The Hilly Vanilli weekly Zwift ride will take place on Thursday, 10:35am Pacific Time, 6:35pm London time, and every Thursday thereafter. This is the second in the series of “Slowtwitch Indoors” events on Zwift.

The first of the Slowtwitch Indoors events is simply the nameless Tuesday, 4pm Pacific, weekly workout. It regularly features about 80 to 90 SlowZwifters, is a “rubber band” no-drop Erg mode reasonably stiff workout.

The Hilly Vanilli is a ride rather than a workout. It will be 70 minutes long, by time. (After Week-1 an evaluation will result in either staying with time or switching to a distance which will still take roughly 70 minutes.)

This ride is not a race, per se, but there is a little kicker at the end for those who haven’t gotten their money’s worth (we’ll get to that). The Hilly Vanilli begins with a 5-minute, neutralized, warmup. The ride then separates into two groups - a 2.75w/kg (C) and 2.00w/kg (D) group - with ride leaders for each group and a sweep for the D group.

The groups may ride slightly faster on the climbs - regrouping at the summits - for about 40min depending on the route. The effort levels were chosen after querying prospective participants on the power requirements for the 2 groups (723 people chose his or her preferred group effort).

Then the dogs are off-leash for the final 20min. What “off-leash" means is up to each rider. For those who think the pace is fine (me), thank you very much, just continue to ride with the group. For those who want to stretch their legs, here’s your opportunity.

Finish up with a 5min cooldown.

First week course is the London 8. It's about 20km (12.6mi) in total distance per lap including one stout climb and one rolling climb for net vertical per lap of 238m (780ft). The Hilly Vanilli will probably cover two laps of it. This is a challenging course, which is likely how we'll bias the routes for this weekly ride as we change courses. We'll pick courses that are rolling-to-hilly. Not flat but also not mountainous. Feedback welcome on that.

Ride volunteers solicited here. We'll need C group leaders, D group leaders, and a D group sweep. Please let us know on the Reader Forum thread if you want to be a ride leader.

If you have questions about how to join the ride, or you want to know how to navigate Zwift, go to that Forum thread and ask. We also have a 6-part series on how to Zwift, each article getting a little deeper into the experience.