This isnt true at all. If they are geared correctly they can absolutely have the same gear to tire ratios.
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Well, you have a 42x11, I have a 32x11. No way I can go at 50-60km at 80RPM in real life. At least with that workaround it works.
I apologize, i re-read your post and get it now. Yes, a 26” mountain bike is going to have different resistance to a 29” mountain bike if the wheel size is not taken into consideration, which by default, is the case.
No problem, we just trying to help people here. I’m glad it’s working for you. Hopefully, Zwift will come up with a slider or something at some point to set it in their software.
It is the same as IRL, if you go to a road race with a MTB you will be slower than the road bikes.
But when I had my MTB on the trainer I change my front chainring to 56.
Well yes, but we’re talking about Zwift here where the entire idea is that it is not IRL aside from measuring your power output.
I understand your concern, I may have been the first one on the forum asking for more base resistance. LOL
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Sorry if I’m being stupid or haven’t read things correctly, but is this thread relevant to people who don’t have a big enough big ring on the road side of things.
When I ride on zwift, I can only ride in my biggest gear; any less than that and I can’t hit anywhere near my maximum power output.
I am a larger rider (84kgs) and the ridiculous thing is that actually I perform ‘better’ going uphill than I do on the flats, because when I go uphill at least I have increased resistance to ‘push’ against, if that makes sense.
On the flats, I’m spinning at a decent cadence but just can’t reach maximum power.
In any given zwift race, I keep the chain in the biggest gear and it doesn’t move from that gear the entire time.
Is there a way to fix this?
Hi @B_Bridges
Yes a bigger gear on the bike will have your wheel (trainer) rotate faster that will increase the resistance.
MTB’s also spin out when you ride with Road bikes on the road.
Very off topic, but, I’m sure it is not beyond the wit of man to invent a chainring that wraps around a smaller chainring to make it bigger.
No need to swap you 42T chainring out, just clamp the attachment on and it becomes a 52T ring. chain length would be dodgy but if you want to add gearing you won’t want to be using the biggest sprocket anyway.
Hello, yes there is a workaround. Check posts above.
If you’re using wahoo, enter zwift ride, open wahoo app, open training screens, set headwind to, lets say 30km/h, wait for resistance impact, close the wahoo app.
Bigger resistance should stay until you finish your ride in zwift, while zwift will still be able to manage your trainer resistance based on zwift road(descents uphills dust etc.), just the base resistance will be much higher because of the headwind setting.
I know I’ve said this before, but I definitely do not spin out on the road - quite the opposite. I can barely turn my biggest gear on a flat road, but on Zwift it’s my only option. I don’t think my gears are abnormal; yes, biased towards climbing, but that’s the lowest gear, not the highest!
I tweeted Zwift about this but they told me to get lost. Still hoping someone with the customer experience in mind will see it and try an MTB on flats to see.
Agree with Jordan, marketing material should state that Zwift is not compatible with MTBs with standard gearing.
I saw this today one one of the other platforms that someone was testing on youtube
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Hi. Does anyone know how to manually adjust the resistance while riding in zwift? I mean while just riding, not in a workout or race. Also I’m not talking about trainer difficult - not talking about how zwift simulates hills.
If I’m just casually riding a along a route decide to have a dig for a few minutes, or sprint to the next banner against a mate on a meetup, I get to about 250-270w and have no more gears to go up. I can hit about 800w (very briefly) on the road.
Apparently the trainer can provide 2200w of resistance so this must just be me not knowing how to control it properly.
Just to clarify. I’m not talking about workouts and erg mode and trainer difficulty. How to you just put up resistance ad-hoc.
I get that in a workout I can pre-define power output and the trainer will provide required resistance to allow the higher power output.
But how to I get enough resistance while on ‘just ride’?
Sorry if I’m over elaborating, it’s just that I’ve read similar questions with replies like… Why don’t you just create a custom workout. On a casual ride you don’t want to keep stopping to creat custom workouts everytime you change the resistance you want to ride at. I feel others who have asked this question always get replies involving erg mode, and trainer difficulty (which is just hill resistance and drafting to my knowledge).
Thanks all.
Ps. I ride on a wahoo kickr.
Hi Simeon.
Short answer: to the best of my knowledge, the functionality you describe doesn’t exist in Zwift, currently.
There are two workarounds that you could look at.
[Ignore this first point; see edit at end — 1. Choosing a heavier/slower virtual bike (e.g. Zwift Steel, the Buffalo) or one with higher virtual rolling resistance tyres on tarmac (gravel bikes or MTB) will increase the resistance experienced and therefore demand more power for the same in-game speed.]
- If you’re spinning out on your KICKR (and you’re sure that the trainer is correctly calibrated), changing your physical gearing could help, i.e. increasing front chainwheel tooth-count will give you more headroom when you max out.
If you’re able to hit 800W outdoors but not able to get higher than 300W-ish indoors on the same bike, I would say that something isn’t right with your set-up.
Edit: As Mike pointed about below, my point 1. won’t really help.
How are you connected to Zwift (ANT+ or BLE)? And is your trainer paired as both power and controllable from the Zwift app? And on what device are you running Zwift?
This is not necessarily true. While the rolling resistance will be different in the game, it will not provide heavier or additional resistance on your trainer. It just slows down your virtual speeds in the game, or speeds them up if you are on a dirt road with a MTB while in Zwift.
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You’re right, Mike. Doh 