quite a lot.

I live in the lakes and like riding hills, so on the turbo I just usually either pick a route up the radio tower in zwift, or a classic alpine climb in BigringVr and try and ride it as quick as I can.

Most sessions I do are about an hour, maybe 90 mins, can usually get 2 or 3 sessions a week in.

Would I benefit more from doing some kind of structured erg mode workout, or if I like hills should I just keep doing hilly routes?! If a workout would help, any Zwift recommendations?

Race.

I think if you can only get 2 or 3 hours a week to ride, the advice would be to go as hard as you can. Obviously if you had more time available you could add structure, but sounds like what you’re doing will give you best bang for buck.

Racing doesn’t appeal, I’d be off the back straight away and would then lose all motivation to continue! I did try one once but my pc struggled with all the riders on the screen and it was really choppy graphics. Also I can never commit to an exact time as it all depends on how long it take kids to get to sleep!

Gonna do a good STW-type answer and suggest something you haven’t asked: TrainerRoad.

They have structured plans that you can follow (the low vol stuff is about 3 hours a week). The structure really helps you build up and avoid burning yourself out. It’s also not every resource-heavy for graphics and whatnot so you can run it happily on your phone then use whatever was running zwift to show the entertainment of your choice.

You don’t get the pretend bike ride that you get from zwift, but it will make you faster.

If your turbo can emulate a good range of slope gradients, sometimes it’s worth climbing hills where you change gear manually to keep the power up.

But ERG mode is great, I select 34/16 gear and let Zwift and my turbo control the power, which means you can use any course including downhill and still put out say 300W.

There’s loads of ERG sessions on Zwift, my fave is Emily’s Short Mix, which if you use your FTP or slightly above is a brutal 30min workout. There’s also a new TT one from Zwift Academy 2019 semi finals I like, ~60mins with a chunky interval in the middle.

The beauty of the ERG sessions is you can set your FTP to whatever you like before the workout and then still have the ability to change it by +/-10% during the workout, depending upon how good you feel.

Yep, get trainerroad instead. Very effective and thousands of workouts to pick from.

Gonna do a good STW-type answer and suggest something you haven’t asked: TrainerRoad.

They have structured plans that you can follow

Zwift has all that as well, and is considerably less dull 😂

Gonna do a good STW-type answer and suggest something you haven’t asked: TrainerRoad.

I’m going to typical STW and double down. I tried Trainer Road for six months an found it too monotonous. I get on much better with Sufferfest. With either I’ve nothing left after a 1hr session. Both allow you to do a focused workout plan based on the time you have available and what you want to achieve. I don’t do this, I just do workouts when I have time free (3-4 times a week).

I’ve never tried Zwift so I can’t compare above to it but get impression Zwift is more focused on real time online racing against real people whereas Trainerroad and Sufferfest are more workout sessions?

Forgot to say, obviously all offer free trial periods so you can try before you buy. Sufferfest has an “issue” in that it’s currently only on iOS and Windows so that might be a decider for you.

I am currently using TrainerRoad after using Zwift for about a year. TranerRoad workouts are far better than Zwift. All the infrastructure to do the workouts is available in Zwift but they haven’t implemented it for some reason. The Zwift training plans aren’t very good but the TR ones are – they have a calendar that populates the workouts for you so it is very easy to plan.

TR do a month free trial if you get a referral code (go on the TR forum and theres a thread for it). You can also run both (run TR on your phone on Bluetooth and Zwift on a PC or similar using Ant+).

I personally find TR more productive and just use other entertainment sources during the ride. Also listen to the podcast for TR and it gives you a load more information relating to training etc.

TR do a month free trial if you get a referral code

Pretty sure I have referral codes available if anyone wants one.

I actually find Zwift more dull than TR with a video playing in the background

Go hard or go home- do Trainerroad workouts whilst on Zwift 🤣🤣🤣

That’s what I do. I usually swap one session a week for a race. And sometimes, just to mix it up, I’ll use the Zwift hills to do the set.

So for example, the other day I was due to do 6x 2 mins at 375w with 4mins recovery. Instead of just following the Trainerroad line and letting my Avatar use the power data to mince randomly around Watopia, I did a lap to warm up then hit the KOM for the work. 2mins at that power never quite got me to the top so I’d just hit U turn and spend two minutes riding back down to the start banner, then back to the KOM again.

Mentally, it feels more fun than being locked into TR- whilst getting the benefit of their structured plan.

There’s hills of almost every length you can use.

KCAL, power and TSS etc were identical to if I’d done the set ‘properly’.

There’s cats for all abilities in the races. If you struggle to stay with D then just lie about your weight and height until you can (but I’d be surprised if that’s the case).

Whichever of TR or Zwift you prefer does depend on how you view training. If you require lots of stimulus then Zwift is probably better, if you prefer to focus on the numbers and the actual training then TR would be more suited.

No reason why you can’t do both: TR for the training plans and Zwift for the racing. Main and sweet courses if you like.

do Trainerroad workouts whilst on Zwift

This is kind of what I’m doing this winter, after years of TR I really needed a change to freshen things up a bit.

All my previous years workouts following the TR plans are saved in my TrainingPeaks history, I use a workout builder to recreate similar sessions import and ride them in Zwift.

It’s having the desired affect tbh, much as I like and have championed TR in the past (and will continue to do so) I’m starting to look forard to jumping on the turbo again.

The group rides seem a good option for when I don’t fancy anything structured or when it’s raining/snowing etc.

Will mostly leave any virtual racing until nearer the time for race specificity.

Why not do one of the Training Plans on Zwift – You can select one based on the time you have and then it gives you different sessions to be done during the week.

If you want one for 10 weeks, give build me up a go – You need to do an FTP test first, but there are 2 or 3 options in Zwift to do that, once your FTP is set then the sessions are the appropriate level.

I did this twice last year for the winter months and it seemed to benefit me, occasionally you miss sessions out as life gets in the way, but overall I did feel fitter at the end (and my FTP increased)

Training plans on Zwift appeared v poor to me.

The Zwift workout builder looks great though – if you buy the Chris Hoy book (cheap on amazon) there are basic structured workouts to copy

I currently use Traininer road for the calender/ structured training plans – I can only do the time crunched 45 min plan, anything longer and I get too bored.

I race on Zwift too when the fancy takes me. Racing is the best thing about Zwift by far IMO. There are different levels of racing (ABCD). You would have to be really slow to be out the back of the D cat.

It all depends what you want to train towards.

If you like riding hills then just crack on grinding little gears.
But if you want to train towards some sort of racing then zwift races is where its at … the fast starts of races is what is the shock to those new to it. The zwift races copy it perfectly; a few times getting shelled early doors – but you soon get used to the sudden effort and last longer each time.

You would have to be really slow to be out the back of the D cat.

You called?😆

You would have to be really slow to be out the back of the D cat.

Not sure on that… The D is often a big fish in small pond location, along with heavy slow guys putting in massive power.

My lad is massively hindered by soemthing within Zwift though which means his rider really struggles to hold groups, i guess it’s some sort of height/weight thing… but he’s go to be putting out 130w constantly to hold slowish D riders, which being only 11, isn’t that easy for him. He seems to find it tougher on zwift than he does outside in many ways

https://www.zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=243578

This one was cracking fun last night, both for me and my lad. He did the first 1.5 laps, then i closed a few gaps for him on the next lap, then he did another, then we alternated laps to the end. I wasn’t allowed to destroy any riders, only close gaps.

You can’t imagine how much speed you can make being 45kg though LOL… Getting to 6w/kg was effortless for me 🙂

But as you can see in the results, being a pointy end of D is being in the top half of C at the race. Youll get a race at lower powers, but it may not be a big race.