D.A. I’m not against dynamic pacing per-se, but I take your point entirely.
James (from Zwift) takes the view that steady state riding should be done as a workout, but that misses the point entirely. All workouts (ERG mode or otherwise) remove all the gradients completely, so you have no road feel to work with - mucking about with the road speeds, to compensate, does not solve this. The old static pacing replicated the situation you would have if you were riding in Z2 in real life. Hills come and go, and you have to deal with them. If Zwift were to follow James’ suggestion properly, they would offer “no ERG mode” and “with all gradients in-place” as workout options. Try riding the magic tunnel out of London, or Titan’s Grove, in workout mode - and you’ll see what I mean. The old pacer bot model gave you the opportunity to do steady state workouts, with proper road feel - and enjoy some company too.
As a lightweight male rider (~62kg), you would think the new dynamic pacing model would help me out - not a chance! If I’m going to get dropped it will be somewhere like Titan’s Grove, and it will ALWAYS be on a downhill section! In real life, Sportive groups often freewheel down hills, so the pace bots would have to drop a lot more than they do, to replicate this. The assumption must be that we’re all racing (all the time)!
Off topic a little, but why do actual group rides publish positions anyway? In real life, if I do an Audax ride, my finishing time and position would not be published - only the fact that I completed the ride in the specified time window. If group rides were more like that, I suspect they would be less attractive to “flyers” (I know these are often bounced nowadays, but they are still disruptive).
A little off-topic again, I know, but I agree that Zwift does seem think it’s all about going out and trying to “smash it” every ride. My understanding of training theories is that, for most athletes, this is exactly what you SHOULDN’T be doing. The new “ghosts” are a great example of this - every time I start a KOM, my ghost shoots off and tries to entice me to chase it. If I’m attempting a breakthrough - great. Any other time, “I’m doing a Z2 ride, so you’re on your own mate!” I know people like the ghosts, and they do have their place, but it seems to be another example of how the Zwift mindset works (and, in many cases, they’re correct). For me, I would like to be able to choose to toggle mine on or off, on a per ride basis.
Back to the topic - I’m not sure if it would be realistic for Zwift to offer pace bots with static and dynamic pacing as options. Keeping the groups together, or offering twice as many groups, would seem to be a logistical nightmare.