Rapha Festive 500 (2023)

California’s Central Valley checking in.

As is typical this time of year the valley has become a (Festive) 500km long fog bank. Today’s view from space:

and forecast now has rainouts on Tuesday and Thursday:

likely going to be a damp and dank Festive 500. Like a nice West Coast IPA beer :beer:

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Producing a Festive 500 beer, now there’s an idea…

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There is no time limit for an Everesting, one can rest for as long one wants to rest, just not allowed to sleep during the rest. The Roam has a time limit of 36 hours though, with other prescriptions.

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For true high speed on your trainer, put it in slope mode, and set it to -15% for that fast downhill 500km.

Last year my view was that it had to be outside and I was quite vocal about my view, especially on this forum. My view has changed since last year.

Now I see it as a personal challenge and you do what ever you want to to feel like you’ve completed it.

The real winners are Rapha and of course those that ride their bikes as a result of it.

Personally I don’t want to ride my bike that much during the Christmas week. I’d rather spend it with friends and family.

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Go riding with them

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Buy them fat bikes

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My Zwift speeds are way, way faster than my IRL speeds even just on the flat.

But yes it will be a lot faster on Zwift if you do it in a big group, I’ve done it 3 times, once on Zwift and twice outside.

Last year I did it all on Zwift apart from the last 60k (nice weather, went for an NYE pub ride), 504.5km in 14h 31m - nearly 35 kph (last 60k outdoors dragged it down somewhat).

Year before, I did it all on the road in cold and icy weather mainly, so mainly on flat roads that were gritted, 502km in 19h 31 (25.7 kph, pretty typical)

First year I did it in 2019 we had really nice weather mainly, so I rode a lot of it in the hills (and the last 25k on the Brompton which is a very slow bike!), 504km in 20h 47 (24.3 kph)

This year I am going to be travelling around most of the festive period so I don’t think I will be able to do it on the bike. I am considering if there is a sensible running equivalent, 50 km isn’t enough but 50 miles is probably a reasonable challenge (for me anyway, I’m not a big runner usually and I think that would be around 7-8hrs of running)

SF / Bay Area Forecast - so outside Festive is Sat, Sun, and maybe Mon for me. But who knows as future forecasts change frequently

In my experience the Wunderground forecast is more wrong than right. I like the graphic you posted, but stopped using it for forecasts. Accuweather is quite good on mobile, and crap in a web browser. The Apple Weather app on mobile is also very good. Would love to see Accuweather/Apple forecast use the Wunderground style graphic.

Big chainring front, small cog back, cadence high, erg mode, put wheel diameter as max, your weight as 1kg, take off your left crank and rig up a drill/driver with high ah battery to drive it, etc. Just like our cycling ancestors did.

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I use yr.no

I’ve never known that to be wrong. A lot of mountain guides use in I’m the UK too.

This is as far as I’m going to go…I do want to get the benefits of the training!.

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How’s everybody doing?..doing it indoor is a bit harder than anticipated. I’ve done two days of endurance with some LT1 intervals. Maybe tomorrow I add some intensity, and pure endurance on Tuesday for “recovery”.

Hit 100+km yesterday and today so off to a good start. Yesterday was PacePartner, today was endurance ride on the Uber Pretzel until my HR went above 150 for 5 min without coming down. 2.25 hrs yesterday, 4 today.

I’ve been using it as an opportunity to test out some aero bars on the gravel bike and a few different fit things.

I’m out…came down with a bit of cold last week. Have missed both days since it started so not gonna even bother to catch up.

Good luck all!!

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found out how to turn on trainer roads virtual distance and it has me at 20mph. this should be easy.

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3+ hours and 115km after 2 Zwift RoboPacer rides. Rebounding from Covid, so just taking it easy and not worried if I don’t get thru it all. But it’s a nice little goal for getting back into the swing of things.

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I know it’s been asked and answered somewhere, but will a trainerroad workout uploaded to Strava count towards festive 500 miles?

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Unexpected heatwave where I live, nice sunny -4℃ here. Roads snowy but cyclable with knobby gravel tires. Speed around 23km/h, so it is going to take some time outside but this is very welcomed change for past month fully on indoor trainer :stuck_out_tongue:

Yes, it does, as virtual ride.

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