Please, Zwift. Please, please, please get rid of the group workout rubber band feature.
It’s the absolute worst ‘feature’ of any event on Zwift. The point is to suffer together, which is fine. We’re all on the same course and able to chat. But WHY do we have to be tied together?? I don’t care if I’m actually in the blob for a workout if it’s going to hold me at 12mph.
For example, I did the Haute Route Threshold Booster this morning. It included 40 minutes of threshold work, yet we only covered 18.5 miles in 83 minutes. We shouldn’t be penalized by the slowest riders. Just let everyone go at the speed appropriate to their effort.
Everyone can still start in the pens. But we don’t need to be bunched together. If we string out, so what. Maybe having someone up the road ahead of you would be motivation to push through a hard interval.
The group work-out is just that and if the rubber banding didn’t exist it wouldn’t be a group workout at all. If you want to do a solo workout you can…
I normally do (like for Zwift Academy). But the Haute Route workouts arent available unless you do a group workout event. But thanks for providing zero substance to this conversation.
I think you’re missing the point of a group workout. It’s about staying together as a group. Who cares how many miles you cover during a workout? It’s not important.
Jose, not sure if you are aware but xp in a workout is based on stars and time in the zone . So distance is not a meaningful measure And it’s not slowing your speed accumulation. As long as you get the full the star you will get full xp. Zwiftinsider has an excellent write up on how it is all calculated . How Zwift Calculates XP for Cycling Workouts | Zwift Insider
So unless the concern is Strava virtual distance looks light or visually moving through space seems off it’s not material to the xp calculation and it’s truly only for aesthetics and group feel.
It’s optional, don’t use it if you don’t like it, not understanding the issue. In a social application if riders of different abilities want to ride “together” it’s a fantastic feature!
The notion that Zwift should remove it because one person doesn’t like it is ridiculous.
I fully understand how and why the group workout functions the way it does. I don’t like, so I don’t join those types of rides.
My gripe was with that specific event. Per the original event emails, doing a Haute Route workout was supposed to unlock an event specific accessory (socks, cap, etc - which it ended up not doing. But that’s a different story for another day). Being forced to do rides that we don’t enjoy to unlock items that we want to earn kinda sucks. That’s all.
I don’t expect them to change it ‘because one person doesn’t like it.’ But since this is a community forum that they use to gather feedback for future updates, it’s completely logical for me or anyone to post about a feature they like or dislike. If you agree or disagree, fine. Add what you dislike or like about it. But if you have nothing to offer other than criticism of my opinion, then just move along.
I agree about getting rid of the rubber band , at least to an extent. Though it doesn’t affect XP, it does affect how many kilometers get counted toward challenges.
Ok, so that’s not the point of it all? You say that it’s to keep everyone together? lt would be nice then if people who are WAY behind the main group didn’t slow us all down. I’m down to rubber band as long as you stay within a certain distance of the main group. I just did a group workout where a rider was way in the back and slowed us all down to 15 km/hr on a -8% grade while we were in Zone 4. Explain to me how that makes sense. They never even caught up to us.