I went down to Lawrence with Bill and Trudi last night to eat with my team mates and have a couple beers. We hadn’t gotten together this year and it was nice to catch up some. We were waiting at Freestate Brewery, but it was going to be over an hour so we ended up down the street eating Mexican food.
Anyway, after dinner we were all talking about how hard it was to train since there has been ice and snow on the roads for the last couple weeks. Eventually, my two young team mates, Benn Stover and Garrick Valverde started talking about riding Zwift. A couple days ago, a few guys left comments that I should try Zwift to help shorten the perceived trainer times.
Zwift is a 3D cycling app that allows a rider to participate with other riders on the internet. It has different courses and you can race or just ride different places.
I’ve known about Zwift for quite a while. My friend, Mike McCarthy sent me an email a couple years ago about trying it out Mike was World Champions in pursuit and is in the Bicycling Hall of Fame. It was in the prototype phase then and since I didn’t really think I’d ride a trainer that much, I just skipped it completely.
Now I’m sitting at a team dinner and listening to Garrick say that he was riding along the coast and a group of 60 guys blew by him and he had to chase them all day. It was funnier than shit. Benn said the same thing, he was “riding” along with one other guy and the guy jumped him. It is so weird listening to them talk like it was really happening when in reality, it is an interactive video game.
Anyway, I think I might have to try it out some, just to keep up to speed with current trends. It would be like not knowing about Strava as a cyclist, so it is nearly mandatory to at least get up to speed with it. It you go to the Zwift website, you can get a couple weeks free. I think if you’re a Strava premium member, that expands to two months. That would get you most of the way through the winter, unless you live on the Canadian border.
Anyway, I’ll let you know when, or if, I try it out. I rode outside yesterday for a couple hours and have a scheduled ride again today at 12:30. It is supposed to be nearly 40 today, but windy once again.
It does pass the time faster. Seems like everyone on there has a ridiculous wattts per kilogram number though. Or I am the slowest person in the world.
Glad to see you might try it. Just beware, being in the software industry myself, I still consider it Beta. They have a LOT of issues to address. It runs fine but there are some features they need to mature in the program. I was given the opportunity to be a beta tester way back and never jumped on it. I’m never an early adopter – just got on facebook, don’t twitter or strava. But Zwift is cool enough that I’m already dreaming of upgrading from my crappy work laptop with it’s embedded GPU and 5 frames per second to a home built PC with a GTX 960 in it. I keep seeing youtube videos and can’t believe the graphics that I’m missing out on (apparently in one of the tunnels you can see water droplets).
I can’t reiterate enough how I continue to find myself sitting on the trainer for 2 hours at a time when normally I am wanting to get off at 15-20 minutes before Zwift.
And a bonus – the wife wants to use it so bad, she’s fully 100% on board with my PC build, she’s the one driving it to get done NOW. When does that ever happen?
Check it out—interesting: http://cyclingtips.com/2016/01/the-path-to-a-professional-cycling-contract-may-be-in-your-living-room-canyon-sram-and-zwift-launch-talent-identification-competition/
They come in the night and put a chip in your head. Sorta like in Star Trek where Ricardo puts a creepy bug in the dude’s helmet! Next thing you’ll be passing up good ride days to train w your Swift pals! Too windy. Sand on the streets. Traffic. Whatever.
Geeks, nerds and sissyasses. Get out of the cyber world and into reality.
Just an observation. If you enter your weight wrong either mistakenly by missing it or intentionally, that could explain the reason some people are blowing past others. 🙂
‘Cheating’ on Swift is rampant. Who’d a figured?
This is the future. As soon as they pass enough ludicrous legislation like riding with 15′ flags, having to stop and get off you bike for cars, licenses, and taxes. Add to the mix iut seems when a bike ride gets hit by a automobile it’s always the cyclist fault, the majority of people will gravitate towards virtual cycling. No more road bikes, you race in the simulation.