The Open Pro: An Inside Look at High Level Training on Zwift

Editor’s note: Jordan Cheyne’s “The Open Pro” series details his experiences with high-level Zwift training as a rider in the pro Continental ranks. You can read his past posts here.

It All Began on Jarvis

For me, the Zwift experience clicked right away. The interplay between the bright orange and blue performance metrics and the avatar in the center of the screen captivated me immediately. The usual mental strain of my rigorous, decade-long indoor cycling habit quickly abated. I found myself immersed in the tropical splendor of Jarvis rather than the various screens of the Garmin on my stem. I started telling all my friends and coaching clients and looked forward to crushing intervals and virtual KOMs whenever I could. Soon though, spring came and it was time to hit the road as an aspiring professional cyclist at races from California to Arkansas to Northern Quebec. I folded up my trainer and forgot about the virtual cycling world for a while.

Prep for 2016 with Jelly Belly

Eventually the snow was flying again and I hopped on my new Kurt Kinetic Rock and Roll and returned to Zwift to prepare for the 2016 season. I had signed my first professional contract with the Jelly Belly p/b Maxxis team and Zwift had taken a giant leap forward. On a meager Neo Pro salary I couldn’t afford to join the bulk of my professional comrades in warmer climates so I began to use the new routes on Watopia and Richmond to clock the needed winter miles. I plugged my coach’s workouts into the new Workout mode and cranked out endless 4×30 minute Tempo blocks, 6×10 minute Lactate Threshold reps, and 20 second big gear sprints. I even rode a couple centuries on the island, every km on my own reveling in the immediate performance feedback on my screen.

I arrived at my first professional training camp having ridden outside perhaps a half a dozen times in three months but I was in the best early season form of my career. I landed on the podium in several of our low-key early season races and earned my spot on the roster for big time events like the Amgen Tour of California. The team finished the year on a tremendous high, becoming the first American team to win the GC at the Tour of Utah when Lachlan Morton stormed to victory. Zwift helped me build the robust foundation to be a part of that.

More than a Winter Distraction

In 2017 Zwift has continued to evolve and I have begun using it as more than just a foul weather motivation machine. It is one thing to come into the season with a sharpened power profile but coming off the trainer always leaves a gap in race preparation. In professional cycling the changes in speed and power throughout a race are constant, ranging from a single hard gap-closing pedal stroke to several minutes at 55-65kmh spinning out the 11 cog. Trainer workouts don’t replicate that the way outdoor group rides and training races can, so I was excited to enter the burgeoning racing scene on Zwift.

It took some figuring out and I was dropped from the A group more than I want to admit but eventually I found the racing to be a great stimulus. In my first big race of the season I used a combination of strong time trial and an uncharacteristically aggressive crit performance to take second overall at the San Dimas Stage Race.

Altitude Training On a Budget

My Zwift riding didn’t end in March this season either, as it had in previous years. When it was time to train for high altitude races like the Tour of Gila and Utah, I was able to stay close to home rather than spending time and money to acclimate at a faraway altitude training camp. Big White Ski Resort sits at 6000+ ft and was only a short drive from my home in Kelowna. Despite late season snow and the small selection of training routes at elevation I was able to train high using Zwift for my key workouts. Instead of riding up and down the mountain over and over I could dial in my intensity and inflict just the right amount of hypoxic torture to adapt.

Garage Heat Training

Finally, this seasons my racing calendar stretched into November at the Tour of Hainan in China. We had a cold and wet fall in BC and I had to prepare for a race in 100-degree heat and stifling humidity. I turned one last time to Zwift and spent several sweaty days riding in the garage with the heat maxed out and all of my 2XU cold weather gear on. Those rides were interminably uncomfortable by nature and I couldn’t have lasted more than 15 minutes if I didn’t have the Volcano loop to distract me. I had my doubts about the efficacy of that approach but ended up with one of the standout rides of the race. I raced off the front on the sweltering 230km second stage and I was caught solo only 700m from the line by the charging peloton. I went through 12 bottles in the last 50km of that effort, but I never overheated even as my breakaway companions cramped, cracked and dropped away.

Gaining Traction Among Pros

Zwift is gradually gaining a lot of traction with the eternally reluctant pro cycling community. The platform can bridge physiological and practical gaps in the arduous pro racing calendar and riders are starting to harness that. I am no longer the only guy on my team who suffers through intervals on the way to Watopia’s radio tower. I have also shared Zwift and some of the training techniques I have discovered with the athletes I coach at my Peak Form Coaching business.

About this Series

In this blog series I want to share my racing and training experiences with you throughout my third professional season as I look to turn my 2017 podium places into wins and take the next step in my career. I also want to share indoor training tips and advice I have learned in my thousands of kilometers on the roads of Watopia.

It should be a great year ahead and I can’t wait to get started again for 2018. Until then, Ride On!

The Endurance Lab Coaches’ Corner 2

In this episode:

• What is really causing your cramps
• The importance of rest and recovery
• High cadence and how much you need it in your life

Watch me train for ITU World Championships on Zwift

My name is Ian, often seen as I. Murray ODZ Endurance Lab on Zwift.  I have been an endurance athlete for about 15 years, and I am one of the original Zwift Beta participants.  Many of you know me from the TeamODZ SkillZ and DrillZ classes held every Wednesday evening and as the Evil Elf from the TeamODZ Endurance Lab.  Now, it is time to embark on another adventure.

On 12 November, my triathlon season culminated at the USA Triathlon Long Course National Championships held at the Miami Man Triathlon.  I had one goal: punch my ticket to the International Triathlon Union Long Course World Championships in Odense/Fyn, Denmark.  Mission accomplished.

I now have about eight months to get ready for the race.  The race is a bit longer than Miami Man, so the build will be a bit different.  This time, though, you will get to see it all, both here and on Zwift.  Other than the swim, about 95 percent of my run and bike workouts will be on Zwift.  (I will still have to do a little outside, as I cannot get good speed workouts in on the treadmill.)

Each week I will put up the results of the previous week’s training and the plan for the upcoming week.  I’ll publish the times of when I plan to do each of my workouts, so I hope that many of you can join me on this journey!  Training starts in earnest on 4 December, as I have decided to take a couple weeks off to let the body recover.

Keep tuned in to Zwift Insider for more fun and suffering!

Mental Training Using Zwift

Let’s be very clear here, training for any kind of long distance event is straight up difficult. Period. Now, having said this, as a mental skills trainer I am always working with athletes to stay motivated, focused, consistent, and confident in their abilities. I have trained in a slew of applied techniques to facilitate those critical attributes from my Masters at the University of Utah, however, very few were as effective as the combination of training on the Wahoo Kickr and Zwift.

A bit of a background story

I began my journey in Ironman Training and completion with a call from the Salt Lake Triathlon Club. At this time, my athletic pursuits had slowed to a crawl after a long stint with the game of lacrosse, having played through high school and college, and my body was wrecked. With 2 junk ankles, an ACL repair, and a cracked belief in my body holding up to anything significant I answered a call from Rory Duckwork, the president of the Salt Lake Tri club, who asked if I would come work with some of the elites in a weekend intensive training down in St. George, Utah. That weekend I covered personal distance records in all three disciplines, came home, signed up for the St George 70.3 (just 2 months away) and started training.

As I covered in my Coeur d’Alene Ironman Reflection, as a mental skills trainer I felt that the experience would help me understand what the athletes of long distance events go through. I wanted to understand the mindset so I could get closer to understanding those athletes I worked with. One of the first things I learned is that, when the novelty of training and the excitement of signing up wears off, the mental game comes into play. I am talking about keeping the motivation high to work through 2-a-day training sessions, work, family, and everything else that needs to be done in a day. The long and lonely bike rides on roads notorious for popping tires due to the local bull thorn growth. I am also talking about pushing and trusting the body into places it has never been.

I completed the 70.3 at St. George and with the energy of the finished race, signed up for the 70.3 at Coeur d’Alene just 4 months later.

This is when things got real for me. If you look at my training peaks data (365 Days), you can see a major lapse in motivation and drive about 3 months out from my 2nd 70.3 race. The panic monster had not set in and the monkey mind had taken firm hold over anything having to do with training. If you don’t know what I am talking about, take a look inside the mind of a master procrastinator. I had to do something to get the fire raging once again. So, like so many, I started buying things thinking, “if I just had a new pair of shoes or a new pair of sunglasses I would be motivated enough to go out yet again.” This worked… for a day…

If you have ever been here you might understand how frustrating it is to KNOW what you need to do but have little CARE to actually do it. Even as a sport psych, knowing all of the techniques to get me out of the funk, I didn’t because I simply did not care. This might be a good time to say that throughout my limited experience as an expert in sport psychology, motivation is the MOST IMPORTANT attribute to develop with athletes. If you do not have the motivation, you will fall short of what you are trying to accomplish even while knowing everything about what you need to do to be successful.

After another shopping spree, I had a shiny new Wahoo Kickr and Rory had recommended joining him on this new virtual reality platform called Zwift so we could train together.

Everything changed after this.

3 Reasons I Love Wahoo and Zwift as a Sport Psych

Zwift increases motivation DRAMATICALLY

Ok, so I will put the research behind this here in a second but the fact is I WANTED to get on the bike day after day after day because it was freaking FUN!

If I were to put the science behind the effect that occurred I would bring in a bunch of research from Ryan & Deci’s self-determination theory which states that there are 3 things we can do to help increase motivation:

1. Increase camaraderie (go do what you want to do with other people who like to do what you want to do).
2. Increase competency (learn more about how to do what you are trying to do).
3. Choice (allow the person to choose to do what they are trying to do rather than having someone make them).

The combination of the Kickr and Zwift helped me impact each one of these critical elements. I was riding with virtual Team ODZ, Team SLTC, and about 1000 other riders on the hills of Watopia (Camaraderie). I rode the ‘skillz and drillz’ rides, listened to the experts on a Discord group talk nutrition and strategy (competency). And, I raced at least 2 times a week just because I thought it was fun (choice).

Zwift indoor efforts consistently bring trust to your training

With every virtual race that I participated in, I saw an increase in my FTP. If you do not know what FTP is, just think of it as the max amount of power your body can produce over 1 hour. Before Zwift and the Kickr, my FTP went from 166 to 187 in 6 months. In the 6 months after Zwift and the Kickr, my FTP climbed from 187 to 217. The fact is, I began to trust my training because I knew it was consistent and deliberate. Check out the structured training in the picture. I could also see RESULTS, which (let’s be honest) is what we are really looking for in training. It helps drive us forward no matter how process-oriented our focus is.

Over the winter months, when the snow was thick and the crappy Utah air was heavy I spent hundreds of hours on the bike. This allowed me to continually see progress even when there is a typical lull in training. Without getting into too many details, the first race of the 2017 season was Ironman Oceanside 70.3. At this race, I was able to drop 30 minutes off of my previous best bike split.

Zwift pushes you past limits through racing

The last reason I love Zwift from the perspective of a sport psych is the fact that there is no substitute for race day intensity. I personally was able to get into and train a race day mindset 2 times EVERY WEEK! This is so impactful for long distance athletes because races are so few and far between. These athletes previously didn’t get the advantage of competing every week and now they can! A common mental training assignment that I give the athletes I work with is to have at least 1 day a week of training that they focus primarily on getting in and holding the race day intensity and mindset. This allows the athlete to practice and gain confidence in their ability to control emotion and focus. The difficult part about this is that there is NO substitute for competition energy. It is truly difficult to get into that mindset and energy state without the competition.

Well, as you can guess Zwift solves this problem. I can attest to this because through every race I participated in, I was able to hold an intensity that I never thought to be achievable. I had a whole new ‘gear’ that I was not utilizing and because I was racing, I was not thinking about how my body felt. I simply raced!

In the end…

I completed the Ironman Coeur d’Alene 18 months after starting the journey. I suffered through 5+ hour rides indoors on a weekly basis and maintained the motivation (again, what I believe to be the most important attribute) to achieve this monumental challenge and I owe a lot of it to my Kickr, by allowing me to stay safe and stay out of the weather, as well as the effects of training using Zwift.

Note from Nate

I hope you find it interesting to get a hands on perspective of a trained sport psych as mental skills training can be vague and intangible at times. I personally feel that there is a disconnect between athletes and the experts that they work with in the fact that far to many of ‘experts’ or professionals have little experience in doing the things that they are teaching. Having said this, I personally find that there are new age approaches to helping athletes to train their mental game that can only be seen through participation and engagement.

The Endurance Lab Coaches’ Corner 1

Meet the coaches of The Endurance Lab!

Grab a seat, sit back and enjoy the FIRST Episode of The Endurance Lab Coaches Corner! The Coaches corner is an unscripted, informative podcast covering hot topics in cycling and triathlon training, racing, and nutrition. Hosted by our Coaches and Nutritional Therapist specializing in endurance sports.