Zwift: First Race

I tried my first race on Zwift.  Because it's my first, and maybe because I'm old, I was in Cat E, lowest of the categories.  It's hard to be proud of taking first place in my cat when Strider, who took third, is in his 70s.  Matthew is in his 30s though, and he was pushing hard in spurts.  When someone is doing that 5.1+ watts/kg for a sprint randomly, you suspect they're a bit younger.  I pushed a little harder than I should have because, a. it's a race, and b. it felt like the other three at the front with me were pushing really hard to keep up, standing on hills [virtually, but standing implies a big effort], sprinting to get back in the group, and pushing their watts/kg higher than their cruising speed to keep up.  I'm 100% sure it won't work in other cats, but it felt like I could try to wear people down by the end by forcing the pace.

Anyway - bumped up a bit, not much.  I'll still be in the lowest category, but close to moving into the next cat.  Unfortunately, when I look at the zwiftpower profiles [not everyone who raced uses zwift power, so the placings are different; at least I think that's how it works], D cat has a very clear/clean demarcation between those who push more the 3.0 watts/kg and those who are in the 2.5 range.  I'll need to prune weight to deal with breaking 3.0.  I registered as a tie for heaviest person in the race and that's after losing weight.  That guy one ahead of me in the second photo, Miho ^ 2....he weighs half what I do.  Literally.  The watts difference is amusing to push along our respective weights.

This is the bottom of the zwift power site connected to Zwift.  So not everyone in the race is over here and, I suspect fewer in the lowest categories who aren't racing consistently, otherwise you'd see a bunch more Es.  But it highlights I can keep up with the back end of the Ds.  I might not have to take last place in a race a cat up [as long as it's like 14.1 miles and 600 feet of climb.  I know they get longer and sprint-ier than that].

Definitely a fun adventure after 3 months of Zwift and I fully expected I'd finish almost last.  I feel great today, even after a 35 minute sprinting workout, so that's a sign that some of the gains are starting to bake in.