Hi.
So I cycled Richmond ‘The Fan Flats’ yesterday and today, only using phone screen (so I might have missed something).
When riding, how do I know:
Thanks,
Pa.
Thanks Dave,
When you say overhead banner you mean one that crosses the entire road, like at the end of a sprint?
That’s the only one I saw on this course.
Why, oh why doesn’t it tell you the lead in length? Adding this to my list of extremely obvious features that Zwift should have but for some unknown reason doesn’t. Also in that list is display distance left.
Thanks, will hook up to monitor next time.
btw I found out that Strava will show my history for sprint times.
Hi Patrick,
For details of the routes, this page on ZwiftInsider is probably your best starting point.
For courses such as Richmond, ZwiftInsider also mentions Strava segments, which are probably the best way to record your best times on routes, sprints and hills (in answer to your question 4). To record your PRs this way you need to create a Strava account and link it to Zwift.
I would add this resource:
If you’ve ridden in any of the Tour of Watopia events, the lead in, transition to route start, and distance remaining elements of the ride are all displayed on-screen… Clearly, this oft-requested “feature” is already available. Simply not implemented.
In the screen shot, the start “banner” is depicted just ahead… and in this particular format, distance remaining indicator, together with a progress bar (distance ridden), will also coincide with a finish banner.
So many examples of poor UX design on the software. Makes you wonder what the hiring process is over there for leadership in the game design part of the business.
“Want to know the real distance for a route? Go scour through several 3rd party sites to find out.”
“Want to know how the bike you just purchased performs against other bikes? Search for the actual distinction on other websites and blogs since our star rating offers no valuable information.”
“Want to change your bike, apparel, or check badges earned? We won’t let you upon the initial startup screens or on the companion app. First, start a ride and then you can change or view these things”
“Want to start another activity after you finish one? Completely exit the game and restart the program.” (Fixed after 6 years of complaints)
This works for events because there is a defined finish. But when someone is just riding Zwift has no idea when they will end. So, how could they slow the distance until the finish? Just show the distance to the end of the route, you say? Well, then what happens when someone makes a manual turn? Does the distance to the ‘end’ go away? Does it change to show the distance to the end of whatever route Zwift thinks the rider is on now? Something else? And how many would then complain that the distance to go disappeared? Or that it went from 2 miles to 15 miles, or vice versa?
I do think Zwift could get some points by, at least, also showing the lead-in distance on the route selection screen. Beyond that, though, I think riders could spend a little more time actually looking at the route maps to get a better understanding of what to expect.
Yes. Because the rider is no longer on the route they chose at the start of the game - it makes you choose one! That behaviour would be completely logical, and ties in with the whole ‘only get a route badge if you don’t make any manual turns’ logic. If you stay on the same route and get to the end, the progress bar should return to the start.
When someone selects a route, there is a “defined finish”. There is also a defined Lead-in, and a defined start. When “free-riding” in Zwift, one must first select a route, unless you choose the very buggy and seldom used “Surprise Me”, and of course this would not apply. Showing the distance to the finish would be based on the user’s route selection. Likewise the lead-in (where applicable.) When a user makes a manual turn, the distance to finish would be reset to NOTHING. No progress bar at all!
There are approximately 35 riders in the world of Zwift that have completed all the standard routes, as well as the Zwift-Insider Rebel Routes, all of which require manual turns. I’m one of them. I certainly know the implications of navigating through the Zwift worlds with manual turns. Zwift does not provide any route maps in-game (with respect to the portion of a route already traversed, and route portion to complete), and provides very little data on the route selection screen. These functions are not rocket-science. They exist right now. Easy-peasy.
It will almost take the “fun” out of running the Rebel Routes if they implemented this! (Reverse psychology?)
Surely those are only the subset of all such people who sync to Strava, and of those the subset who sync to Veloviewer. Out of millions of users, I’d expect more than 35 to have ridden all the routes.
Surely? Here’s the Strava Segment for the Rebel Route known as KOM Monster. Veloviewer gets all its source data from Strava. And SURELY you know the expression, “If it doesn’t exist on Strava, it didn’t happen”. You’re surely mistaken.
Sounds like you’re up for the challenge. Surely you should “go for it”! I’d expect!
Edit: I just checked again… and the Leaderboard still has only 35 Zwifters who’ve completed all the routes… though there is one chap who is only one ride away!
Don’t forget to take into account that feeding that information to VV requires a Strava Premium subscription. My route info stopped feeding to VV when Strava changed their model a while back.
That’s patently untrue. I have a non-subscription, non-premium Strava account. In fact, when Strava arbitrarily changed their Zwift segment policy recently, I actually had to re-ride some routes, but the data went through with few problems. The fellow who runs Veloviewer is extremely competent and professional. Each time I contacted him with issues of this nature, he took the time to assist me (one who also holds a non-premium VV account.) So, NO, feeding that “information” to VV does NOT require a Strava Premium subscription.
Contact Veloviewer and get assistance on your particular anomaly.
The ONLY problem that I could not resolve was the display of my data in VV is in the useless Imperial Units, which VV read from my default Strava set-up on day one of my participation. VV informed me that I could not change my units display to the International System of Units without getting a premium account. So I’m stuck with VV maps that display in the arbitrary, idiotic Imperial miles. Fortunately, alternate maps with imperial units are generally available elsewhere…
Hmmm. Good to know. I’ll have to check that out. Maybe it’s just segments that don’t feed over to VV, or am I mistaken on that, also? I just recall that there is one portion of the update pop-up that tells me it requires a Strava Premium sub to get that data.
I don’t think you’ve understood what I said.
And as for “If it doesn’t exist on Strava, it didn’t happen”, that’s obviously not true.
When Strava executed its NO WARNING change to eliminate most of the non-Zwift-Insider-verified segments, many of the segments did NOT get automatically picked up. There are helpful kluges (changing the activity-type on Strava for example) listed on the VV website that will force the seemingly randomly ignored segments from passing through to VV. It was a tedious process, and as I said, to join this particular club, I was forced to re-ride some bits… It was actually a fun challenge to tick-off all the boxes in February. Cheers,
The distance remaining indicator is shown for a few routes even outside events, IIRC the London PRL routes and maybe a Watopia Pretzel or two. No good reason why it couldn’t be shown everywhere, at least when you don’t have the route badge yet.
