I’m likely mistaken, but I thought a mass-start race is same as joining the E category, or the whole event is just an E category? How do you self-label yourself and “join as a (A, B, C, or D) rider” if you enter one of these races/rides?
It is. Normally in those races your assigned category shows up on the leaderboard and sometimes with color coordinated kit. My point was to establish the difference so inexperienced Zwifters don’t think it’s OK to jump into lower category races than their talent level.
Most of the non crit and non TT races are mass start.
You sign up A-B-C-D and all the riders start at the same time.
The nearby rider list shows the riders name, w/kg and a colored dot representing the riders category.
Unless the race organizer chooses to hide categories from each other, you can see everyone and draft etc.
Question
If other cats are hidden, can you still draft?
On occasion, my rider has sat up but I didn’t see anyone in front of me.
I would say ride with some groups of friends instead. I won’t go near any of the Zwift racing with all of the sandbagging. I’ve been asked to join and just tell people thanks but not interested.
A group of us just do very hard rides every day, 2-3 laps of ADZ everyday and sometimes at a fast pace such as yesterday. This is enough. If someone gets dropped, then we u-turn and go back for them.
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ZRL’s promise of divisions (or leagues, I’m still unclear) is yet to bear out. With a consistent promotion/relegation system and stability around team ability, maybe even removal of the categories in favor of just 1…N leagues, you’d end up with around with 12–20 teams somewhat reasonably matched but there will always be stronger teams. Currently some leagues already are — ours is certainly better than last season — most probably aren’t.
I posted a thought about the problem of introducing new or changed teams into such a league structure earlier.
Fundamentally Zwift also needs to improve the variability of courses. Right now, nearly every course favors high sustained power over everything else. Two major changes that would make races more dynamic and create opportunities for more tactical racing would be braking and pack maneuvering.
I’m all for braking if there’s jeopardy involved - e.g. it’s good on GT Bike 5, where you need to brake going down the downhill MTB track or you’ll crash - but I’m not a fan of automatically slowing you down for corners.
While most people don’t have steering, I think your point on variability of courses (and race formats) could be a better change. Imagine doing an omnium one evening!
There is braking for a u-turn in precisely one place - London - as far as I’m aware, so the technology is there, they just don’t use it elsewhere. I’m all for adding realism and it might make the group descents especially a bit less crazy.
RGT has a devil take the hindmost format which is fun on a small circuit.
We all have things in common and things where we differ. I’m only for adding realism when it’s fun and - when there’s no danger involved - I find it much more fun to fly around corners at speed than slow down for them!
How did the braking discussion move to this thread?
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I was expecting that having UPGed from C last season.
Was put into a B2 division (despite there being a B3) so expected the worst. Have actually had some good results and scored some FAL/FTS which is totally unexpected.
That unfortunately is the lottery with WTRL. At the mercy of the league you are put in. We had another team setup at the last minute, they got put in a B1 division and have been last in nearly every race. That is no fun - but is purely because they were put in the wrong division. (Start at the bottom anyone?)
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Found out yesterday that RGT don’t use your height in their algorithms so 6’7" or 5’3" doesn’t alter your drag at all. I suppose it stops ‘height doping’ 
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As someone who’s 6’4" you’ve just piqued my interest.
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I don’t think they use weight to adjust CdA either (or if they do, it’s since last time I was riding on RGT)
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