Cat D Racing

Fondos in Zwift are categorized as Group Rides. Some people treat them like races but they’re not Zwift races. It’s just a group ride without a leader.

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Maybe they don’t have the word “fondo” in the event names, but there appear to be about 250+ races in the calendar over the next 7 days, that have all cats starting together at the same time. Over 60 of those are over 40km in length.

Hey, @David_Sleator. Fondos on Zwift seem to be run pretty much the same way they are IRL: they are technically non-competitive events, where the goal is to finish a given course, but nearly without exception there are plenty of riders that approach them as races. But no race categorization or anything like that, which is what you’d mentioned in your post. As such you’re generally not going to find them on Zwift by filtering the events by “Race”, but rather by “Group Ride”. You’ll notice that many/most of them appear to have categories/pens (A, B, C, for example) but unlike races, those aren’t breakdowns by skill or strength, rather they’re generally different routes and course lengths. They’re often designated Grand Fondo (A, longest), Medio Fondo (B, medium-length), and Bambino Fondo (C, shortest).

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I race in Cat D but i am firm middle of the cat 1.5-1.7w/kg … but every race ive been in the other D cats are normally pushing top bracket of the cat over 2w/kg so i have no chance . But i do still enjoy it , just would like some other mid D people to join .

@James_Zwift I found a raver :crazy_face:

@Maria_Bott @David_Sleator @Dave_DuPlantis

Hey, just an update on Herd Beginner Racing:

Still standard-category D only, but starting this weekend, there are category enforced zFTP subcategories labeled A-C:

A is 2.3-2.7 w/kg
B is 1.7-2.3 w/kg
C is < 1.7 w/kg

I’m really hoping that the C category catches on.

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Would be great to get masses of sub 2W/Kg zFTP riders feeling like its worth joining a race, rather than blown away from those towards the top end of standard Category Enforcement pen D.

I will definitely check it out, but can’t help with the C category myself :grinning: since it looks like I’ll be squarely in B. Should be interesting, since I’m in the lower part of that range, it’ll be closer to a normal-ish D race for me, which is fine.

I’m just about in C, I think, I’ll try to get myself along to some of these!

A quick visit to eg: ht tps://www.zwift.com/events/view/3727523
and you’ll know what you can enter

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Chiming here with some thoughts that have probably already been expressed by others. I’ve been zwifting for 3 months and have gained a reasonable amount of fitness from never having ridden as much. Currently have a 255 FTP and weigh 100kg. Finding the top end of D to be extremely competitive, with some people who should clearly be in C (potentially me as well!). However C times from a London crit last night are minutes ahead- I’ve screen grabbed the last 10 place times here. So in short - really feeling like I’m in no-man’s land!

look up the tiny human rule!!!

Don’t read too much into that. As you cat up, the peloton moves faster, partly just because of the higher wkg, and partly because there are usually more riders in more cohesive blobs in B and C than in D.

It’s still gonna suck … just not necessarily as badly as those time differentials might suggest. :rofl:

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Thanks, that’s good advice! I’ll put any pride aside and have a go at C :wink:

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Just go out hard, settle in with the front group and hang on as long as you can.

Oh, and choose flat races.

:blush:

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Did the 2 PM EDT race Sunday; we had one in the A pen, 4 of us in the B pen, and one in the C pen. It wasn’t much, but we did at least have a mini-pack in B. Not surprising since it’s summer in the Northern Hemisphere and a lot of folks are outdoors, especially on weekends.

I’ve expressed concern too that the herD beginner races (which I assume you’re referencing) won’t appear in a filtered search list of zwifters looking for D-level races, since the Pens are only A, B, and C and the filters don’t currently work by searching on w/kgs.

yep, sorry, I left that out - also that’s a good point about not seeing them in D races since I knew that myself and still forgot to include C when I was searching for the race in the app.

I’m happy (as always) to make any alterations on request.

Can you make Zwift Events filter for “intensity” actually equal the Cat intensity, and not the pen labels? :grinning: