My second time hitting one of Zwift’s Climb Portal routes, and things have changed slightly since last time. Previously there were various climbs to choose from, whereas now there is only one.
This isn’t as bad as it sounds. In fact, in some ways it is better.
Now the climbs are on rotation, much like the regular worlds. There’s possibly a hack to ride whichever climb you like, but the Col du Platzerwasel looked plenty challenging enough for me.
Last time around I rode the Col des Aravis. And last time around I had a little chart with the Climb Spiciness rating:
So today’s climb was a 4 spice, one spice spicier than last time.
In my head I had this down as being similar to Innsbruck KOM. However, it’s definitely harder than that.
Pre Climb
Before the climb I did a couple of things right.
I ate some food.
And I managed to watch a video about indexing my gears, and then use that knowledge to actually index my gears.
Absolute result.
I’ve been suffering from phantom shifting for a while now – longer than I ought to have. It was super noticeable outdoors, less so on the turbo. I think the outdoor cassette is shark toothed, and the indoors one isn’t quite as bad.
Anyway, the video taught me two things:
- Turn the barrel adjuster anti clockwise to increase cable tension – needless to say, I had that opposite in my head.
- And the low and high limit screws are equally back to front.
Thankfully I didn’t need to touch the limit screws.
After just a couple of half turns of the barrel adjuster, things were beautifully smooth once more. Lovely jubbly.
On To The Climb
With the indexing I had done a couple of small rides as part of the adjusting and testing, so I figured that was a suitable warm up. I was warm, anyway.
The Climb Portal rides have a shockingly small lead-in. I think 1km. And then bam, it’s on to the climb.
I was still trying to find some music to listen to for the first 2 minutes, so it took me a while to even settle in and find my rhtyhm.
When I did start paying attention I was 400m in, 30m climbed, and 5% done. How hard could it be?
Well, harder than that. That’s for sure.
I give myself that first segment to find my pace, get settled down and assess the situation. I’d already gone in with a plan:
Ride at ~240w, which is my current FTP.
From Zwift Insider I had seen that the estimated time for me would be somewhere between 37 and, realistically, 32 minutes. And straight away the ETA was putting me around 33 minutes, so those pre-ride figures seemed spot on.
Also from the pre-ride recon I knew this one was pretty much steady, heavy going. Lots of red sections, a good number of orange, and the occasional flat / blue bit.
For me, I find the harder going bits somewhat easier than the chop and change of the more roller coaster climbs. For example I prefer the Innsbruck KOM or Alpe du Zwift to the Epic KOM. It’s somehow easier to find and keep a rhythm, if the road doesn’t ease off frequently and disturb me.
One disconcerting bit about this climb was that when blue sections did appear, they looked weirdly steep. Here’s an example:
There’s a blue section ahead, but it looks like it’s straight up. However, it’s something of an optical illusion. The blue bits are definitely flat(ter).
For me, all the but one of the segments felt very similar.
Only segment #2 felt hard to maintain that rhythm. Unsurprisingly this was the one segment without 7% stuff to hit.
Here’s how I got on:
By and large I was hitting my metrics for each, so pretty pleased with those numbers all told.
As above though, it doesn’t get easier as you get to the top. Some climbs ease off near the summit. Not so with this one, it’s actually a grind to the line.
I was out of the saddle just to see it out.
After that I was cooked, and barely had much for the descent.
Like last time I would say the descent is the most lack lustre part of the Climb Portal. I found getting back down those 8km was a real chore.
I think the only other thing today is that I was sad not to have hit a PB on the 30 minute effort. Still work to be done to get back my old form, but it’s coming. This was definitely a solid ride. Not my absolute best, but a real good reinforcing that my recent change of strategy is paying dividends.
Anyway, tomorrow looks wet so it’s probably going to be another turbo ride. Or maybe a walk. I do quite fancy a foot destroying long walk.
