Tonight, I had, along with who knows how many thousands of other Zwifters, planned to ride the opening event of the first stage of this years Tour of Watopia.
However, it’s been a decent day today. 15 degrees C. That’s the hottest of the year so far. Bit breezy, but the first time I’ve managed to get out without a jacket – just a base layer, jersey and arm warmers. Truly, the Spring is upon us.
Altogether this was a decent ride. I went out with no plan, other than to stick at 3.1w/kg average. I managed 3.3w/kg average. Really happy with this, and no mean feat. I was working for it.
The route I had chosen tonight is one that gives me a strong chance of a fast lap. And I managed to tick off two further achievements today:
- An outdoor sub 20 minute 10km
- An outdoor sub 40 minute 20km
Sadly I’m still experiencing a metric ton of issues with the heart rate monitor. Sometimes it works. Today it did not. I wish I’d been at or around 123 / 131bpm for these effort. I suspect it was perhaps 30-50bpm higher.
The crappy part of that is that at the end of the ride the Garmin’s telling me I did a “recovery” effort, yet I’d just slayed myself putting in what I think is probably my strongest prolonged effort of the year.
Aside from the lovely weather today, I was also greeted with some freshly paved roads. What an absolute treat. There’s a part of this circuit that was like the surface of the moon. Now it’s crisp and smooth, a nice recently laid asphalt.
At some point I really ought to do a bit of a true recovery ride. After last week my left knee was hurting. These regular outdoor rides are great, but they definitely put extra pressure on my joints.
A strong start to the week, let’s see what else lays in store.
