So in my last 2 races in crit city zwiftpower changed from C to almost B and now B and disqualified me from my last cat C race for too much power. It’s fair enough according to Zwift and zwiftpower I should now be in cat B.
Any tips for a newly promoted category B rider? Try and hang with the lead group until I blow up and hopefully over time I’ll be able to hang with them for longer times or do I just settle back in one of the following groups and try and “win” that group?
Congrats. And yes.
I’m in the same boat. Very hard to hang onto the front group, I usually try and then settle into the middle group and try and win that one. I find that the middle group regularly catch and pass smaller groups as the race develops!
Start out and ride at your own pace. You’ll kill yourselves to hang with the front group of Bs who are probably As or weight dopers. Monitor your HR and bring it up but not over your limit. Settle in with a good group and enjoy the race.
not much point racing in Cat B if you can’t hold 4 w/kg, so I’d say stick to group rides / free rides / workouts to continue building fitness cos races won’t be much fun after you get dropped by main group…!
I recently got upgraded to B for the 2nd time now. I’ve noticed most B races are people who average 4.2 to 3.7 for their 20 minute. Almost no one under 3.7 bothers to even join these races. It’s mostly inferior A riders sandbagging to stay in a winnable category. I really hate the 20-minute cat based system if you can’t tell.
It’s nice to have someone on here who was ‘promoted’ from C to B and is asking for tips rather than whinging about it.
Well done sir!
Good luck on the next adventure.
I did a long time ago
I want to whinge about it and think it’s totally unfair, but I’ll save that for another thread!
I tried my first B race and it wasn’t as great as I’d hoped (I was secretly a pro and ran away and won it) and it wasn’t as bad as I feared (I’d get dropped and finish several hours behind). I finished 16th out of 25. I hung with the lead group for maybe 5 minutes. I was always at the back and would get dropped in a small group, I managed the first two times to bridge the gap and rejoin, but the third time was too much.
I ended up riding the race with two others and we managed to stay ahead of the group behind us and overtook a couple of people that seemed to have blown up trying to stay with the lead group.
TBH racing hasn’t been my main interest so far in Zwift, I’ve only done maybe 1 a week so far. I’ll probably try and finish off the route badges and keep trying a race a week and just keep trying to improve.
@Gerrie_Delport_ODZ I’ve voted for that rankings based upgrade and I’d love it if they do it. Until then I’ll probably just keep plugging away and trying a race a week or so and see if I can improve. Maybe once I’m done the route badges (PRL and Uber to go) I’ll maybe try out a longer B race over the crits and see if I can be more competitive in those.
Hi David, I am experiencing the same in C.
I am a low C, aiming to be outside of the last 1/3 - 16 out of 25 is perfect!
Ride on!