Riding with the Yumi botpack today in Makuri (“Country to Coastal” route). On numerous occasions I was in the botpack, well tucked in to a large group… but avatar indicating that I was not getting any draft at all
Screenshot of one instance below but it was happening intermittently over several hours.
IPadOS, fully patched, and latest version of Zwift
How does your avatar show if you are getting draft or not?
Did it only happen above certain speeds? I have a suspicion that ‘sitting up in the draft’ is overridden by ‘wheeee, I’m going really fast so I’m going to ride in the drops’ above some speed threshold’.
Yeah, this seems to happen on some descents even if you definitely should still be in the draft. Saying this for the umpteenth time, but more useful draft feedback would still be nice…
See “drafting cues” section at Drafting in Zwift: Power Savings, Tips, and Tricks | Zwift Insider
Interesting, thanks, I hadn’t really ever noticed (or cared too much about drafting)
So I guess it is whether the draft wasn’t working or the avatar position was wrong. Hard to tell without some other indicator of draft. Something like the flashing drops icon when you’re going up a gradient might be useful to indicate you’re experiencing draft benefits.
Your avatar is in drops above 50km/h no matter if you are in draft or not…it will be on Tops always under 32km/h if you are in draft or not. 
There’s so much visual clutter riding in a pace partner blob that I warmly recommend just switching to no HUD mode. Occasionally turning the HUD back on, I noticed that I was still getting the 2.5x drops multiplier even though I was way out of the nag zone (say 100+ m ahead).
went 20m ahead of d taylor the other evening and lost the multiplier count
No issues that I’m aware of but it is determined by the size of the group.
I’ve made recommendations that we standardise this for all Pace Partners in the future.
I got the draft bug today too. Got zero draft in a C ride holding 3wkg and was hilariously in last place. When the draft works Zwift is great but when you get the draft bug it just makes you want to unsub. Was using the tron bike in a 540 person group.
At the risk of asking a stupid question - were you on a TT bike?
There are no generic drafting issues that I am aware of.
… but carried on for nearly FOUR HOURS!?!
this might be a silly question - is the only way to know if you’re getting draft benefit the position of the rider or is there some other way of knowing?
John was on a Tron bike which doesn’t give you that feedback.
I believe Sauce 4 Zwift can show something about draft benefit, though I don’t use it.
I was on the Zwift concept bike. Honestly if Zwift wasn’t going to allow me to draft today in the century group ride I would have preferred the TT bike, as I would have been able to go a couple miles per hour faster as it was mostly flat route on Watopia waistband. I lose draft seemingly randomly, so I can’t really give you steps to reproduce, but when it happens it’s just an awful experience. I’m glad I’m not the only user that has this issue, but it is frustrating for staff to just say there are no drafting issues.
Yea, was trying to knock out the hardest TrainerRoad endurance workout, Robinson +2 with a 330w FTP. Got to 3.5 hours of 4.75 after cursing for half an hour about not being able to hold wheels doing 1.1 - 2.0 w/kg, myself holding 2.6-3 for the duration. Probably could have finished the workout if I ignored the fact that Zwift didn’t like me today.
I have used sauce before, and I believe it’s probably most useful for seeing chat from people out of range. All the other extra data from it isn’t really actionable or more useful then seeing w/kg around you so didn’t spend more than $2 on it. Today because I was 5 miles behind the main pack, I wasn’t seeing people’s chat on my screen. I only saw the ride leaders, and it was just a weird one sided conversation going on in my companion app and on my PC screen. But in terms of seeing if you can draft, if your in a pack doing similar power, you are getting a draft benefit, which in turn dramatically increases your speed.
Everything seemed fine to me last night during the TTT (I have the latest update too), and I don’t think they made any changes to pack dynamics with this update… so… what exactly are you experiencing?
Here’s a screenshot of us coming downhill into the downtown area, I’m doing a considerable amount less in the back of the pack than the leader. 2.0 w/kg vs 2.8 w/kg, others doing even less in between us.
Are you using a TT bike in a non TTT event so drafting is disabled?
Just did a ride and it was impossible to hold downhill, even groups of 2-3 would pass by and be impossible to hold unless at 5wkg
check you aren’t on a TT bike (no draft), gravel, or MTB (roll slower on tarmac)
That’s always been a thing, you don’t just get sucked along as a faster group passes, you need to put in a burst of power to match their speed then you can back off. You shouldn’t have to hold 5 w/kg the entire time however, if that is what you are experiencing.
