Page may contain affiliate links. Please see terms for details.
alex_cycles
Veteran
- Location
- Oxfordshire
I'm sure you're right. That's the discrepancy I'm talking about. We have seen strange results amongst all the resets and reseedings.
Signed up to the Tinies tomorrow morning. With ZRS of 270 I'm in the 2nd pen - with race 1 being a climb I may not even make the cut for race 2 as I'm waaaaay weaker than the rest of the pen (Bs at 3.8 w/kg and higher Cs). Once that road goes up I'll be on my own. This is a shame I've been put in this group given I couldn't hang on in the previous Tinies on the hillier routes.
ColinJ
Puzzle game procrastinator!
- Location
- Todmorden - Yorks/Lancs border
I went out today and did a lumpy little local loop to test my power meter, and me! Unfortunately, I forgot to put my HRM strap on and could not be bothered to come back for it so I only gathered half the data that I wanted!
I weighed myself before setting off - 79 kg.
The results:
Trundling along at a comfortable pace, keeping an eye on the power reading... 200 W, 2.5 W/kg.
Trundling along at a comfortable pace, but forgetting to keep an eye on the power reading... Effort slipped down to 180 W, 2.3 W/kg.
Comfortable trundling, completely lost in thought... Further slippage! 160 W, 2 W/kg.
More focussed trundling, which I only did for a few minutes before getting stuck in traffic. (I will pick a different route that minimises that next time!) I am fairly sure that I could sustain this for a significant time. 220 W, 2.8 W/kg.
I didn't check minor increases on that because I came to a very short 10% ramp which I sprinted up at around 475 W, 6 W/kg for 5 or 6 seconds. I definitely could not sustain that for long!
Then on to the first of 2 harder little climbs. I normally muscle my way up that in a 40/15 gear but decided to use a lower gear today - 40/29. 350 metres at 7-10%. Average 5 second power showed a steady decline from 350 W at the bottom (4.4 W/kg) to 305 W at the top (3.8 W/kg). If it was longer, power would have continued to drop!
The second climb is a little easier - 270 metres averaging 6.3% with a maximum of 8%. I averaged 320 W for that - 4.0 W/kg.
I think I might be able to do a sustained climb at around 240 W, which would be 3 W/kg. I'll try to get over to Mytholmroyd soon and do the 8+ km Cragg Vale climb, which will reveal the truth!
And I will try to remember my HRM next time...
I weighed myself before setting off - 79 kg.
The results:
Trundling along at a comfortable pace, keeping an eye on the power reading... 200 W, 2.5 W/kg.
Trundling along at a comfortable pace, but forgetting to keep an eye on the power reading... Effort slipped down to 180 W, 2.3 W/kg.
Comfortable trundling, completely lost in thought... Further slippage! 160 W, 2 W/kg.
More focussed trundling, which I only did for a few minutes before getting stuck in traffic. (I will pick a different route that minimises that next time!) I am fairly sure that I could sustain this for a significant time. 220 W, 2.8 W/kg.
I didn't check minor increases on that because I came to a very short 10% ramp which I sprinted up at around 475 W, 6 W/kg for 5 or 6 seconds. I definitely could not sustain that for long!
Then on to the first of 2 harder little climbs. I normally muscle my way up that in a 40/15 gear but decided to use a lower gear today - 40/29. 350 metres at 7-10%. Average 5 second power showed a steady decline from 350 W at the bottom (4.4 W/kg) to 305 W at the top (3.8 W/kg). If it was longer, power would have continued to drop!
The second climb is a little easier - 270 metres averaging 6.3% with a maximum of 8%. I averaged 320 W for that - 4.0 W/kg.
I think I might be able to do a sustained climb at around 240 W, which would be 3 W/kg. I'll try to get over to Mytholmroyd soon and do the 8+ km Cragg Vale climb, which will reveal the truth!
And I will try to remember my HRM next time...
ColinJ
Puzzle game procrastinator!
- Location
- Todmorden - Yorks/Lancs border
Oh, and I should add...
My original aims for Zwift were mainly to get me fitter for outdoors, and to give me something to do in bad weather.
Now though, I am getting more interested in Zwift racing. I never considered it in real life because a nasty cycling accident as a teenager left me with a fear of crashing. No such worry in a virtual race. Well, except perhaps for the risk of collapsing off the bike when doing a knackered dismount! I have carefully mitigated that risk by planning the pain corner to be right next to a king size bed... If I ever do collapse off the bike, I would have a cushioned landing!
My original aims for Zwift were mainly to get me fitter for outdoors, and to give me something to do in bad weather.
Now though, I am getting more interested in Zwift racing. I never considered it in real life because a nasty cycling accident as a teenager left me with a fear of crashing. No such worry in a virtual race. Well, except perhaps for the risk of collapsing off the bike when doing a knackered dismount! I have carefully mitigated that risk by planning the pain corner to be right next to a king size bed... If I ever do collapse off the bike, I would have a cushioned landing!
Yes, that's the plan. Just need to make sure I don't miss the cut off. May force me to miss race 2 and go to race 3 if I don't make the start of race 2
That's exactly why I started zwifting but soon did a bit of racing and with encouragement from this thread I've slowly improved my zwiftcraft and I'm a pretty decent rider on the hillier routes due to my lightish weight . There is definitely a knack of racing on zwift which is different to in real life and is very difficult to explain but you get better with experience, The able to surge and recover is very useful to follow attacks to keep in the draft but then recover for the next attack I really used to struggle with this could follow the 1st attack but then couldn't follow anymore attack resulting in me getting dropped out of the front group but now I'm much better at it , . You will certainly get encouraged in your journey
ColinJ
Puzzle game procrastinator!
- Location
- Todmorden - Yorks/Lancs border
I know people who do/did race in real life and listening to them discuss racing I always found myself regretting that I didn't have the guts to ride in a competitive bunch of cyclists. For some reason it has taken me a long time to consider virtual racing!
Surge and recovery - that's my limited skill (added to the sprint at the end)
. If I could get my 20 minute w/kg up to a decent level I'd be better at hanging on up the climbs too (or maybe I need to lose weight).For me I can always push harder in a race than on any sort of workout I can just go that bit deeper because as we on here all know there's nothing better than out sprinting a random on the internet for 52nd place in a completely meaningless race 😂
ColinJ
Puzzle game procrastinator!
- Location
- Todmorden - Yorks/Lancs border
That is the one area where I have made a lot of progress. I lost lots of weight due to illness and managed to keep it off. 12 years later I am still about 35 kg (5.5 stone) lighter than I was back then. About 6 kg more and that would be my target weight achieved.
Back then I could only climb for about 5 seconds out of the saddle. I would have no problem doing 5+ minutes now!
alex_cycles
Veteran
- Location
- Oxfordshire
Surge and recovery - that's my limited skill (added to the sprint at the end)
It's taken me 3 years to go from 3.4 to 3.7, but that's without targeted workouts - just riding and racing a lot of whatever the hell I feel like
You used to kick my arse in ZRL on anything other than a climb >5 minutes. Your fatal 'error' was stopping for such a long time. Takes time to build back, but I have no doubt you will get there. Probably all compounded by getting your Wattbike serviced and losing a lot of top-end. 😭
I'm probably carrying c.5kg excess timber that I could/should look to lose. Most of my 'excess' weight though is muscle as I train at the gym quite a bit, so not weight I'm looking to lose. I quite like being bulky, it's just not great when the roads go up
I'm ok at sprints though, so long as I can get to the finish line with everyone else It's taken me 3 years to go from 3.4 to 3.7, but that's without targeted workouts - just riding and racing a lot of whatever the hell I feel like
You used to kick my arse in ZRL on anything other than a climb >5 minutes. Your fatal 'error' was stopping for such a long time. Takes time to build back, but I have no doubt you will get there. Probably all compounded by getting your Wattbike serviced and losing a lot of top-end. 😭
The forced 6 months off definitely didn't help, then I decided that weights and the gym was a higher priority so I've been cycling much less. I think my top C/bottom B days are gone t be honest. If I can get close to 3.2 w/kg again I'll be happy but also surprised. I'll keep plugging on though and who knows. I'm just not planning to lose the muscle weight
