Team BKool CycleChat

[<Tommy>]

That sounds like a great and very fair idea. I've entered @TurboTommy 's ride in spreadsheet, we have a new leader !

Cheers Keith. Honestly even if the margin is much wider than a couple of minutes I’ll do it again. Just right now I’m contemplating trying to find time where I can do it and it feels like a headache!

Saying this if aaac come back and says the data stinks, then obviously it’s back to the start line with me.

 

[Daddy Pig]

I’ve had a quick look at my run on the laptop. I don’t know what to do other than compare watts with speed and they seem to dip and spike in tandem, and say that they seem to respond in part at least to the terrain’s peaks and troughs.

It’s diffcult for me in the sense I’ve not been on BKOOL for a fair old while. So I don’t really have a lot of feel for it to say whether it felt too easy or not. My heart rate was up around 170 average which for me seems about right but I’m not sure what that’s worth either! The watts are actually probably a little low for me on recent form but do they correlate to the speed/time I guess is the question.

Basically I’m a bit cr@p at this type of thing... @AAAC 76C I’d be interested to hear you opinion as I feel like I’ve seen you do the most analysis in the past and have a good gage on it.

I’m not looking to gain an unfair advantage but hopefully that goes without saying! Maybe let it stand and if there’s someone within a couple of minutes of me at the end I’ll re do it?

It will be good to see how the next couple of stages go for you. It's possible that all your hard racing on zwift has made you fitter and stronger than ever before! It may not be fairy dust after all...

 

[bridgy]

Cheers Keith. Honestly even if the margin is much wider than a couple of minutes I’ll do it again. Just right now I’m contemplating trying to find time where I can do it and it feels like a headache!

Saying this if aaac come back and says the data stinks, then obviously it’s back to the start line with me.

As we don't have much to compare your ride with recently Tommy I think it would be good if you could try and re-do it at some point if you can - particularly as it was so quick compared to everyone else. Having said that we do have 3 more stages so hopefully that will be enough to confirm whether this was a one-off or you've just got really good form anyway. For the sake of the NC team I hope you're just super quick on all of them of course !

 

[AAAC 76C]

Cheers Keith. Honestly even if the margin is much wider than a couple of minutes I’ll do it again. Just right now I’m contemplating trying to find time where I can do it and it feels like a headache!

Saying this if aaac come back and says the data stinks, then obviously it’s back to the start line with me.

Your stats trough and peak in a similar manner to mine and Bridgy's so that's one check.
I assume you are riding at 76kg and I ride at 80kg.
I didn't do a lot of drafting and I averaged 4.7 w/kg and you did 4.6 w/kg, nothing to get too excited about there but appears to be 'weighted' the wrong way.
I don't know how much drafting you did but considering this is a downhill run (on average) and you were a whole 2.5 minutes quicker I would have expected your average (369 watts/kg) power to be considerably higher than mine (395watts/kg) based on the velocity squared rule and that gravity should have advantaged me by 4kg.
That said I did at times, draft both Bill and Bridgy so who knows the math.
So other than try and overlay our watts and power graphs I couldn't say anything conclusive other than:

'your in the team' and don't change anything, we need all the help we can muster.

 

[<Tommy>]

As we don't have much to compare your ride with recently Tommy I think it would be good if you could try and re-do it at some point if you can - particularly as it was so quick compared to everyone else. Having said that we do have 3 more stages so hopefully that will be enough to confirm whether this was a one-off or you've just got really good form anyway. For the sake of the NC team I hope you're just super quick on all of them of course !

I don’t have any form in the sense that I’ve done very little racing recently. I’m on traineroad etc training relatively hard but I don’t have anything to compare it with. My gut says too fast. Relative to previous races vs you guys. I think I just needed someone else to say it...

Your stats trough and peak in a similar manner to mine and Bridgy's so that's one check.
I assume you are riding at 76kg and I ride at 80kg.
I didn't do a lot of drafting and I averaged 4.7 w/kg and you did 4.6 w/kg, nothing to get too excited about there but appears to be 'weighted' the wrong way.
I don't know how much drafting you did but considering this is a downhill run (on average) and you were a whole 2.5 minutes quicker I would have expected your average (369 watts/kg) power to be considerably higher than mine (395watts/kg) based on the velocity squared rule and that gravity should have advantaged me by 4kg.
That said I did at times, draft both Bill and Bridgy so who knows the math.
So other than try and overlay our watts and power graphs I couldn't say anything conclusive other than:

'your in the team' and don't change anything, we need all the help we can muster.

For what it’s worth I’m 80kg too. And my watts are showing as 378 normalised. (That mean average?), but it still doesn’t add up does it.

I suppose the good news is if my watts are that close to you I won’t be too far behind you next time!

I’m going to leave it until I’ve done the other stages if that’s ok guys.

 

[JuhaL]

IME you get a bigger difference in the Velodrome. I can do 200w on the vectors and have 240 on bsim when riding the velodrome. On a flattish course from
Holland, for example, 200 on the Vectors would be 225 on bsim. On BRVR 200 on the Vectors would be 200-205 in BRVR. Today my avg on my edge was 170 (using the vectors) and BRVR was 175 using the classic trainer.

As much of an ego boost as the numbers bsim supplies can be, I have learnt to take them as a guide only for me.

The good news for me though is I got a improved 20 minute ftp section on the route I did today. I am starting to get back to my level of a year ago.

That is good news and also confirm how i feel when i ride with BRVR. Compare Zwift and Bkool simulator it feels more realistic, those power numbers prove that and also resistance in my legs.

 

[bridgy]

Just got an email from bkool saying the Nations cup qualifying leagues has started which is encouraging! Still not showing as a current league on the website though but maybe it will tomorrow...

 

[theboxers]

Just got an email from bkool saying the Nations cup qualifying leagues has started which is encouraging! Still not showing as a current league on the website though but maybe it will tomorrow...

Sorry to disapoint but I'm getting almost daily emails for LEJoG 16-30 and it is still not fixed .

 

[<Tommy>]

That is good news and also confirm how i feel when i ride with BRVR. Compare Zwift and Bkool simulator it feels more realistic, those power numbers prove that and also resistance in my legs.

I really should get on to BRVR. Is it still free? I can’t remeber when they were going to start charging.

 

[berty bassett]

Just worked out what speed i would have to average !! you lot must think i am bonkers

 

[<Tommy>]

Just worked out what speed i would have to average !! you lot must think i am bonkers

Regarding nations cup? Don’t forget it’s BKOOL speed Berty!

It’s a shame we can’t put in different people for different stages. That course I did yesterday probably wasn’t ideal for you but there’s one that’s right up your street.

 

[theboxers]

I really should get on to BRVR. Is it still free? I can’t remeber when they were going to start charging.

Still currently free. Not sure for how much longer though. It runs from a folder, not installed software. Give one of the shorter routes a go.

https://bigringvr.com/Ride.aspx?rideID=1082 Magnolia has some nasty ramps only 7.3km though

 

[simonsch]

My bkool classic runs on BRVR with no issues. Not f-ec enabled (not capable) but it runs just fine. It's free at the moment so give it a bash.

So I just checked, and it doesn't seem to find the BKool classic. Which is also what they say on their website will happen, w/o the f-ec update.

 

[bridgy]

Sorry to disapoint but I'm getting almost daily emails for LEJoG 16-30 and it is still not fixed .

Oh. You're right, it's still not showing as an active league today despite yesterday's email.

You have to have a grudging respect for Bkool's ability to keep finding new features of their system to break

 

[JuhaL]

I really should get on to BRVR. Is it still free? I can’t remeber when they were going to start charging.

Yes it's still free, well it was yesterday. New update suppose to release in few days too. I read that there suppose to come 2 new features, coast in downhills and you can resume your unfinished ride.