Does the new paint skin for the Absa Cape Epic have you drooling? Me too. But I also feel like it would be sinful to ride that beautiful bike on tarmac.
Singletrack and gravel roads are limited in Watopia (but I’m hopeful for more soon). So what route options do we have that fit the rolling resistance advantage of the Scott Spark RC mountain bike? And how long would it take to do the entire 9,350’ mission in one ride? Follow along and we find out!
Just finished this yesterday in 3 rides*
First two rides were 24.23km/603 m and 7.76km/234 m for a total over 32km/837m (19.88 miles/2746 feet).
Third ride was 1.5x times up Alpe de Zwift for 66.34km/1,983m (41.22 miles/6505.9 feet) while averaging 16.6Km/h (10.31mph)
Did learn a lesson …. don’t use a MTB to climb the Alpe 🙂
*was actually 4 “rides”, but one of them failed soon after starting
Oddly, the Cape Epic Workout #10 yesterday had a glitch and rode up the Alpe instead of around the Jungle Circuit Reverse loop as advertised. In a group ERG workout (rubberbanding on) using MTBs, I actually bested my previous PR up the Alpe by 12 minutes — mainly because the strong riders in the event were compensating for my weak sauce. But we got more than 1000m of the challenge done in a 90 minute ride (the timed workout event ended at hairpin #1, so most of us just finished the climb, for all the obvious reasons), so maybe the… Read more »
Not a bad way to knock two birds with one stone
My longer ride yesterday was in workout mode (which I’m glad that they still counted the elevation). Took me about 2hrs to complete, but was at the mercy of the workout’s required power.
I did a couple Lutschers to get a route badge, will finish with a couple trips up Alpe. Almost as vertically efficient as radio tower without having to ride as far to get there, plus you get nice bonusat the tip every time.
It’s the reason why I chose the Alpe, was for the bonus. Still trying to get the Light wheels.
I did the same ride, for the same reason….. but I didn’t get them……again….
I was doing three laps of jungle circuit per day, pretty boring and not much climbing for the time taken. So decided this morning to select Road to Sky, flip a u-turn and go up to the radio tower, descend a fair bit, then U-turn and go up the radio tower again. I was climbing at 920m per hour, but not for much more than an hour. I was curious about the snow road, thanks for confirming. Wish I’d have done radio tower from the start rather than jungle laps. You’ll find you have some serious speed when descending, turning… Read more »
So I had just over 1000m left on this mission. Decided it was a good idea to just do Road to the Sky on the Scott Spark RC and finish it off. 72 minutes to climb 1000m, obviously the lead-in is a bit of flat-ish distance but I think I completed AdZ climb in 66 minutes. I was pleased with that, didn’t even bother to change bike when I completed the mission, I was nearly at the summit anyway so wanted to see what time I could do on an MTB.
Does anyone know if MTBs keep up with the road bikes during group workouts? Could be a good way to gain some elevation.
And we have the Tour of Watopia Jungle stage that we can get double XP on if people want to complete that stage multiple times.
MTB in workout with Roadies will perform like MTB, not roadie. If it’s a Meetup with rubber band (not fence) the MTB can get help from anyone else donating the watts 😉
I don’t think I knew about this rubber band effect! So Do you get the milage as long as your group does it?
I finished the entire mission in 3 hours and 58 minutes. https://youtu.be/8aKbgheR3jY
When I originally calculated the time it would take I didn’t account for the descent back down the road and took a 10 minute break. Otherwise I think my estimate of 3.5 hours was pretty much right on!
Finished in one ride 3:14
3 times up Alpe d’Zwift
Starting out with Road to sky.
Actually that was 3:11:56 Ending at turn 6 on 3rd time up.
I did mine across 2 rides, notably Watopia Quatch Quest and London Surrey Hills to complete the challenge.
Any way to get to the top of the mountain and just ride the BONUS ICE TRAIL?
Do Road to Sky. Do a U-turn at the very start, then go straight. Takes around half an hour to get to the bonus climb, and you do 300m or so of climbing before you get there. I think that’s the fastest way. No way to start at the top of Epic KOM that I know of.