It snowed over night, so the conditions were unrideable today. A good day to hop on Zwift. I chose the Watopia Mountain Route. There were over 12,000 riders when I hopped on. The legs felt good to start. My Madone feels good. It took about 15 minutes to reach the base of the climb. I was ready to go when I got there. I had two Halo Replays going on. The overall and the climbing segment. I was trying to keep them in my sights. I was putting in good wattages, for me. Mostly around 3.0 W/kg plus or minus. I was doing in and out of the saddle efforts, trying to keep the wattages up. The Halo Replay helped me pace my effort. I had my new Garmin Edge 1040 running. Interesting that it picked up the speed and distance even though I was stationary. I’ll have to investigate why. It was picking up the wattage, cadence and HR from my sensors. The miles went quick. I tried not to look at the numbers much. After half way up the climb, I was ahead of my Halo Replay, so I tried keeping it there. I was paying attention to time while guessing where I’ll be on the ascent. The morale felt better as I reached the tunnel landmark. I noticed that I was on par for a PR, so I kept the tempo high in the last few minutes to the summit. I posted a sub 30 minute climb, making it a PR. From there, it was to the top of the bonus climb. I was neck and neck with my Halo Replay. I kept him in my sight. I don’t recall if I beat him to the summit, but it was probably within seconds. After that, I headed back down the mountain. I was doing the time estimates in my mind while I made my way back to the mainland. After making it to the mainland, I tried not to slack off. I kept my tempo going. I was on par for a Lap PR, so that motivated me. I put in a good dig through the sprint zone. I used one of my power ups just before making it to the finish. As I anticipated, I put in a PR for the lap. A definite bonus. From there, I commenced the cooldown till my HR reached 112 BPM.

Concentration was good. My patience was in check. The morale was good form the start, so things went quick. Balance and form was good. Nutrition was good. I had to feed before the ride as I was a bit low on energy. A banana, Clif Bar, apple sauce and some grapes. That held me over. Ailments were minimal. Some hand soreness and numbness on the bigger out of the saddle efforts. The joints and muscles felt good. Gear worked flawlessly. I had to adjust the rear derailleur alignment before the ride started. Other notes, there were over 12,000 riders when I hopped on the map.