jsigone

looks like I have allot to do, only have 2 route badges

expatbrit

2, not 2T. I sort of wanted the 2T (the two apparently breaks road feel with some odd acceleration feel/slippage. It’s not like I’ll be getting good road faking anyway) but the price on the 2 was so right and I wanted the direct drive, no calibration, and especially the L/R balance stuff just to see how my hip recovery is actually going. That meant no KICKR for me, and the cheaper Elite’s didn’t do it either.

expatbrit

see above for why I went Neo.

I think I’ll stick with the actual FTP test. I
mught try a ramp to compare, but now I’m at a reasonable baseline and probably more accurate, the long FTP will be my thing. (Mind you, I’ve said that several times in the past and I’d almost always rather ride outside. Long FTP test is painful and not in a good way). All good, I use Zwift to train and burn off crappy work days, so I like The structure. I’m not really into the racing on-line thing, so I won’t be doing the @TrojanHorse FTP test either.

I’m actually logging to both Zwift and Garmin and interestingly the ‘lower’ intensity of my new FTP makes Garmin’s new fitness metrics/tracking much happier. It’s telling me my training is ‘Productive’ and the reporter VO2 Max is going the right direction. 4 week program has a lot of HIIT, unsurprisingly, with sprints at up to 2x FTP. HR is staying pretty low in those (below 160!) so I suspect I am a test sandbagger. I’ll run the program, re-test, and text @jsigone to whine about it and have him crush my numbers like a grape.

Beachgrad05

Wasn't questioning why. Was congratulating you.

Cool beans. You do what you feel works for you. Ramp test is actually quite accurate tho from what I have researched. It seemed in your initial post that you were questioning the result. Maybe I misread.

expatbrit

Oh! I mostly figured; I actually looked really hard and wanted a KICKR Core for ages, but the Neo ended up being The One, to quote some movie series or other. It's been pretty good. I thought the choice info and decision tree in my life might be useful for others!


Dunno -- mostly, for me, it's repeatability (not even a word, but I hope it makes sense). Everything I've done has been on an FTP test, so using the long FTP means at least I'm following the same process every time, and if I /do/ end up with some PM pedals and get out on the road, it'll be the same process there on one of climbs here where I can do 20+ min at max. Adding another variable doesn't make sense for me, and I question the result for me -- not in general. Honestly, it's not the absolute number that matters at all, it's that it's measured right and done right for you. Everything else is bragging rights

I've been slogging thru' the 4 week builder, though. Lots of intervals, lots of over measured FTP. Classic HIIT stuff. GOt the first 6 days down and plan to just ride thru' it indoors for the program and see if I get a result from structure, rather than messing around. Adding a Lasko 4900 fan to the setup has made everything much less drippy, to boot, and for less than the Wahoo headwind! (HR controlled fan is pretty cool, though!)

jsigone

rainy days in socal, picked some random work out in FTP builder, 45s on at 100rpm is pretty good burn.

Podagrower

Incremental improvements, that's what it's all about right? My first Zwift attempt resulted in the death of my laptop (it was a mercy killing). So I went looking for a way more powerful laptop to go with the 720 TV in the exercise room. I used zwiftalyzer (sigh) to tweak settings and get the best experience I could. Then I got a 4K screen for myself and the 720 screen goes with the ATV for my wife. Over thanksgiving weekend I ran cabling for ethernet all over the house. I took 8 devices off the wireless network and hardwired them, including the ATV and my laptop. The last little bit of stumble in my graphics is gone, which is awesome, and just in time for indoor riding season!

expatbrit

Hah! That was in my training path after my exploderated and sandbagged (so I'm told by SOMEONE) FTP test that had my HR up in the upper 170s.

I'm into week 4 of that as of today; last night was the first free ride and I expected Zwift to have me on the level, not adjust based on the terrain. Of course, it adjusted based on the terrain and all of a sudden I'm trying to put out power on a 7% descent with the Neo spinning the flywheel for me. That went ... poorly.

MattTheHat 

Got my Kickr Snap set up tonight and took my first couple of Zwift rides. The spin down test would not complete successfully, so I’m going to have to figure that out. I’m guessing that’s causing power to read high. Strava is estimating my FTP 98 watts higher than my year average for the two approximately 20 minute rides. I was definitely riding hard as evidenced by heart rate and sweat output. But not 98 watts worth!

I got the Snap to avoid cold temperature rides. Mission accomplished. 45F in the garage feels like about 70F IRL.

PsychoMike

Hehehe....Zwift is always a fun one for us bigger folks. Can't beat the skinnies up the Alpe, but Tempus Fugit is my go to (nice and flat) when I want to show what us bigger riders can do.

(I've got my mtb set up on an Elite Qubo Digital B+ Smart that has been calibrated to match my road bike's power meter.)

Thomas15

I just wanted to jump into this conversation. I started riding this time last year but did very little (IRL) until about mid May. Probably about 600 miles from May to Sept 1 including a metric century.

In Sept I started riding in my very hilly neighborhood, saw some improvement but still not too good. I started Zwift exactly 1 month ago today. I should hit level 10 in two days, this Friday. I have set myself up for a personal challenge, that is to hit level 12 and complete the Everest Challenge by the end of the year. If I do that I will attempt the Alpe on New Years Day.

Last night I rode to the radio tower for the second time. Tonight I'm going to do it again, then a group ride on Friday and to the tower once each Saturday, Sunday and next Tuesday. I have a medical procedure next thursday hopefully will be back on the bike by that weekend. At that point I plan on 3 more rides to the tower, that and a few group rides will get me level 12 and the Everest Challenge, which I should be able to do in the 11 days remaining in the month.

I'm planing on using Zwift in the summer. The bike I have on my trainer is an extra so no hassles there. My biking goals for this year include a century ride and a few big local hills. I'm very encouraged by some of the posts in this thread about how using Zwift in the winter has paid off in the spring.

zjrog

Tried to join London Stage 2 last night. But could not get it to go. Tried on both the laptop and my Android with Zwift Companion. I started 15 minutes prior to start time. I guess my first question is, the start time is in what time zone?

I still did a Lap of London, 16 miles...



Might be time to replace the battery in my HRM...

Doing pretty good considering the Air Cast boot for my left ankle...

PsychoMike

Zjrog, good on you for still spinning the cranks while wearing a boot! Heal quick!

zjrog

Ihad a toe partially amputatamputated a couple weeks ago, same foot, the ankle is in bad shape, fusion or replacement is imminent.

I finally joined the Stage 2 ride. Hit a couple achievements including 50 mph.




But I need a better seat. Or Rocker plate...

Stage 3 awaits tomorrow.

zjrog

Ihad a toe partially amputatamputated a couple weeks ago, same foot, the ankle is in bad shape, fusion or replacement is imminent.

I finally joined the Stage 2 ride. Hit a couple achievements including 50 mph.




But I need a better seat. Or Rocker plate...

Stage 3 awaits tomorrow.

Thomas15

As mentioned in my previous thread, I had planned to make level 10 in Friday. This didn't happen, was short some XPs. Rode up to the Radio Tower on Saturday and finally made it to 10.

There was a race (ABCDE levels) to the Alpe today and so I just went ahead and registered. I made it to the top, not a good time, 1 hour 51 minutes but hey, I made it. I think what I want to do is ride the Alpe once a month, and to the Radio Tower twice a month. I still should make it to level 12 and thus open the Alpe up to ride when ever I want, I should do that within the next two weeks.

ericy

Did the radio tower once, and once is enough. I had a phenomenal ride down however, and picked up all of the speed bonuses.

MattTheHat 

I did the spin down calibration in the Wahoo app, and now it appears to also work within Zwift. Power is now reading lower than what it should, but only by 30 watts or so. I finally realized that I can use my power meter to handle power measurements, so I'll be trying to get that set up tonight.

I did a 26 mile ride last night with just over 1,096 feet of climbing in just under 2 hours. I'm not sure what to think about Zwift being harder or easier than real life. On the flat, my average speed on Zwift appears higher than it should be. On hills, probably a little slower.

I will say that two hours on the trainer is about all I can put up with. It's just not as fun as real riding for me.

zjrog

I'm working on the Tour of London for the silly reason of gaining the in game jersey... My observation, using the Kurt Kinetic fluid trainer and iNride power sensor, hills are murderously slow. I'm going to see if turning the trainer difficulty down does anything for that, as it does for the smart trainers... 5 miles, then 2 miles of climbing in Stage 3 took more than 1 hour of the 2 hours 12 minutes and 31 seconds my butt suffered on the seat... Otherwise, I feel my speed in game and real world are pretty close. On the 3% and 4% grades it still sucks, but 5% and above are well out of reality. To me... I'm not a great climber, but I can do better than 3 MPH...

MattTheHat 

I’m now using my Stages power meter instead of the Snap’s power calculation. And it now feels very much like power feels in the real world. I notice I feel like I’m always needing to be in between gears. I’m going to experiment with the power feel setting to see if I can’t fix that. I’m riding at least two gears higher than I think I’d ride in real life, but then again I’m riding 1 or 2 miles per hour faster than in real life.

It’s fun. It makes me ride harder than in real life because it feels like I’m going so slow. But I couldn’t imagine riding 100 miles on the trainer. That’s a little over 7 hours in real life for me. That would be absolute torture on the trainer.

It will be interesting to see what the shorter but higher intensity trainer rides do to my power in real life.

Thomas15

I'm optimistic that it will be fun when spring arrives.

jadocs

Do you mean checking the trainer difficulty setting in Zwift?

If you are limited on time, focus on doing sweet spot training. In order to do that effectively, you need to know what your FTP is.

MattTheHat 

Yes. My understanding is that the effect is similar to changing cassette range. That's what it feels like needs to happen. The default was set at 50%. I think I need to increase it to the next setting. Though, this will probably have me at my lowest gear on bigger climbs.

I'll do some research on sweet spot training, thanks for the suggestion.

MattTheHat 

It's depressing how slow I am on Zwift. It is fun looking at Veloviewer after a ride to see how far I've moved up on a given segment. In real life, a good improvement might move me up 600-700 places on a popular segment. On one segment on Zwift last night, a 12 second improvement moved me up over 57,000 places. LOTS of people riding on Zwift!

MattTheHat 

Okay I've done some reading on sweet spot training. The main point seems to be almost the physiological benefits of L4 training at reduced training stress. I can see the importance of knowing FTP. I don't know mine. I have what I felt was a good estimate (200 watts), and I know what Strava thinks it is (236 watts), but I don't think either is accurate. I think it's probably somewhere in the middle.

I just ran the numbers based on an FTP of 200 watts, my Zwift rides have all been well above the sweet spot range in terms of power. In terms of heart rate, I'm on the high end, but within the sweet spot range. This leads me to believe that my actual FTP is higher than 200 watts. Now that I have the power meter synced up I can do a ramp test. I'm going to try to do that tonight.

All very interesting.