Rather than take on a Free Ride, and potentially go harder than I should, these last two rides I have opted for one of Zwift’s structured workouts. In particularly I’ve tried Zwift’s 4 Week FTP booster.
Yesterday I did the Tempo Into Sprints exercise. Today I went back a day (according to the training plan) and did the HIT 45sec #1 exercise.
As I have mentioned before, my FTP (currently 189w) is guesstimated. In other words, I have yet to take on a proper FTP test, or a ramp test, so the figure is guessed by Zwift based on my previous rides.
What I would say is that right now, 189w feels about right. My last few rides have all been around this figure, and pushing past this figure over 20 minutes feels like it would be absolutely exhausting. Maybe that’s the point. Anyway, currently it is what it is, and it is 189w.
On the ride choice screen, the ride graph looks different to how it looks once inside Zwift proper. I often find I’ve forgotten the ride graph once I get into the ride, but it’s not the end of the world.
This ride started fairly gently. I knew the hard part would be the 6 anaerobic bouts (red efforts in my terminology), but with a 4 minute blue zone recovery between, I figured I’d be alright.
I opted to ride on New York’s high line for this workout.
This is the KOM section, something I don’t think I have ever properly taken on. At least, not that I remember. What is interesting is that when riding a Zwift Workout, you can tackle any route you like. The effort you put out is translated to be relative to what the same effort would look like if you were riding the course for real.
In other words, if you’re riding the KOM, you don’t feel the climb, but you move up the climb at the same speed you would as if you were putting out that amount of watts. Sounds weird, but it makes sense in game.
What it does mean is that I only ended up doing about 20km in distance during this ride, but climbed about 350m.
After a fairly calm and gentle warm up, the workout had me do 170w for a minute. This isn’t something I find particularly difficult, especially at the start of a ride.
What I do / did find challenging in both this, and the previous ride, is in keeping up a ~100rpm cadence during the intervals. Spinning fast is bloody exhausting.
Yes, the red arch ahead signifies incoming pain.
I have to say I have started enjoying New York a tad more since upgrading my computer graphics setup. It looks really nice, even though I’m not a huge fan of the futuristic look and feel.
The first interval was a bit of a wake up call. 45 seconds at 330w, and again, at 100rpm.
Just getting the turbo trainer up to 100rpm under 330w is a challenge. Once you’re there, it’s easier to maintain, but spinning that fast was really hard work, even on the first interval.
This ride was a constant ticking off by Zwift.
Spin faster! Spin slower! More watts!
Good grief.
In total there were 6 sets of this 330w at 100rpm carry on to attend to.
From the third set onwards, I needed to get out of the saddle to get the wattage up before sitting back down and frantically spinning the legs to keep up.
I’d love to try a different turbo trainer. Maybe the Wahoo Kickr, and see if the response / resistance is similar. I find the Tacx Neo 2 to be somewhat loose for want of a better word.
I’ve moaned about this before, but there is a definite lag between what I see on screen, and how quickly the resistance changes on the trainer. In other words, what I see on screen (e.g. passing through the arch) will translate to the trainer about a second or two later. It’s quite jarring.
Once at that resistance, longer stints are better than shorter. For example, having to hold 330w for 45 seconds is much easier to be consistent with (over that time period) than having to hold for 15 seconds, whereby the trainer hasn’t had as much chance to keep up.
Half way through the 6 reps and I was feeling it for sure. Each one felt harder than the last. a 4 minute recovery was much welcome, and I was glad I had a big towel and massive drink of water to keep me satiated.
In total I think I covered the circuit three times, or there abouts.
I kinda wish I had opted for a flatter course (Fuego Flats perhaps) as that way I would have covered more kilometers and more likely hit my weekly 100km goal. Is that cheating?
With the 6 sweaty 330w intervals done, there was a 7 minute gap until having to put in a “sub threshold effort”.
Again, riding at 185w for 5 minutes isn’t something I’d find that difficult normally. But normally I don’t ride at 95+rpm.
The high cadence had me panting.
I’d expected to find the course somewhat busier. I’m guessing that whilst New York is a popular course, most people opt to ride on the lower ground (the flatter ground) than on the KOM segment. Fair enough.
Whilst I can’t say I deeply enjoyed this workout for the visuals, I definitely found the exercises to be challenging. The 45 second sprint blocks were suitably challenging.
This weekend, Sunday 9am, I am taking on the Alpe Du Zwift in the 7th and final stage of the Tour of Watopia.
As such I have been having an easy week. I plan to ride once more on Friday evening, putting in ~1 hour before taking Saturday off.
With the Tour of Watopia out of the way, I am aiming to recover on the Bank Holiday Monday – ride entirely dependent on how much my legs hurt. I expect that the Alpe will take me at least 2.5 hours to climb.
Once all that is out of the way, an FTP test is on the cards.
Getting an hour on the bike was a good use of my time. Better than slobbed in front of the TV, or computer.
I’m happy with how my week has gone so far, even with just the two rides to show for it. I think my 100km per week / 3 hours ride time goals should be met, if only just on the 100km goal.
I’m not sure whether I will take on another structured workout tomorrow evening, or opt for a free ride. It’s entirely dependent on how my day at work goes, and which of Zwift’s courses are available on the day. Whatever course I opt for, it will likely be a flat route.
Anyway, enough of that, time for bath and bed.