Hi All- as so many of you race in Zwift, I thought it would be helpful to share my coach’s (Tom Danielson) feedback on how I got dropped so quickly from today’s race. He breaks down how important positioning is in these races.
You’d think I’d know this by now, but we all make mistakes. I am sharing mine in hopes it can be helpful to you!
Interesting! Thank you for sharing!
Wow! Thanks for sharing! I am in awe of your efforts and loved hearing Tom D’s feedback. I know of him from his Garmin days! He holds the record for the Mt. Evans climb— highest road in the US— Will you share another time when you use his feedback? There’s so much to this sport!!! 
Thanks Coach. After joining a team I soon realised it was not just about brute force in races but also positioning and learning to “read” the race. Great video and thanks for posting. 
Very interesting, thanks for sharing! The washing machine 
Thanks for sharing - that was fascinating to hear Tom’s analysis of your race
Excellent feedback!! I feel like that is something that’s has happened to me a few weeks back racing with the fellas.
Thanks for sharing this @Coach_Theia! Super helpful things to think about for next time I do a race myself!
Thank you for sharing. Really appreciate this. I feel like I do this at every cross race and can’t seem to recover fast enough to stay with the pack. Very helpful.
Thank you for sharing. This is extremely helpful.
Thanks for sharing this. So much commentary for such a short period of time. This was really interesting.
That was really interesting - thank you for sharing.
Race 2 report! Another super tough race and this time I stayed with the front group longer. Still, I was doing 5 w/kg in the draft! This is where some perspective really helps. If this was an outdoor road race, for me to be doing 5 w/kg in the draft, the front group would need to be doing about 7 w/kg. And we are talking doing that kind of power, non-stop (remember no coasting), for over 30 min (which is when they reached the top of the Epic QOM). Yeah, not happening IRL.
The other important fact to provide perspective: these racers are pros. Have been racing for a long time. I started riding a road bike at the end of 2015 at age 43.
1st place - Katheryn Curi
2nd place - Former international rower turned pro-cyclist
3rd place - former collegiate-level competitive cyclist
With all of that in mind,I have absolutely no idea what I was doing participating in that race!!! 
So here is how it went for me. After doing 4 minutes at 5 w/kg and 6 minutes at over 4.5 w/kg (average!), I got dropped. Took a breather and proceed to do my workout! 
Can you spot the 20/20s intervals below?
The good news is, lot of PRs:
So all in all, I had a good race. From the perspective of someone looking at my result in Z Power however, they would say that I suck! But the truth is, I was way out of my league.
It’s way cool that you were invited, and cool that you were able to hang on so long. It was quite a long course with a lot of climbing. Although that does not play to your strengths (as I understand them) you demonstrated your mental toughness by getting back in the saddle!
That is impressive Theia!!! You should be very proud and happy with that massive effort. This brought back memories of my first MTB race last year where I came in last but it’s still the race I’ve felt most proud about my effort. Perspective is everything and you are a true champion 
Thank you @CandaceC and @Covi. I do need to rethink what I want from Zwift racing though. If outdoor events were happening I’d not be racing indoors.
Wow what a race and effort. Takes a lot of mental strength to jump back in a second time!
I have a question, why did you then do a workout? Was that a plan prior to the race or did you decide on the spot to do that?
Congrats on racing with the pros!
@gosimrr I did the workout because my initial effort was short. So instead of riding for 1+hs easy, I figured I’d take the opportunity and do my Thursday’s workout that I didn’t do. Also to keep me mentally entertained. I had planned it ahead of time, as I knew how he race would go.
I was fan view spying on you @Coach_Theia and watched the start play out. It was really exciting to see you taking your coach’s advice and putting it into practice! Your positioning was so much better based on what he said and I was cheering hard for you. But watching the watts, holy cow! That you did what you did as long as you did had me floored! Super strong against those pros. It doesn’t feel good getting dropped and thinking you are out of your league, and maybe right now you are. But after watching you yesterday, if you decide you want to seriously compete with the top zwift racers, you could really get there if you want to 
Thank you so much for sharing this video. Sharing it was very generous. Very interesting and informative.
