The Zwift Games are upon us, and with them big race packs on fresh routes. Having finished third in stage 1 (read more) and second in stage 2 (read more), I was really enjoying myself in the 450-570 group.
But then the climb stages arrived, and everything changed. Here are my summaries of stages 3 and 4 of Zwift Games.
Stage 3: Warmup
It didn’t take long for me to realize that today wasn’t going to be pretty.
As I spun my legs to gently warm them up prior to the race, I could tell today (Tuesday, March 11) was a bad leg day. You know what I’m talking about. Sometimes these days are expected, other times they come as a surprise. Today was a bit of a surprise since I had ridden the day before and felt fairly good.
What was the cause? Poor sleep? Insufficient nutrition? Getting sick? I wasn’t sure. But I could tell something was off.
Stage 3: Volcano Implosion
Stage 3 took place on the new Downtown Eruption route in Watopia, and I knew exactly where I would have trouble here: the Volcano KOM. This segment has often been my undoing in races, as it’s just a bit too steep and long for me to hang on!
We had a big pack of 144 starters in the race, so I knew the effort was going to be extra tough. That’s just how it works on Zwift: bigger packs mean more strong riders, generally.
The course begins with a quick climb up the bottom half of the Hilly KOM, and it took ~450 watts for 50 seconds to hold onto the group here. Job done, but I knew the big test was up the road.
I made it to the foot of the Volcano KOM without incident, but it wasn’t long (around 600 meters in) before I saw my avatar drifting backward in the group. At 1.1km into the climb, the white flag came out. 75 riders rode away in a long string ahead, and I was quickly passed by several more.
At first, I sat up and spun easily, sinking down to 93rd place. Then I realized there was still a GC competition going on, so I pushed a bit to catch the wheels of the small group just ahead as we hit the flat halfway point of the Volcano KOM.
But then the road tilted up again, and that group rode away from me too! Jimmeny Christmas. This was bad.
Over the top, I found myself with just a couple of riders. We descended together, and I used the supertuck and some well-timed power to bridge us up to a small group just up the road.
The race may be lost, but you can still make it interesting, right?
You can tell it’s a bad leg day when your legs like you’re riding at threshold, but your heart rate doesn’t want to get above tempo zone. That’s what I was feeling on this day – like I couldn’t even push my legs hard enough to make my heart work hard!
Stage 3: Finish
Six of us made our way through Downtown Watopia, then it was time for the final challenge: the Hilly KOM. This climb is around 2 minutes long and, again, has been my nemesis in past races, seeing me dropped by just a few seconds as we crest the top.
Our group strung out and separated up this climb, and I finished somewhere in the middle of my pack of 6, for a final placement of 94th overall.
See my ride on Zwift.com >
See my ride on Strava >
Watch the Video
Stage 4: Warmup
On Saturday, March 15, I raced the second climbing stage on the new London Uprising route. I knew this one would be rough, too, because it features two big climbs: Fox Hill and Box Hill.
My legs felt nicely recovered during the warmup, and I spun my legs for around an hour prior to the race.
I’d been chatting with Nick Kalkounis from ZwiftHQ about the Zwift Games stages prior to this, sharing my results as he shared his. (Nick is a cool dude who’s done a lot of work with Zwift Racing Score. We met on my trip to the Specialized Win Tunnel back in October – read more about that here).
We decided to meet up for this race, and Nick invited Tim Hanson (of zwiftracing.app fame) along. So the three of us were having a sort of informal “race within the race.” Nick is a fit dude without a scrap of fat on his body, so I didn’t think I stood much chance against him on this course. But it’s always fun to race with friends anyway. Let’s go!
Stage 4: Outfoxed
The London Uprising route begins by taking riders straight up Fox Hill. Then you descend, do a lap of the Classique, and head up Box Hill for the finish.
Simple. But not easy.
The start was pretty chill, since everyone knew the work would begin just up the road. 67 riders left the start pens, and soon enough we hit Fox Hill, and things exploded! Despite holding some solid power numbers (for myself, at least), I was dropped from the front group by the time we hit the first flattish spot just ~400 meters into the 2.4km climb. And I kept drifting back. 34th… 36th… 39th.
At 3.4km, I saw a gap to the group behind, so I pushed to hold the wheels just ahead. “Maybe Nick is in that group behind?” I hoped, against hope. Then I tapped his name in the Companion app and hit “Fan View”… and saw that he was sitting in 2nd place, on the 1st place rider’s wheel. Crap!
I finished Fox Hill in 39th, and joined a group of 7 riders. We were caught by a group of 8 from behind, despite my valiant supertucking, and that group headed to the Classique.
Soon enough, a few riders from our group got bored and attacked, leaving me in a pack of 10 riders with 3 up the road. By the time we hit the base of Box Hill, I was in a group of 8 constituting places 34-42.
Stage 4: Finish
On the first section of Box Hill, our group stretched out, and I simply didn’t have the legs to hold on. Most of them went up the road, then as it leveled out I found a bit of energy to push hard to reel in some riders just ahead.
I made it to the flat top of Box Hill with two other riders in 38-41st place, and my only goal was to beat both of them to the line. I deployed my aero powerup and went hard with 250 meters to go, but M. Moore (ART) had a much stronger sprint and blew past me. I finished 39th overall.
Chapeau to Nick Kalkounis, who hit the bottom of Box Hill with the front pack, and ended up finishing in 21st.
See my ride on Zwift.com >
See my ride on Strava >
Watch the Video
Takeaways
Races with climbs over a few minutes are always tough for me, and Zwift Games stages 3 and 4 were no exception. Stage 3 was especially rough because my legs just didn’t show up!
I actually had some decent power numbers in Stage 4, hitting 2025 bests in the 6-11 minute range as I climbed Fox Hill:
But that simply wasn’t good enough. It’s clear that my racing score puts me in a group where I have a shot at the podium in flat races, but will get dropped handily if the race features any significant climbing.
Which is how it should work. I have no complaints. If I want to put in a hard effort and know I won’t have a shot at a win, I can do a climbing race. If I want a shot at a podium, I need to stick to flatter events.
Lastly, I think it’s worth mentioning that my two terrible finishes in the races above each only dropped my racing score by 1 point! After stage 3 I went from 550 to 549. Then stage 4 knocked me down to 548. Ha! (If I was doing these races to tank my score, it would take a long time…)
Your Thoughts
Did you race Zwift Games stages 3 and 4? How did they unfold for you? Share below!
Climbing is my nemesis so I joined the ZRS group one higher than my 414 score hoping to hang onto a group quicker than me. Close to PBs on both climbs finished 42 out of about 60. Because of my finishing position my ZRS dropped to 410 but my Zwift Racing App score improved as I finished higher than ZRA predicted, reflecting my climb handicap. So ZRS seems to lack intelligence when compared to ZRA.
I have had same experience. Flat races stand a chance of staying with group but as soon as you put any elevation in, I just have no way of keeping up. I can only do 4.1 wkg as an all out effort for 20 minutes and around 5 wkg on for 5 min. I see myself a good B for a flat race but average with anything that goes up.
With race score I have to race advanced and get dropped within the first minute on a climb 😅
With a race score of 572, I did stage 4 in A (570-700) with 2 days of rest. I fell off the lead group on the first climb and struggled to hold 200w on the flats. Legs were dead (not sure why) and my scored dropped to 566.
2 days later I tried again in B, felt way better (even though i did a 12mi mtb ride that morning), got on the podium, set 8 and 10 min PRs and cut 4 minutes off my time. Crazy how different you can perform within a few days.
I was in the same Race 3 :). My strategy was “stick with Eric, he races smart”, but no smart racing will help you on a course like this. Was surprised to see you drift back. I lost touch with the front towards the top of the volcano, where it wasn’t really a group anymore, but a long string of riders. Came down with the second group at around place 50 and finished 57th at the end. Quite satisfied with the result, as I am on the lower end of the Range 2 races with a ZRS of around 485, and with 83 kg not really a climber. I do all the ZG races in Range 2, I like the challenge. I set a new Volcano KOM personal best, even beat my “non-realistic zpower watts non-supported dumb trainer” time from years ago!
Race 4 was also quite exhausting for me, but I had good legs, again finished with second group or what was left of it at the top of Box, 25th out of 62. With Fox and Box personal bests.
Nice work, despite your poor strategic choice at the start! 😂
Somehow I got prs on all the climbs, yet dropped by over 3 mins in each race (cat b range 2) – sounds like it is a decent number of people who perform reasonably well in flat/mid-hilly races, and climbers/stronger all-rounders who may not sprint as well can then completely dominate anything more than 3-5 minutes of climbing.
Good motivation to get fitter!
“my two terrible finishes”
Finishing 39th out of 67 riders in a course that does not suit you seems like a pretty decent finish. You aren’t supposed to be at the top of your category every race (if you were, would ZRS being working properly?), being in the middle is where most people will find themselves.
The sentences I wrote right before the one you quoted would say I completely agree with you, Tim.😀 “Which is how it should work. I have no complaints…”
By “terrible” I meant my overall placement was poor, and I was surprised by how little they dropped my racing score.
That’s what I’m saying though, your overall placement was not terrible or poor. If you take a random zwift racer you’d expect them to finish in the middle of the pack. Not everyone can finish in the top 20%. To even begin to call a result terrible you’d need to be well back from the halfway point. If you finish in the middle of the pack that result is telling ZRS that you are in the probably right category so no major changes should happen.
I did the R2D race for stage 3 and hung in with the front group until the last 500m or so of the Volcano climb. Managed to catch 3 others on the descent and we were only 5 seconds off the lead group of 3. I held it at 5 seconds for a kilometer or two but at first I wasn’t getting any help and just couldn’t claw any time back myself. Eventually the others rotated through but it was too little too late. We had almost 20 seconds on the group behind us, but that dwindled as the gap ahead grew. On the final climb I got blown out and a few riders from behind caught us. I crossed in 9th, which bumped my score a few points to 287. For stage 4 I pre-rode the climbs and knew I’d be put to my limits. I did the R1C group for the first time, because the time slot worked for me. Even with a solid warmup it was a hard effort to stay in the first 30 into the climb. The numbers just weren’t there and I was around 40th approaching the top but was hemorrhaging places rapidly. Got into a group of 7 that formed on the descent, and we maintained a gap on any chasers. On Box Hill the rest of the group dropped me right away. I stopped looking at the screen and just put my head down and stared at the PM on my bars, finding a good rhythm. The climb being very steady, it worked and I passed several on the way up. My 8 minute power and HR ended up being nearly the exact same as the first climb, which I was pleased with, as at least I didn’t fall apart. I was 40th and this still moved my score up to 291, remaining close to the bottom of the C group but still well below the 330 limit for R2D. I’m looking forward to putting stage 5 behind me, so that I can refocus on training the weaknesses these races have exposed. I’ve lost about 12kg in the past 12 months, but I’m still 5kg above my proper race weight. My 20 min power has come back to within 4-5% of where it was a few years ago, but my 1m-5m power is still in the toilet. Time for some 4×4 work. Four races in 11 days was a bit much too, as these all have me nearly on my limits start to finish. Thanks for another great writeup.
Stage 3 went pretty good – I’m usually rather bad at climbing but I was able to hold on to the front group on Volcano KOM und to Hilly KOM. I like Hilly KOM, because it lasts about 2 minutes, which is about the max I can go fully out – I won by 4 seconds (out of 59).😊
Stage 4 I got dropped at Fox hill and was not able to go to the small front again – Box hill I got dropped again finishing 15th of 73.
All in all better than expected. 🙂
Hopefully those rocks you snuck into Nick’s saddlebag are still there, as I’m doing Stage 5 with him tomorrow. 😅
I saw in the video that in the right part of the screen, lightly left form the column, you have the position and the gap of other riders, number of riders in group and other information that I don’t have in mine.
Is it due to the Zwift bike?
That’s the Sauce for Zwift app: https://zwiftinsider.com/sauce-for-zwift/
thanks a lot!!