Anti-sandbagging is unfair for lightweight riders or young

Looking at the times for the whole field these two lads would have placed very well in the Cat B group and would even have picked up a few places in amongst the Cat A riders. I guess you could introduce lightweight or junior categories but then it starts getting complicated and I suspect you wouldn’t have a big enough field of riders in the classes to make it much fun.
I think the real solution is probably for people like me to chill out - I’m only ever really competing with myself in these events so provided I’ve beaten last week’s Scott then I’m generally happy!

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Tim camden Alot of good points.
People should look at speed weight calculators for cycling irl. At a constant power ( 300watts ) a much heavier rider ( 200lbs ) will not go much slower ( .2mph ) then a lighter rider (150lbs). On Flats that is. But the zwift algorithm benefits the lighter rider by giving them considerably more speed in this situation. In the outside world speed is not calculated by w/kg.

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Are there test results that show Zwift unfairly gives signifignantly more speed to a lower weight, higher wkg, rider on the flats at the same power output?

I would love to read into this further.

As an overarching statement I do see many comments about “being dropped right away”, or “can’t stay with the lead group” etc. Everyone needs to understand that not everyone is able to stay in the lead group every race. Not everyone is able to contend for the win every race. There should not be this expectation by the racers. This is especially true when you first move up a Cat and your fitness is not up to the level of the best in Cat.

There is only 1 winner and that is hard to come by. It is already an accomplishment to be contending for the win and make the selections that occur during the race.

I have not made the lead group for my Cat (used to be D, now C) many times. Maybe the start was too hard, maybe the small hill was too much for me 15 minutes in, maybe I simply lost concentration and didn’t see what was happening in front of me, etc. Whatever it is, I missed out when a gap formed and I was on the wrong side of it and therefore I missed the opportunity to contend for a win. Be it my fitness or otherwise.

Point is that there is the expectation that “the right Cat for me is one in which I am competing with the leaders to win the Cat” and I must disagree.

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I’m not sure if the kids are benefitting from a light weight or from a short height.
We need to make sure we don’t group our responses to the kids in with category cheats and sandbagging.
These are 3 different issues and sand baggers and kids are not breaking rules.
The kids are just riding and the program is not capable of being realistic.
It’s ridiculous telling a 12 year old he must race B because he wins to much.
The B group doesn’t reflect his true ability.
A sand baggers, on the other hand, should be told to race B, because it does reflect his ability.

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Here is zwift insider test strange thing is they did not discuss the difference between weight but sifference between calculations.

  • ***150 watts, 75kg rider
    Specialized Venge S-Works, Zipp 858 wheels: **31.4kph
    BikeCalculator **30.55kph

  • ***150 watts, 50kg rider
    Specialized Venge S-Works, Zipp 858 wheels: **34.4kph
    BikeCalculator **31.44kph

This shows a 1.3 mph advantage on zwift compared to outside riding that is a huge difference

Links are not allowed

Now its also ovious because of the discussion above about 10 year okds putting out 130 watts are not gona stay in a outside peloton putting out 300 watts not gona happen . I also can soeak from experience with riding outside with guys who are 25lbs less then me cannot do what i can but on zwift they would drop me in a heart beat
Also understand thats at only 150watts if 300watts that difference will be greater

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Thank you for the data. I am not following along with the two speeds for each. What does the 31.4 and the 30.55 (kph) for the 75kg rider represent? Is the 31.4 the Zwiftinsider test result in Zwift and BikeCalculator a different program all together? Let me know if I have it correct.

Can you post link with a coupke spaces added in? I can remove the spaces and find the page.

Thanks again.

Just slip a space or two into url’s and paste until you get enough posts to be able to directly paste.

Thanks. It looks like the difference between 75kg and 50kg on the same bike at 150W is 3kph then in Zwift. This was using the same rider height if I read this correctly. That speed difference would be even greater for a shorter 50kg rider.

I would love to see them compare a 225W 75kg 175cm vs 150W 50kg and say 168cm. It would be reasonable to assume less power from smaller rider and that smaller rider would also be a little bit shorter.

zwiftinsider .com / zwift-speeds

I calculated 75kg rider would go 2.04mph faster then a 100kg rider at 300watts which is alot. Now imagine if it was totally flip floped that would really show how off this whole thing is. Get in zwift use erg mode at 200lbs and see what your speed is at 300watts then do same thing for 150lbs its like 2mph on flats It should not be anywhere near that

Same problem for me!!! I hope ZHQ finally does something about this to make it more fun for kids

The bottom line is that ability should be measured by ability and not your weight. I’m all for stopping people from cheating but this whole sandbagging thing just punishes honest riders for their weight.

If I finish 25th in a race of 50 that does not mean I’m too good for a category and it certainly shouldn’t mean I get my power limited by Zwift.

Why not just have a simple promotion/relegation system where if you finish in the top 10% you go up a category and if you finish in the bottom 10% you drop down a level?

Then if people are cheating they’ll be funneled to the top where they can be managed more easily.

I don’t understand why anyone would even want to cheat on a Cat C race in the first place.

Hello, I found this thread because I just finished my first official zwift race with ceramic speed series. I am in B cat. But I was averaging 3.7 I’m lightweight as well and the course was flat only 1k ft climbs. I was doing 3.9 for a good amount of time while the guys in front of me were 3.2! Heavier guys have advantage and I was dead just keeping on the wheel. The drafting doesn’t make any sense to me compared to really life drafting. No time to let off pedaling or power. Although I was about to gap 10 riders on the climbs, I got sucked right back on downhill or flats. I also feel bad when I’m in a group and riders are working together. I have to put 5.0 or higher just to pull… I’d be dead dropped if I keep doing this but I don’t want others to feel in just wheelsucking. I would need to find hill finishes or mountain climb finishes to see a difference…

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They’re the bullies from grade school as near as I can tell. Just want to push the little kids around…

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W/kg doesn’t tell you their weight, and therefore how many watts they’re putting out. More watts is always going to be key on a flat course. You are going to be at a disadvantage unless you race on climbing courses.

ya i understand. its a little sad haha

Hi all,

I am glad the thread received lots of reply. It certainly demonstrates that it is a sensible subject. I think Zwift should take that in consideration.

As always in forum, there has been some good posts, some bad. Often people just not take time to read. Anyway…

I remind that my concern was about my son losing his motivation to Zwift because of the anti-sandbagging feature that was penalizing him unfairly. I maintain that the current anti-sanbagging feature is unfair for lighter riders.There has been some good comments about a different reality on hilly roads. I have already much to say, so I won’t comment on this hilly road difference. I just remind that the anti-sandbagging rule is applied on crit.

First, I wanna respond to some indirect criticism about my role as a parent. It is not important at all that my kid wins a race. I really do not give a f… about that. This is all about keeping him motivated to do sports. And having fun about it. Fortunately, he succeeded to transition to more organized training and group riding. Congrats to him.

Now, he is back at more racing. He did a small crit race yesterday. Of course, he avoids the ones having anti-sandbagging, because it is just a waste of time. So, yesterday he raced in the C cat. at 4w/kg. His power would have put him strong B rider or weak A rider. But, he finished 37th over 72 participants. He pushed hard during that race, being a part of a small group of riders. He was proud of his race. Did he cheat in that crit? Clearly no. At least from my way of thinking. Some are arguing too simply that if you do not follow rules, you are a cheater. Ok, fine for you moral police. But why penalize ‘cheaters’ that are having no impact on results. Please, don’t tell me that the adult who finished 38th might be frustrated by being ‘cheated’ by a 10 years old that finished one place ahead.

An argument has been made about Zwift not being made for young athletes. I respect that argument. But, there is a reason why I added to my post title ‘for lightweight riders…’. The unfairness of the anti-sandbagging rule applies to lightweight adults and women too.

I noticed that the anti-sandbagging races are not very popular. I wonder why… I think it created a type of races that is only popular among riders that are affected by the ‘real’ cheaters: 80 kg adults pushing 3.5w/kg in the D cat… I think it is correct that some races with the current anti-sanbagging feature exists. When I wrote my post, my fear was that Zwift would enforce that rule on every races. So, I was ready to push for other anti-cheater systems.

Now, I think Zwift has no real interest to fix cheating except for pro races. The current anti-sandbagging seems more a public relation action. It is IT, so much data on servers. If cheating was a real concern for Zwift amateurs, they have all it takes to fix it.

Anyway, this would be so easy if adults were not competiting where they should not just to feel a bit Sagan. Yeah, wining in the D being a very good B contender. Or winning in the C being a very good A contender. It is so a winning spirit…

Cheers and have fun Zwifting or road cycling.

So i got covid and naturally got weaker. To be placed into my “correct category” i just need to ride my race in my old category and it will naturally allow me to move down. Then i can just work my way back up

hi @Kameron_Wilson

Welcome to the forum.

If you race in a category lower than your current category you will be DQed.

Exactly. Get shelled for a while in the category you used to ride/race and 90 days after your last event before you got COVID, you’ll get moved down to where you should be. Some way to petition for moving down cat would be nice but this way works too.