What might help is if the sticky-draft/auto-braking mechanism is a bit stronger for the bigger riders so they have to push harder to overtake the person ahead.
We have seen on here the bigger and stronger folk saying they can just stand on the pedals, punch 450w and rocket through to the front without much effort, while a light rider has to put a significant effort to overtake the person in front (unless they can steer around the other riders).
Testing and possibly some adjustments to make this aspect more equal might help.
I know the stronger/powerful riders will be furious about that idea, but it might slow the group speed down a bit more.
As a bigger, stronger rider I donāt think I need to do 450w to get through the pack, certainly not the C grade packs that zwift still let me race in.
Iād gladly take some extra sticky draft and auto braking if it slowed the group down a bit, I keep floating through the pack and hitting the front too early for the sprint so itād only help.
Today I was beaten by a Cat B in an enforced cat D race, in Zwiftpower the rider is in group D despite having a power of between 4.1 to 4.2 in most of the race but only has a FTP of just 160, but when you looked into the Companion app heās a Cat B? How is this possible? The race was 12.33 3R Racing on Canopies and Coastlines with only 3 in the race
The āwinnerā hasnāt been on Zwift since February. After a mere 90 days their data expires and they can race in the lowest category if they want to punch down. Thatās how it works and this is the time of year when you can expect that. ZwiftPower is not a reliable source of information about a riderās category.