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Race The Training Thread

I pulled the trigger and signed up to that training program. I did the first workout yesterday despite it being beautiful weather.

A 60km TT today under blue skies.

Hard to believe we'll be snowed in in two months...

Andy
 
If you hit the "did it!" button it will mark the workout as having been done outside.

I decided to go ahead and do a session even though I rode today. During the cool down I got bored and spun my legs as fast as I could. I hit 173 rpms. Haha.
 
The 60k was of my own design.

Didn't realise you can do Zwift workouts outside!?

A chance of rain tomorrow morning, so may do the 2nd workout on the trainer. Or more TT work if it's dry...

Team social ride with local legend Murayama san on Sunday morning. With a boozy team BBQ in the afternoon.

Weather looks good!

Andy
 
There's no reason you can't if you have a power meter, although I wouldn't recommend it. The mobile version of Zwift wasn't designed with riding outside in mind. They should probably make an outdoor mode that just gives you power targets and intervals.

What I mean is that if you want to ride outside on any given day, you can click a button (at least in the PC version) that gives you credit for the workout. So you can attempt it outside if you want.
 
There's no reason you can't if you have a power meter, although I wouldn't recommend it. The mobile version of Zwift wasn't designed with riding outside in mind. They should probably make an outdoor mode that just gives you power targets and intervals.

What I mean is that if you want to ride outside on any given day, you can click a button (at least in the PC version) that gives you credit for the workout. So you can attempt it outside if you want.

Right, got it!

Right now, all I'm doing on Zwift is hitting the numbers it's asking for. So, come to think of it, an outside version would be good for that.

But I may try some races in the winter. For a bit of motivation.

A few friends do the "Japan morning zwift race" every morning from 5:10. I was going to do it this week but the futon always feels heavy at this time of year...

Andy
 
Oh, it is. Of course, I am nowhere in the same league as your stepfather, but it is quite sad I can't do a sport I actually enjoy and could do when I am on a business trip.

He has since had a replacement for the replacement. It is better, but still not perfect, and you can't make up for the time spent not being able to do things, and then there is the muscle loss from lack of use, which is hard to repair at his age.

Actually, for hill climb repeats that sounds about perfect. My local training hill has roughly the same elevation difference and I have three options with different gradient profiles. The default one is intermediate (5-8 % on average with a steep ramp and a flatter bit), the second one has a super steep section in it and the third one is more drawn out. And the 5-10 minutes sound like a great warmup. (That's pretty much the same distance from my lab to "my" hill — I always arrive warmed up.)

Your hill sounds good, especially with 3 different options to keep it fresh. I find an average of 6% works well. Here, we are spoilt for hills. I tend to use three, which allow up to 25 min intervals, depending on fitness. There are more, but either the gradient is off-putting - double figure % slugfests, or the hill is one way, and the looped descent takes too long. I especially like that climb, as it starts with a steep ramp, eases off, has another steep ramp in the middle, then half-hard, then a steep ramp at the end. Apparently, hills with steep ramps to start are the best way to go, as they kick off your VO2 kinetics faster, and also, a steep ramp at the end is good too. And using the mama chari, means you can do 3 x 3:00, then progress 3 x 3:30, 3 x 4:00, 3 x 4:30 etc. (The hill doesn't last long enough on the road bike to do that.) There is a turning half-way, but then you go into 15% territory!!!

Timewise, I can get the VO2 session done inside 30 mins. Reducing the recovery time is another way to progress an interval, rather than extend the length. Usually, I can hit the 2nd interval as soon as i hit the bottom, the 3rd one might approach a nearer 1 to 1 (time of internal vs rest time), and if i do a 4th, it usually goes past a 1 to 1 rest interval. With the short hill, recovery is mainly 0 watts, as it is straight downhill, so switching to the longer hills, means you can do the interval up the hill, and continue climbing/pedalling on the recovery, then hit the next interval, so changes things up.

For the mama chari, I bought a very good Bridgestone one (Bridgestones have really increased their prices over the years), and it has been fine for 8 years, apart from chain stretching (it's on a new chain now, as the bike couldn't be adjusted to use the old one anymore). My wife bought a cheap, nasty 10,000 one before i arrived here; got thrown away after a year.
 
Right, got it!

Right now, all I'm doing on Zwift is hitting the numbers it's asking for. So, come to think of it, an outside version would be good for that.

But I may try some races in the winter. For a bit of motivation.

A few friends do the "Japan morning zwift race" every morning from 5:10. I was going to do it this week but the futon always feels heavy at this time of year...

Andy

After six months I have only attempted one event. Holy hell, the pace! I gave up after a few minutes....

I suppose I should have done a race separated by watts/kilo instead of a mass-start race with no classes.

I just find the solo workouts so compelling. I don't even "just ride" that often unless I am trying to recover.
 
After six months I have only attempted one event. Holy hell, the pace! I gave up after a few minutes....

I suppose I should have done a race separated by watts/kilo instead of a mass-start race with no classes.

I just find the solo workouts so compelling. I don't even "just ride" that often unless I am trying to recover.

Likewise. I tried a race yesterday. Was chugging at FTP for the 10, 9, 8... countdown, but the pace was crazy. 500W to hold on to the shirt tails of the group!?

Still, the workouts are really good, so I think that's where it's at for zwifting.

The weekly training blog below.

Cheers,

Andy

 
I suspect a lot of the people are cheating. Either they're lying about their weight (like me, but the weight I use is the equivalent to 17% body fat) or they're lying about their tire size and using a speed sensor instead of a power source. Also, differences in your trainer or power meter can make a difference in how fast you go. E.g., my trainer takes about five seconds to respond in an all-out sprint, so I have no idea what my actual maximal power is. I'm just going to assume its OVER NINE THOUSANDDDDDDD.
 
I don't think cheating is quite as prevalent as it used to be (or as people seem to think). Zwiftpower (which handles race results and such) automatically DQs people that go over w/kg classifications (and you can see if people are weight doping in Zwift races, since weight is one of the recorded categories). Anyone with a w/kg of over five is automatically removed from the race results unless they can prove it's a legit performance. Most races have WKG enforcement / forced upgrades (if you exceed the wkg limit for your category your'e either removed from results or you're forced upgraded to the appropriate category). In fact, anyone not using some power source can't win any race on Zwiftpower (ie, if you're using Zpower, or virtual power, which uses speed/tire size etc to estimate power instead of a power source). Not saying cheating doesn't happen, but from what I've seen it's not near as common in races as it apparently used to be prior to Zwiftpower. Might be more common in non-race events, but they're not races, so who cares?

And racing with an artificially high w/kg isn't an advantage in all races - yes you might go faster up hills, but you'll get killed on the flats and downhills, where raw power is far more important (just like in real life).

Zwift races do indeed start out really, really hard - make sure you've done a good, hard warm-up. The pace settles in a bit after a couple of minutes, but especially the first few races, the uber-fast start can be a massive shock to the system.

A five-second delay for your trainer to respond to an all-out sprint is....obviously sub-optimal. What trainer are you using?
I'm on a Wahoo Kickr, which responds to an all-out sprint pretty much instantaneously, and the delay in my starting an all-out sprint and my Zwift avatar responding is less than a second.
 
Tacx Flux. Firmware updates have supposedly reduced the lag but it's still noticeable. It doesn't have an actual power meter like the Elite Drivo or the older versions of the Kicker. It's estimated from applied resistance versus flywheel speed. I think the newer Kickrs do the same thing, but they're probably better at it.

I don't recommend the old Flux....its basic design is flawed. I run it with one cover off because the belt tends to slip off the pulley.
 
Did another mock TrainerRoad FTP ramp test. Time to bump the FTP up another 10 watts.... Hurray, 300!

If only I had the willpower to actually do that for an hour!
 
Nice one! The mythical 300...that's one of my long-term targets.

I'm pretty sure a bear on an aero bike would have be chasing me to actually do 300 watts for an hour. And I'd still need a power meter to do it.
 
After yesterday's tough 100 TSS+ workout, my training plan called for a zone 1 ride. Since I forgot to hang my bibs out to dry today, I thought I'd just skip riding today and drink some (a lot) of wine while re-reading the Training Bible. But then I decided I could just do it since it's a mere z1 ride.... so there'd be no need to be sober!

Today's hydration is the drink of champions's: chilled white wine! Aka "iced win."

I also used my winter bibs as a makeshift saddle cover.

Man, a 50-minute z1 ride is almost harder than an hour of SST, especially without proper bibs. SOOO BORING. And uncomfortable!
 

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29 mph on the flats is ludicrous speed. How many watts does that take? I assume it's easier to do it when people are drafting off of you, since that reduces your drag slightly, which at that speed has to be quite a lot of watts. That has to be part of the reason why the pro peloton is so damned fast. That said, the air is so thick at that speed its like pedaling through molasses.

I changed my bike fit a bit on a whim the other day. I think moving the seat back (I basically had it slammed forward) might have, counter-intuitively, actually reduced pressure on my hands, which was a problem. So I went back to my old longer (by 10 mm) stem and flipped! My back and neck are still sore, but my bike has never looked cooler and I am pretty sure I did the fastest ride around the lake (78 km) that I've ever done!

Still having problems with my right knee on long rides... probably need a full bike fit.

Also, damn, triple zwift sessions? You hardcore.
 
29 mph on the flats is ludicrous speed. How many watts does that take? I assume it's easier to do it when people are drafting off of you, since that reduces your drag slightly, which at that speed has to be quite a lot of watts. That has to be part of the reason why the pro peloton is so damned fast. That said, the air is so thick at that speed its like pedaling through molasses.

I changed my bike fit a bit on a whim the other day. I think moving the seat back (I basically had it slammed forward) might have, counter-intuitively, actually reduced pressure on my hands, which was a problem. So I went back to my old longer (by 10 mm) stem and flipped! My back and neck are still sore, but my bike has never looked cooler and I am pretty sure I did the fastest ride around the lake (78 km) that I've ever done!

Still having problems with my right knee on long rides... probably need a full bike fit.

Also, damn, triple zwift sessions? You hardcore.

The speed is 3 riders rotating on the flat, so not so fast really.

This 6k stretch of riverbank was done with a tailwind at 45kph.

_20181029_150555.JPG

Into the headwind on the coast, the average was 38.5 over a 10km stretch.

_20181029_150628.JPG

No power data but HR is 140. Probably 10 beats down due to a cold and fatigue, so 150HR zone 3. Which is good for fast through and off.

Some workouts on zwift are easier than others. This year I've practiced riding at threshold for TTs. So I find the threshold workouts easier.

Today's workout had 24 x 30s intervals over threshold at 370W.

_20181029_144609.JPG

I've not done any top end like that this year so I find that harder. And I don't think I'll do it twice!

I'm hoping these kind of workouts will help longterm in my TT ability. The training plan is TT specific, so I hope it works. Anyway, now, as I approach the offseason, is a good time to experiment.

I would say a decent bike fit is definitely worth the investment. If you use someone good like Enosan here, or @ProRaceMechanic in Matsumoto, it should be considered a lifetime investment as a continuous work in project.

Good luck!

Andy
 
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Who is Enosan? A shop owner in Joetsu?

I did a bike fit on a Shimano fitting machine locally (well, an hour away) but I remember it was vary cursory and wasn't specific to my bike. It also didn't involve any flexibility/symmetry checks, interviews, or any video analysis of my pedaling, or discussion of my comfort issues you expect from a good fit these days. I guess that's all you can expect for 5000 yen. I did get a sheet with the dimensions of my ideal bike, though...

I personally don't mind a handful of 10-second intervals at 600+ watts. But a couple dozen 30-second efforts around my vo2 max (probably somewhere around 370) would definitely take a lot out of me. I'd rather have a few really hard but really short intervals than a ton of longer fairly hard efforts. If if there's going to be one absurdly hard block in a workout, I'd rather there only be one!
 
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