TPH Zwift Racing

Adam smashing it in the Newbury Velo Race

The team have turned their attentions to Zwift racing during the lockdown, to keep sharp and still get their competitive fix. They’ve been competing in a variety of different events over the last few weeks and been enjoying the indoor pain.

Adam, Ryan and Keeds have competed in several of the Lotus League ‘WKG - Critty Critty Bang Bang’ crit series on Tuesday evenings and have had some great results. This event has been a great focus for local riders with the SCRS / Lotus League adopting the race as their weekly ‘virtual’ event.

Bec has been focusing on TT’s on Zwift, and is basically winning every ladies’ event she now enters. She is absolutely flying, and will be a force to be reckoned with when the racing starts back up in real life again.

Lucy has been putting in some regular race efforts as well, and has seen some really impressive power gains and results, and Rob continues his addiction to early morning Zwift racing and has now completed over 200 Zwift races. Lee has also managed to race a little more regularly than usual, and this consistency has resulted in a meteoric rise to the ‘A’ category.

The variety of courses and events available now on Zwift makes it a lot of fun, so if you haven’t tried Zwift racing already we highly recommend giving it a go.

TPH Racing – Mid-Winter Race Update

The team has stayed very active throughout winter so far, with plenty of cold, wet and muddy Cyclo-Cross races as part of the Eastern Cyclo-Cross league. The most recent adventure saw Molly and Alex brave the conditions at the Stow Scramble last weekend, and both gave it their all as always. Keeds was there in support, and on photography duties, with his dodgy shoulder still keeping him off the CX start line, but hopefully he will be able to make a return before the end of the series having completed so many races in the previous 2 years.

The growth of Zwift over the last few years has been there for all to see, and all of the team have indoor set-ups enabling them to get their racing fix indoors. This always ramps up through the winter, and this year has been no exception. Becky has raced both Road Races and TT’s virtually, Keeds is back to his 300+ watt performances in a variety of races including the new Crit City smash-ups, and Stu picked up his first B category win in a race up Alpe du Zwift (a ‘virtual’ carbon copy of Alpe d’Huez). Lee is squeezing in Zwift races when work (and home refurbishments!) allow and on current form is likely to make the step up to the B’s soon, and Rob has carried on his Zwift racing addiction with 46 races completed since the beginning of October.

There is plenty more Zwift racing on the horizon for the team over the coming weeks, as well as the last few rounds of ‘Cross. Plus, Adam is kicking off his road season nice and early with a trip to Lee Valley Velopark today to compete in the Cat 3 race at the Full Gas Winter Series – good luck Adam!

Saris H3 Smart Trainer - First Ride Review

The Saris H3 Smart Trainer has arrived in store, and we thought what better way to test it out than in an early morning Zwift race!

The H3 is the third edition of the original CycleOps Hammer Smart Trainer, and the main difference from it’s predecessors is that the unit is now even quieter so that it doesn’t cause much disturbance to anyone else in the house whilst in use. Set up is also very easy, with no assembly required out of the box other than folding the arms out from their stored position. The H3 doesn't come with a cassette, so this will need adding to finalise the set up. Connecting to Zwift was also super easy, although the one thing to note is that calibrating the H3 using Zwift’s spin down procedure didn’t work as intended. This is a known issue, but can be easily resolved by adding the Rouvy app for free and calibrating the trainer there instead.

The H3 has the same heavy flywheel as the H2, and this gives an incredibly smooth ride feel which is very realistic. On Zwift, the H3 responds to gradient changes very accurately, so that what you see on the screen is replicated perfectly by what you feel from the trainer. In a Zwift race situation this really allows you to have a good feel for the speed of the race and ensure that you are well positioned at all times, and when it comes to sprints and hard out-of-the-saddle efforts the H3 is outstanding. It is such a solid unit with the weight of the machine at over 20kg, and this makes it very stable and able to comfortably handle big watts. Saris claims that the H3 can handle 2000 watts and replicate 20% gradients, so it should be more than enough for most people.

Overall, the Saris H3 Smart Trainer is a superb piece of equipment to enable anyone to get the most out of Zwift, as well as all other 3rd party trainer apps. The RRP has also been reduced vs the H2, dropping from £1,000.00 to £849.99 for the H3. This makes it very good value vs it’s competitors in the direct drive turbo trainer market.

The Saris H3 is permanently set up on one of our Zwift stations in the shop, so feel free to pop in and try it out anytime.