Welp, I goofed. I thought today was Innsbruck, but in fact, it was Richmond. I rode Richmond on Friday morning, and didn’t really fancy it again quite so soon. I wanted to ride the Innsbruck KOM, but with that off the cards, I opted for a jolly up to see the Radio Tower.
Last time I rode Zwift’s Epic KOM I was a bit gutted to have missed the radio tower. This time around I made sure the Radio Tower was included in the ride, opting for the Mountain 8 Circuit, a 32.1km ride with 691m of climb. This route includes the Reverse Epic KOM followed by the Radio Tower bonus climb, and then a 0.36km sprint towards the very end of the route.
I found riding Zwift’s Epic KOM to be challenging. It didn’t break me, but it was certainly no walk in the park.
Having done my research I knew going into the ride that Zwift’s Epic KOM Reverse is the second toughest climb in Watopia. This climb is 6.19km long, which is over 3km shorter than the Epic KOM. What this means is that it’s steeper, an average gradient of 6% as opposed to the Epic KOM’s average 4%.
A ~5km lead in sounds quite long when written down, but on fresh legs and with the impending challenging climb looming on my mind, the 10 minutes or so disappeared in no time.
For whatever reason I found the view more daunting today than last time. Maybe it was the eerie night time approach. Even so, that first climb looked more intimidating than last time.
Somewhat foolishly I went hard right at the start, eager to get my legs moving and to get past the first step of the climb. I don’t feel this too adversely impacted me, but I definitely felt like I’d very little left to give towards the end of the climb.
All the while when putting in that initial stint I figured I’d have chance for a short recovery when at the top. The thing is, at the top, 4% up becomes the norm. There are times on this ride when 8% starts to feel like a flat, so it’s setting the tone for things to come.
13% feels hard. At this point my legs felt fine though I wasn’t wanting to go all out, knowing many kilometers of climb lay ahead. I’m fairly sure I was in a really easy gear at this point. That might have been a mistake.
This entire first section feels like a grind. Still 4 more markers to go yet. Good to have the first one down, though.
After the 5-10 minute of effort, the rider is rewarded with a little down hill segment as a reward. It doesn’t last long, and no doubt dropping into a harder gear and building up a bit of steam would be the wise thing to do.
I didn’t though. I used it as a momentary respite.
Looking up ahead at the next climb is fairly intimidating. It’s another steep one. I can’t remember now whether this comes before or after the turn off / split that takes the rider either on the forward, or reverse KOM segments.
As I recall at this stage I was watching the rider ahead of me slowly disappearing into the distance. He began behind me, closed me in, overtook me, and then kept motoring on ahead of me.
I briefly, and I do mean briefly, considered trying to hang on to his wheel. It would have been a bad idea.
I take each first attempt at a new thing as a trial run. Particularly on Zwift. I’d seen the Reverse Epic KOM climb segment as part of the descent from the Epic KOM but I barely remember it as I was knackered coming down. All I do really remember is it was a fairly zippy descent – something like 36 minutes going up, 7 coming back down. I don’t remember my thoughts about what it would be like to climb it.
Being shorter was actually really helpful to me in knowing that I’d get there sooner. I find a steady 7% gradient is about as hard, mentally, as a steady 9% gradient. There were definitely steeper sections on this climb than the Forward Epic KOM, but most of it was just as knackering as the before.
One nice, in a weird way, distraction was knowing that even once I’d climbed about 300m, I’d still have another 200m or so to go. The Radio Tower climb is much shorter, but steeper still. So I knew I had to hold something back.
Climbing the first half of the climb, the Reverse Epic KOM, the segment was timed. Now, I wish I had registered a time on the board. Following the Mountain 8 Circuit once again falls into this weird world of Zwift whereby the intuitive thing doesn’t happen. Why not have allowed the rider to complete the Reverse Epic KOM timed segment? They could have done something with the course to make this possible. Silly, and frustrating.
At this point I hadn’t realised that my time wouldn’t be registered. It was only after seeing the Radio Tower turn off, and then see the arch on my minimap that I knew I wouldn’t have put a time on the board. I’m not sure why the Epic KOM leaderboard is not showing a time here. I think it’s a bug.
You can see on the Zwifters Nearby board that R. Rawlings has the KOM jersey on, and shortly after, it got swapped between two of the three others, as I recall. I never saw how it ended, and I know my time wouldn’t have been KOM anyway as I was behind A. Moore for sure. It’s the closest I’ve ever been to getting the jersey so far 🙂
And then we turned off for a little meany dip.
Again, likely you’re supposed to put the gas on here and accelerate into the climb. Not so, for me. I was pretty thrashed having just done 300m, and now I had another even steeper 200m or so to go. Brutal.
It’s easily the hardest climb I have ever done on Zwift, or in life, so far.
It was bloody exhausting. At one point there was shouting. I shouted. I don’t remember what.
Taking screenshots was a suitable distraction. Fat thumbing the big camera button on the Zwift Companion App, mucking about with camera angles, anything to take my mind off the gradient.
I’d run out of gears here. Low ring at the front, very highest ring at the back. I could spin, but I wasn’t moving very fast. 6kph. How did I not fall off?
There’s an element of “out of the darkness, into the light” about the Radio Tower climb. I’m fairly sure the shadowing on Zwift is constant – there’s no moving Sun afaik. Shadows are not a dynamic thing (unless I’m grossly mistaken).
No timer, no countdown of meters, nothing. No reward. Some bonus.
Except there is reward. It’s a physical accomplishment, and I can say, yeah, I’ve been up there. Good stuff.
The views at the top aren’t great honestly, I expected a bit more. Something fun to see, like the Goat at the top of the Epic KOM. Come on Zwift!
And then after a very brief 360 whirl, we were off and back down the super steep slope.
Now of course you would need to be a Daredevil / maniac to belt it down an icy mountain. Zwift thinks so too, and likely this achievement is unlocked by most on the Radio Tower descent.
My legs hurt by this point. I couldn’t spin too hard even with the help of a mostly constant downhill slope.
Through the arch we went, my time a distant memory.
This bit is pretty cool. I slogged it over the first bump, but needed to drop gears for the second.
I played about with camera angles and glamour shots here but they all ended up looking a bit naff.
Ripping through the “Monaco” tunnel was cool. I was still playing with camera angles at this point, Zwift throwing out a few different ones at different speeds, it seems.
Getting from level 11 to level 12 took about 10 days as best I recall. Maybe Zwift should show some other stuff than just this unlock screen. Maybe like, idk, saying the Alpe Du Zwift is now open for business?
Being night time (in-game) the screenies look super dark sadly. I was in full fledge coast mode on the way down.
They really need to pipe in German Oompah music around the village. It would add character.
The descent from the Reverse Epic KOM is slightly more gradual, and takes bit longer – about 20 minutes judging by the screenshots.
In the screeny above you can see an observatory. I don’t think it’s possible to ride up there, but I need to double check.
Not really sure what I’m showing here, but the picture looked cool and so I’ve kept it in.
And then after that long coasting descent and mostly flat subsequent section, there’s a 0.36km sprint. I’m not sure what the name of this sprint is, so forgive me.
I was sat on J. McPherson’s back tyre just before this sprint, and I used him as a marker for my own sprint. it’s not fair at all as he absolutely nailed me after this sprint, so his overall average was clearly much stronger than my own. But still, I enjoyed it.
Pleased with this. After a long climb, to still have something left for a new sprint PR is great.
And the rest was fairly uneventful. Mostly just cool down, low cadence, fairly easy gear stuff.
Unfortunately I appear to have deleted my end of ride report screenshots from Zwift.
I’d like to have done a little more distance today, but had to get off the bike for other reasons. I took the liberty of a long(er) lie in this morning. A rare treat indeed.
My legs feel alright as I write this about 8 hours later. So probably take a ride tomorrow, though likely something fairly flat.
Good job.
The sun, and moon move, and so do the shadows.
That sounds like an ancient proverb 🙂