Yes! Finally! A podium finish!
Hah. No, of course not.
For my troubles today I got a buggered left knee and 27th place (according to Zwift Racing App), or an even more depressing 34th spot on Zwift officially.
But I’m sure you don’t expect much better than that by now, right?
Well, if you were, adjust those expectations.
Right, so I suspect – but don’t know for sure – that Stage 4 was the last of October’s Race Watopia series. For today’s race we would be tackling 4 laps of the Volcano Circuit CCW, along with a healthy lead-in starting in Downtown Watopia.
This race was an absolute beast. Pretty much full gas from the off. Of course that is usually the case with Zwift races, but typically there would be a necessity to send it from the start line, and then ease off slightly within 1km or so.
Today though, heading out of Downtown Watopia, there is a little riser to tackle. And that was taken at speed.
Going in to this I was already feeling a bit … sore(?) in the left knee. I noticed it as I was rushing around getting my kit on, my water bottle filled, and that sort of thing.
However, once on the bike it seemed to go. So that was nice. I actually completely forgot about it during the ride.
But I imagine those big efforts – mostly to get back on, or at the very least avoid being dropped in the lead-in – were responsible for what is quite a sore knee as I sit writing this.
I’m not sure if I have ever raced on Volcano Circuit CCW. It actually makes for a pretty good crit circuit. There are a couple of little slopes to attack, and attacked they were. Very much so.
I gave several big efforts on lap 1 which I knew then and there were completely unsustainable for three more repeats. Several times during that first lap I had almost been dropped. It’s fair to say I was pretty much over my limit just keeping up.
So of course, that couldn’t last.
And it didn’t.
At the start of Lap 2 I had to be realistic and rein it back in.
For the next two laps I was with a small bunch of maybe 5 or 6 riders who all seemed fairly content to sit at or around 3.2w/kg, surging to ~4w/kg up the climbs.
Then on Lap 4 four of them went for it and I had nothing close to keeping up with them.
For the last lap I sat with one other rider and we somewhat worked together to see it out. I got a Ghost power up for the final lap. I’d had a bunch of them throughout. No feathers. One burrito. All no good for me.
I dropped my ghost about 700m from the line, on the final hill and stomped on it. Once I’d made it up the hill I saw the other rider wasn’t fighting for it. Even if they had been, I was all in. I pushed through the flat and found yet another surge in that final little rise to the line.
After that I was spent.
Utterly spent.
I didn’t ride yesterday due to how tired I’ve been feeling. Instead I went for a 40 minute walk. As such I stayed on a little while longer after today’s race to bump up the overall activity on the week. Walks tend to be fairly low calorie burns so I figured I’d make up the deficit on this one.
And that was that, really.
Not a whole lot to say.
I mullered myself, as usual, and got nowhere in the overall standings.
Pretty standard.
