A few Plus 2.0 w/kg riders seem to find enjoyment (I have no other explanation) in beating those riders that genuinely are SUB 2.0 w/kg.
Having these riders tear up the group ride is frustrating for many users. It’s easy to ignore, yes but tendencies of humans (as all we know and have fallen victim to before!) means more riders follow. This leaves the group pulled apart and the opposite of what it’s meant to be.
I’d like to see a feature that allows there to be a cap on the maximum w/kg of an event. This should weed out the ‘show-offs’ and keep group rides grouped.
Having group rides is important. I’d hate to see more and more people posting about their disappointment.
An alternative would be to boot folks off the ride that get a certain distance or time ahead of the leader. The problem with capping power is that sometimes folks like to sprint up hills and them drop back to the leader. Those are not the people that need to be penalized
Capping ride power is not the answer, I participate in many excellent Sub 2 rides that feature informal sprints for those who want to take part but more importantly it would restrict the riders who work as sweepers for the group doing valuable work to help dropped riders back to the peloton. Often when sweeping you need to push hard to get back to the group. Many other riders use Sub 2 rides as Z2 type rides with High Intensity Intervals by dropping behind then sprinting back.
I agree that it sometimes breaks down, usually because the leader is lost or has a technical and that this is very frustrating, bit like real life in that respect really
I have to say I have a similar experience to K Bennett.
I’m pretty new to Zwift, but I find that there is pretty much no group ride that I can participate in that is a “group” ride. Today I entered the sub2 2 hour endurance ride with the instructions that anybody riding off the front would not be chased down, however in reality with 157 starters when the ride got going within 20 mins half the riders were in front of the leader and by the time we were halfway up Boxhill some were minutes in front of the leader. So much so that the leader even put out a message that he would have to try and bring the pace back because he needed to bring his heart rate down because he was recovering from a cold.
Clearly people are using the Sub 2 ride as K Bennett suggests and feed their egos to show how they can beat all the slow people and the leader is responding to that. Today’s ride was certainly not sub 2 and after an hour I was 1.30 off the leader and I was by no means at the back, there were people behind me down the road. At the hour point I gave up as it was clear there was going to be no group ride for me today.
There has to be a way of controlling these rides. Perhaps some sort of block that stops you getting ahead of the leader or only by a certain distance? That way the leader could well and truly control the pace.
Anyway the long and the short of it is for me after this mornings ride I’ve cancelled my membership. After all what’s the point? To me Zwift is about community riding. I’ve been a member for 3 months and have yet to participate really successfully in any group event. That might be due to my shortcomings as a cyclist (I only have an FTP of 159) but this morning sealed it for me. I’m not going to bother again.
Neil,
Sorry to hear about your experience, and don’t be so hard on yourself.
The real issue here is self control. Some riders (whether in Zwift or the real world) just don’t have any. Additionally these kind of riders don’t realize (or care about) the effect of their actions on the group.
I too, don’t think capping is the solution. I fall in the envelope camp. If the ride leader had the ability to define their ride’s envelop prior to the start that would be best. Could be distance or time…a +/- control.