Creating level courses of 60 120 and 180 minutes for speed assessment (CS60 etc)

Geriatric “newbe” here. 2016 Kickr (original), Ipad Pro 12.9 3rd gen 13.7 IOS Verve Infocrank power Wahoo HRM Am training for IM Hawaii, so coach not interested in CP20 standard ramp or any other short tests. Set up Kickr with a 90 min allegedly flat course to do the first 60 mins of the 90. As a precaution I also used my Garmin 920XT watch to check out the power from the Infocrank as a comparison with that of the Kickr. Followed the instructions to calibrate the Kickr spinning up to 37 kph and wind down. in the window of the so-called flat course there was a graph at the bottom with grey rolling hills which seemed odd. During the course of my “flat” 60 mins (of the 90) I climbed over 600 m according to the icons at the top and the work got harder as the numbers went up (but never down). The wattage read out was way above the infocrank read out. The hour registered 7 km distance done! So what is wrong with my set up? I need to do the following
a) register my infocrank on the Kickr set up which can only be done by Ant+ apparently so need connectors to my iPad pro or perhaps a CABLE (advice sought as to which is better in practice)
b) what is the reason the speed is so low with runners overtaking me and how can I get an accurate speed assessment (not power) (do I really have to go back to my computrainer?) which is the basis of my training for the next 12 months
c) how can I set up a truly flat course on Zwift?
Before you all bite my head off … I have spent literally hours looking for the answers to these questions and not got very far.

What route were you using? 600 m sounds like a lot and about right for something like the rolling terrain of the NYC Park Perimeter Loop, whereas e.g. Tempus Fugit in Watopia is basically pancake flat.

(The graph at the bottom of the screen is your power graph (press G key or graph icon to toggle). It being all grey means you stayed in zone 1.)

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Dear Ms Ronkainen, Thanks for the reply. I was using the “DIY” Riders Choice 90 min flat route free ride I assumed (incorrectly?) that the route was flat! but the map on the top right hand corner shows a zig zag grey road with 2% indicator on it which I did not spot when I started!

PS the grey "rolling hills’ indicating watts appear to be pre loaded before I started the work out. It would appear that the course is not as advertised “Do you want without the fear of hills and descents as this workout supplies you with a flat road to work with. Stress point 96” So the question still is How can I set up Zwift with a totally flat course just to get a CS60 120 or 180 ? Is it possible to make your own "work out " time based on a flat course as you can with Computrainer ?

You picked a workout which simulates flat terrain (you shouldn’t have experienced the feel of any change in gradient).

You (inadvertedly, or by default) had selected a route that was not flat (600m in 7km in 1 hour, I assume you found yourself was going up the Alpe or something like that) - but even so, with that workout you should not have felt any change in terrain, but your speed would be impacted accordingly.

The graph at the bottom of that workout selection is showing you watts rather than gradients. I assume it’s a wavy line because you can vary the watts output yourself depending on how you want to ride, rather than having blocks at a given wattage to achieve.

And yes, you can create a custom workout of any length with a “free ride” block which will achieve a simulated flat feel for whatever time period you want - but not flat road speed or distance. For that, as mentioned above, the flatest route to choose is Tempus Fuguit.

And no one will bite your head off, there are some very helpful people on the forum who can and will explain this better than me :+1:

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Workout (how you ride) and route (where you ride) are two different choices.

The description of the “Rider’s Choice” workout is misleading as it is just 90 mins of free riding so basically a glorified timer and nothing else. If you just want a fixed target wattage, creating a custom workout is your best bet. Remember to turn on ERG mode if you want the trainer to match the resistance to your target wattage.

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The France map also has some very flat routes to explore.

Another way to simulate “flat” roads is to turn down your trainer difficulty in the Zwift settings menu. All the way to the left is “off” or 0% difficulty meaning that all roads will feel flat and the kickr will not increase resistance as you go up hills. Increasing trainer difficulty all the way to the right is 100% so hills will be as advertised (a 10% grade will feel like a 10% grade). The default for this setting is 50% so a 10% grade will feel like a 5% grade.