For this evening’s ride I took on the Tour de Zwift: Stage 2 Race (Innsbruck) in category C.
In short this is two laps of the Innsbruckring (8.8km) with ~70m of climb per lap courtesy of the “leg snapper”.
Typically I would not choose to ride, let alone race at night. But due to some time mishaps today it was either race at 8.10pm, or skip riding / racing today and wait for tomorrow.
Clearly, I decided to ride late.
Being that this was a late start I gave myself the free pass to go at a more realistic pacing than the previous Tour de Zwift race.
Whether it was down to their being about half as many riders tonight, or whether my revised strategy was simply better, things seemed to play out a little more positively for me this evening.
Right out of the gate the pack split into at least two bunches. I say at least two as I wasn’t paying much attention to what was behind me, but I could clearly see a sizable group ahead of me and then I was in a similar size group.
The guys at the front bolted out of the gates at well over 4w/kg and frankly, there was no way I was going to keep up, nor even try.
I’d given myself a fairly steady warm up. First I’d done a bit of a lap on New York in free ride mode, and then I’d switched to the workout “Free Ride” mode – so a nice steady cadence could be achieved. I’d done 10 minutes at 95rpm / 200-230w, and then a further 10 minutes at 150w. After that, I’d had a 5 minute break before the ride, waiting in the pens.
I feel this helped my legs get right into this one for sure.
Even so, I was determined to stick to around 3w/kg per lap, if at all possible.
And by and large I tended to do pretty well at this. Up until the first leg snapper anyway.
It really helped being in a group that was roughly seeming to pace around the same averages as me. No one was pushing too sharply beyond ~3.1-3.2w/kg, and even then they would fall back into the pack and another would take their place.
Slowly but sure the group ahead was disappearing from sight, and it was likely obvious to all of us that we stood very little chance of catching them back up.
Coming into the leg snapper I made sure to get into the small cog at the front, and into a fairly easy gear at the back. Then it was time for 500m or so of up hill fun.
The first run for sure felt fast.
A little too fast, probably.
By the time I’d reached the top I’d clawed back over 10 places and I’d thrown my 3w/kg average out of the window in the process.
My theory was simple:
Be light, push up the hill as quickly as possible, take a breather on the descent, and then get swallowed up by the bunch as they re-assembled. I’d be a bit fresher, and overall it could play in my favour.
Supertuck! 
Only, it didn’t really happen like this.
I powered up the hill.
I took my breather.
But no one was behind me swallowing me up.
And whilst this sounds great, it actually left me kinda stranded. Without a pack I’d be pushing way harder than I ought to be, comparatively. So I decided to extend my breather, kick back to about 160-180w, and wait.
It was as we head back towards to the start finish line that I got swept up at last. Back in the pack, fairly refreshed, and this time noticing the pace had dropped a touch so I was more around the 2.9w/kg rather than the 3-3.1w/kg as at the start.
Perfect.
This pacing remaining consistent for most of the second lap.
I was highly skeptical about my ability to put in a second similar stint on the leg snapper, and so was amazed when I got those Strava stats for this blog post just now and saw the time difference between the two laps at just 1 second.
Heading into the leg snapper I’d been at 37th, deliberately easing off a touch and letting the pack carry me before the push.
By the end of the climb I was 30th, and although guaranteed to lose a bit of time / momentum doing a gear shift back up to the big ring, I figured I could do this during the super tuck descent again.
Alas, no.
I didn’t end up in the super tuck, and instead whilst managing to get my gear shift done without losing my chain (major result) I was once again out on my own. There was a rider some few meters in front of me, but it would be a push to catch him as he was motoring.
I tried anyway, though was fortunate enough to be carried by a rider behind me.
A fairly sizable group – maybe 5 or 6 riders – was amassing behind us but they were 7 seconds away at this point. Together, the three of us pushed for the sprint, keeping a fairly steady pace at around 3.3w/kg.
From here on it was a case of watching the distance tick down, now well below 1km to go, and also keeping an eye on the pack behind us to ensure they weren’t going to catch us up and pip us at the post.
With 400m to go I noticed the time difference to the pack behind us had dropped from 7 to 5 seconds and they were gaining.
I went for it. Definitely too early, and with barely anything left in the tank I figured the two guys I was with were going to smoke me.
And they did. I saw one of them hit 10w/kg or more, and didn’t catch the other. I don’t know what I was doing, but I do know the chart afterwards showed a max output of 400w… so not much :/
Nicking 29th would have been a big ask here. 31st was a fair result, and much better than I could have anticipated.
I feel my strategy paid off, and was also helped by there being fewer riders to contend against this evening.
I’m honestly really happy with my performance. Bit scary on the heart rate – saw a max of 195bpm at one point – but as far as workouts go this was a solid one.
Unfortunately for some reason I do not have the top 10 screenshot for group C :/ What a fail on my part.
Congrats to all the winners, and to everyone else who took part. I enjoyed it. I hope you / they did too.
At the end of this one I got a Zwift guesstimated FTP boost from 206w to 207w.
I don’t accept the guesstimate anymore, so won’t be using that. Even so, I find it extremely unexpected that I was out setting some new personal bests tonight, given that prior to the race I was feeling really downbeat, tired, and generally lacking in any desire to take part.
Tomorrow morning, 10am, it’s the start of the Innsbruck 40km Tour de Zwift group ride. Truthfully I’m thinking that’s going to be a struggle. Again, all things considered, I’m giving myself a pass to just turn up and do my best. No aims to “win”, no pushing myself to set new goals… anyway when I do that, with a few notable exceptions, I tend to come away disappointed.
See you on the hill!
