Often, when I’m riding with a Robopacer, I see a user teleporting to it, letting the auto pedal do its thing, then they coast (I’m guessing until they come to a stop). Then they repeat this over and over again.
What is this person doing? As far as I know, you don’t get distance, XP or Drops while the auto pedal is working. So, I guess they’re doing it for the “free” bits you get while coasting. But this sounds about as dumb as can be. I can’t imagine how mind numbing it would be to keep clicking and teleporting over and over to the degree you’d need to do this to make it worthwhile. Anyone have any ideas?
My limited experience suggests Zwift has made a recent change and that your Streak is no longer kept active with a short (>2km) ride through teleporting and coasting, downhill anyway.
However teleporting and coasting does appear to award the mileage XP and also the weekly streak XP. If this XP was removed possibly less people would find the need to teleport and coast.
But if you do get progression if you teleport and coast on the flat that would mean teleporting and coasting lots of times just to get your 2km and streak progression. Yes a really daft way to gain progression but if Streak progression is really important to people then they will do it.
I think many here would agree that any ride which is powerless should not be rewarded with any XP, mileage or Streak progression.
I don’t think it’s a common thing. I’ve only ever seen this one rider do it. They’re also not just after the bare minimum; they do it multiple times a week, and often have well over 20km.
Zwift have added several things to incentivise riding, like XP, Drops, unlocks, badges, etc.. For some people, something has gone wrong in their head and the incentives become the entire point of riding. As best I can see, this guy seems to be an extreme case of that.
It might be a little more common than you think and along with use of coffee break it does annoy those who ride regularly with the faster Robopacers as discussed in more depth in this thread:
I ride with Constance. Usually do 4 or so hours a week with it. It’s only ever the same guy doing it again and again. That person you quoted seems to indicate it’s just one person who did it multiple times. I’d wager it’s the same person.
I’m not suggesting that. This would only be for people who haven’t provided any power input at all since teleporting. In the example you gave they wouldn’t even have a power source connected.
You do get distance progression - and that’s what these people want.
Just like the level 200 lady today teleporting to her buddy at the top of Alpe and grabbing more free distance. (as she did yesterday as well). Her buddy rides uphill, and almost certainly at the top of Alpe she will appear to grab a fast 12km downhill.
There used to be a guy who would do this all the time with Constance group, he’d get lots of kms per day this way. I don’t ride with robopacers anymore so I don’t know if he is still doing that.
