Romping Around NYC Central Park in Zwift, No Snow
Searching for a different Zwift route for today’s ride I found another HERD ride, the Thursday Social Ride Group D on the NYC KOM After Party course. The ride started at 12:20 PM leaving me enough to get ready, I thought. Earlier this morning I watched The State of WordPress livestream on YouTube that ended about 50 minutes before the ride started. Information about the ride.
I got everything ready but as the start timer counted down to zero my sensors weren’t connected to Zwift through the companion app on my phone. Jumping off the Blue Norcross AL bike I clicked on settings and reconnected them with about 20 seconds before the start. Back on my bike I started pedaling to get the watts up to 80+ so not to be left by the group. Supposedly the ride would average 1.1 to 1.5 W/kg but the leader had internet problems and the fence never appeared. The group jumped from the start and I stayed with them until around 21 minutes when the substitute leader asked the riders in front to slow to allow the new leader to get to the front. I slowed but all that did was move me to the next group and I decided to stay with the because the yellow beacon wasn’t getting any closer. At the time I slowed my position was 52 out of 214. After slowing I moved back to around 95 to 105 depending on whether we were climbing or not.
The NYC course includes several climbs with the hardest around 8%. My overall average speed came in at 17.2 mph over the 17.31 mile ride, the longest ride since I resumed Zwift at the beginning of December. Power output continues to at the same levels since I did the spin up and spin down a couple of days ago: 127 watts average, 304 watts max. Early in the ride my legs felt like they might not hold the power level to stay with the group but they did. At the end of the ride I was surprised with the results.
20th place out of 321 was not what I expected. For a social ride it felt fast.
Strava recorded several records during the ride; 1 new personal record, 2 seconds, and 2 thirds. In real life several years ago when I visited my daughter and son-in-law I rented a bike with my son-in-law and we rode around Central Park. The bikes were in sad shape with large seats and tires. Nothing like my bikes.
