Beginning the year indoors on a trainer. I figure I have to about the end of January, by then my should be good enough to ride outside. I’ll do the brake swap and tire swap then.
My last virtual ride before a week of travel was a sprint and spin-fest. I sat back in zone 2 for most of it. I did a few sprints, but only one to near full throttle. I really wasn’t feeling like making myself really sore then spend the next day in the car.
I tired one ride with Rouvy. The companion app doesn’t work as a bridge like the Zwift companion does. Therefore I was never able to pair my cadence. I rode the ride then cancelled my subscription and the trial period. I’m not about to buy more hardware widgets to make software work.
Then it was back on Zwift. I’ve done two of the stages of the tour as rides not the races. The rides are enough work.
So far pretty good workouts. I do between an hour and an hour and a half. These tour stage rides are a level C which make me work a bit more than I want. I end up spending about half my time in zone 3 and a third in zone 4. I try to do a half hour or so prior to the stage start in zone 2 using an easy workout. The Zwift subscription month ends around the 17th so I’ll stop it then, switch the red tire for the road tire and go back outside for some easy rides. I’ll give the new Strava workouts a try.
Wednesday the 14th, I rode my last GCN group ride until I’m indoors again. I had to move everything upstairs because we got a cabinet for the garage and I needed somewhere to put it, while we worked on taking the stuff off the shelves and taking them down to make space.
While these will be nice, they needed some work and only have one finished side, so some paneling and paint is in my future. For now, these will sit here, with the eventual install forward of this where the other shelving is. When I do that I’ll hang the uppers and add some under-cabinet lighting.
The upstairs set up is pretty nice with the bigger screen and French doors to provide better airflow.
I’ve settled on listening to a playlist randomly jumping around about lot of music from my library instead of the Zwift noise. With my AirPods Pro 3’s they block the sound and I just get music. I think it might help make the time go by without my notice so much. I’m not doing any real workouts, just an easy half hour or so prior to a group ride at 95 watts. I likely won’t ride Sunday with family visiting and will put the Snap away after my riding on Saturday. At that point I’ll be ready to work on the bicycle and do the brake lever controls swap and remount the black tire for outdoors. The Pinarello will go up on the hooks and the old Rocky will come down to lean next to the my wife’s old KHS. I figure Monday for my first outdoor ride. I’ll ride out to Sendero Field, then back around the harbor. I plan a week of minimal hills and easy spinning. With the KickR Snap packed away, I can get the weights setup and begin weight training and yoga. I figure to do yoga stretching when I wake up in the mornings and after lifting. Once I’ve begun riding outdoors again, I’ll include all my recovery training in a new outdoors blog.
For the second to last indoor session, I decided on a whim, part way through a light endurance workout to do an FTP test. Yes, a completely wrong approach. But, I did it anyway and of course wasn’t able/willing to finish the full 20 minutes. On the other hand, I did about what I figured. The result is I think I’m ready to ride outside, though I’ll take it easy and make a long careful ramp back to harder efforts and eventual structured workouts.
The FTP eat was my last indoor ride. Other tasks cropped up come Saturday morning so I cancelled the planned workout/group ride in virtual land and got to work on clearing up the indoor training setup. Bike is down in the shop on the hooks after being charged up. It is ready for my work and check and clean to begin tomorrow, if events don’t overtake that task.
Totals for the month:
Time: 11:14 hours, Zwifting
Along The Way 