All Uphill and Down Dale – Tips for WTRL TTT #85 – Harrogate Reverse

About This Series

Since March I have become obsessed with the weekly Team Time Trial… so I asked Eric if I could share my obsession with you all, in weekly doses.

Each week on a Friday I will give you a profile of the upcoming route, guidance on bike choice and some target times if you want to aim for the Premiere League (top-10 in each coffee class get to be in a special race televised on YouTube). 

If you can’t ride, or even if you can ride, but want more action! Don’t forget to tune in to the live TV show on Zwift Community Live’s YouTube Channel at 6:15 (UK time). 

Review of TTT #84 Magnificent 8

Watopia’s Magnificent 8 is a regular feature on the calendar for TTT – for good reason. It is an excellent TTT route. Enough flat for formation to work – enough hills to make it interesting. There were over 700 teams out there this week. The growth of WTRL TTT knows no bounds!

A pro-tip for anyone who is interested in a PR spot… I discovered this week that there is a checkbox in the team registration each week that is very important. The checkbox tells WTRL you can field a team in the right class, at the PL. Without it, Racecontrol assumes you can’t make the 6:15 PM UK-time time-slot for the PL race!

This week’s results are a little confusing so let me explain. The WTRL guys got around to (apparently they have been busy) separating Vienna into multiple classes, and creating a new highly caffeinated Doppio class filled with mostly A+. That played havoc with my nice orderly table! As you can see though – regardless of coffee class breakdown the times were stellar. Magnificent 8 course records were completely smashed in every class. My own team, the Hyenas, pulled a time 1-minute faster than earlier in the summer but still ended up further down the table. Is all this a sign of summer returnees coming back to Zwift and having a lower race class, or is it a result of increased competition and a growth in the number of teams? We shall see. 

A shout out to Mocha PL riders in CICC C. I believe this is the first time a CICC team have made PL. That said, while they managed a great time last week (fastest Mocha team with 4 riders), they really need to work on the creativity of the team name. 

How did I do this week? Regular readers will know I have had exploding turbo/ergo/trainer issues and had to take a break. In addition, I have been recovering from an infection. All in all that has had a serious impact on my ability to help out the team – in particular my self-appointed role as cheerleader, since I have no breath left to talk after 20 minutes! Here’s an edited version of my ride report:

Hyena Heckle – Full team of eight. With an 18:30 delay we debated between popping to Tesco’s or swapping stories. Stories won. Towards the end of the wait nerves were tested as Hyenas kept disappearing from the screen. Three Hyenas started solo rides but soon popped up in the pack. The strategy of spooling up a few seconds early worked and the whole team crossed the line at pace on 0-seconds. Pace line formed easily and we were off. Everyone pulled hard, took turns. We got into a mess on the way up to the KOM being passed by one team while passing another but everyone got through cleanly. Cat and Lewy led the charge up the KOM and we passed through the gate 30 seconds ahead of our split time. From there we had a nice sprint across the desert – losing Dan to a dodgy turbo connection. POD showed his mettle, taking strong turns at the front and taking on the role of cheerleader… Our two riders up from the Sloths recently were stellar, pulling turns without complaint. Seven riders crossed the line within seconds of each other in record time for this course.

Harrogate Circuit Reverse

Next Thursday we have a 27km ride around the Yorkshire countryside. The course is a reverse of the Harrogate UCI course we did back in TTT #73. While the UCI course has been a regular fixture, the Reverse has not been seen in 2020. Those that rode the UCI course a couple of months ago will remember… this is a technical course with nowhere to hide. It is a sequence of hills and descents with few stretches of flat to regroup. Each lap is 13.8km with 240 gruelling meters of climbing. Simon Schofield, who comes from Harrogate has a nice race recon of the forward route. (I dunno… read it backwards or something.)

I described the UCI course as lumpy… and this is the same thing. It’s not a mountain, but goes up and down throughout the ride. If your practiced maybe you can balance the relative masses of your riders so the lighter ones lead you up the hills and the heavier ones lead you back down. But there’s no getting away from the fact that heavier riders will have their sufferfaces on. 

The ride starts with a nice easy 2% decline… don’t let that fool you into a false sense of security, but do use it (and the slight incline that follows) to get into formation and sort yourselves out. After that it’s a sequence of hills; the first is the sprint hill (because the sprint is on it) at just 2.5% to test the legs, then the Reverse KOM is 1.1km at 4.5% to sap your strength, a little bump up Penny Pot Lane (1km at 4%). Next comes the aptly named Pot Bank Wall which is 750M at 8% and then a bump up Otley Rd (500M at 5%) before descending down to finish the lap back in the center of Harrogate.

What to ride?

Ahead of UCI Harrogate TTT Eric and I had a bit of a discussion on the right bike to use… then he did the science part by testing S-Works Venge versus Tron. It was a tie. That time I rode the Venge, but this time I will ride Tron. Hopefully its lighter weight will help me get up those hills. 

Here are some recommendations on equipment at various levels:

• Level 6 Zwift Aero frame and DT Swiss ARC 62 wheels
• Level 13 Canyon Aeroad 2021 and Zipp 808s
• Level 18 Specialized Venge with Zipp 808s
• Level 25 Cervelo S5 with Zipp 808s
• Level 33 S-Works Venge with ENVE SES 8.9
• Level 35 S-Works Venge with Zipp 808/Super 9
• Level 45 get those 858/Super 9 wheels and pair them with the S-Works Venge

I know I say it every week but it is doubly important this week. Get the Tron! There is no better ride this week.  

Route Recon Rides

There aren’t many rides or races on this course – check out the event listing on zwifthacks.com to see for yourselves. Your best bet is to set up your own recce ride using a meet up.

Race breakdown 

Race breakdown here is tricky. This ride isn’t about knowing the route for me – it’s about knowing your team and managing the effort. For each hill there is a descent, so there is a corresponding recovery – but only if your fellow teammates can manage their effort in sync with you.

Every one of these climbs and descents can cause splits in the team – make sure you stay together.

Target times

This route hasn’t been ridden in 2020 and the times from a year ago are definitely not useful for predicting times this Thursday. For my predictions below, I have broken out Doppio, but not broken out the different Vienna classes… I will work out how to do that in the next week or so.

R&K Hyenas have a good mixed team this week – only 1 B in our full complement, but a good mix of light riders to get us up the hills and strong heavier riders to keep the momentum. I rode the forward course in May (with CICC Vuelta, back when CICC were creative with team names) and we delivered a 48:33 time… so Hyenas have to beat that on the reverse version!

Wrap up

This is a technical, lumpy course. There is no defining feature of this course, rather, it is a sequence of hills that will sap the energy of the whole team. If you know your fellow-riders, and modulate effort to stay together you will deliver a great result.