How I returned to training after the UCI eSport World Championships on Zwift – Training Recap from April 2022

A few months ago, I lined up for the UCI eSport World Championships on Zwift. Well, I didn’t actually line up anywhere because it was a virtual race. In fact, it hardly felt much different than a normal Zwift race. I was still in the corner of my apartment, racing on the same bike on the same trainer, at the same time of day, with all the same food, drinks, and equipment that I was used to.

I did get to wear the Team USA kit though, and that felt pretty cool.

The race went… ‘okay,’ and I finished 27^th. In reality, I was never going to be close to the win. Since the World’s course finished on a steep, 3-minute climb, I knew that I needed world-class 3-minute power. And that I did not have. I had trained for the Worlds, of course, but I didn’t have enough time to increase my 3-minute power by 100w.

That’s literally what I needed to do in order to compete for the podium. Either that or try my hand in a breakaway. But that didn’t work out because my teammate made it into the main breakaway instead, and they nearly stuck it.

Anyway, I came out of the World Championships with renewed focus and determination. To be there, competing alongside the World’s best, and to get dropped from the front group with 700m to go at the World freaking Championships… I was more motivated than ever.

Of course, I’ve learned from experience (i.e. over-cooking myself in the past), and so I took a few days off after the eSport World Championships. I didn’t feel the need to take more than a week off because my training volume had been fairly low in the lead-up to the World Championships, around 10-12 hours per week.

In my years of racing “semi-professionally” on the road, I would complete multi-week blocks of 18-22 hours of training before a goal race – and after that, I definitely needed a break. This time, however, I continued training, but with much less intensity than before, at least for a few weeks.

I needed a mental break more than a physical one, and so I wanted to enjoy training again. After a few weeks of easy riding and a handful of Zwift races for fun, I felt like I was ready to get back to more structured training.

I also began working with Coach Alex Coh, who helped me organize my training and racing calendar both before and after the UCI eSport World Championships. He reminded me that training is a marathon, not a sprint and that I should prioritize rest the majority of the time.

Simply put, I had been racing too much and resting too little. After just two weeks of working with Alex, I already noticed a difference in my race performance and overall feeling. Not only was I performing better, but I was also feeling better, both physically and mentally.

In April and May, I had quite a heavy racing calendar with both the Zwift Racing League Community races and the Zwift Knockout series. Both were 95% as hard as the Premier League, and they also happened to be on back-to-back days: Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

My #1 priority right now is to have fun, and so that was my goal with these races. But then I added the USA Cycling Elite National Championships to my calendar, so the training got a bit more serious. But I am and always will be striving for balance, enjoying my training as much as I am suffering from it. 

The weather finally started to turn here in Wisconsin, too, around May 1st. Trying to ride outside in April was hit or miss, with most of the days being 40-50 degrees and often raining. 

Early on Sunday mornings, I compete on MyWhoosh which is a sponsor of UAE Team Emirates, one of the biggest professional cycling teams in the world. MyWhoosh hosts a Prize Money race on the last Sunday of each month with a few thousand dollars up for grabs. I have yet to finish in the money, but that is one of my foremost goals this summer. 

With Coach Alex, I have crafted a training plan that is both beneficial and flexible. As I’ve learned over the past few years, you can’t just write a training plan and call it good. Things will come up – work, life stress, illness, travel – and you have to be able to adapt. If you cannot adapt, then you will crumble. And not in a good way like a cookie.