Edit - Ignore me…
6 posts were merged into an existing topic: Anti sandbagging and other areas that need development and communication
Howdy all,
I respect that addressing sandbagging in racing overall is an important topic about which a lot of folks are passionate. However, I’d like to try to keep the discussion on this thread more narrow and stick to the topic of this specific series (which had unique issues due to the way it was advertised and then adjudicated) otherwise we will end up in the weeds.
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Ok I have move those chats to the sandbagging talk.
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Hi everyone,
First off, this isn’t perfect, but we’ve made a few changes to alleviate some of the issues that have been noted. Would also note that this has been a good learning experience internally and things to consider for future events. Also having someone in the events team with racing and Zwiftpower (ahem) experience I’m sure will be helpful in the future.
In the absence of an immediate fix, we’ve changed this into a distance based race, so racers will see a blue translucent banner at the point where the race should finish.
We haven’t put this in place but is a consideration for future events (I quite like the idea). Because some of the events had already taken place, it would have the potential to mess around a bit with the overall classification of the series, so we’ve left the category structure in place.
We’ve made some changes to the event description to give as few pointers on which category to enter as well as highlighting rules around category and HRM.
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For those interested the finish line is now on the left hand corner which is about 30 or 40 metres past the big blue banner that you see each lap. Yeah, myself and my fellow racers all just found that out the hard way.
By the time you see the low blue translucent banner at the actual finish it will be too late.
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Do you have, or know of anyone who streamed the event so I can share and potentially get the distance shortened slightly for future events?
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Here you go. Love the guys description. From 30:30 onwards is 500m to go.
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Just watching that stream - If that doesnt scream out to the designers stop making courses with ridiculous zig zagging in them, nothing will.
Neokyo is ridiculous for too many turns - It comes across as trying to extend the course without increasing the size. It doesnt need to have roads like that.
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Crit City isn’t the straightest course in the world tbf. Personally I really like Neokyo. It does add an extra challenge of getting used to where you are on the map, but I think that rewards the extra preparation that you put into getting set up for a race.
I think this would be fine with a banner finish on a crit route.
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i Do love how you end the race is not the same week to week 
, were is it going to end next week.
Crit city works - as you have the small straights and the turns are 90 degrees.
In my opinion, Neokyo is just poor design from the outset. Looks pretty dont get me wrong, but course/route is a waste. No redeeming features or anything to draw you into to wanting to ride it. Though all of Makuri falls into that.
There is simply no need for the twisting & turning, most people are not steering, there is no braking, so all it does is extend the distance by zig zagging and giving motion sickness if you go in first person view.
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I don’t mind this - I think the idea is that it feels a bit claustrophobic and confusing, like a big city should. That said, when I switch back to Watopia I now realise how awesome that world is - the sheer feeling of openness and scale. That when you are climbing the Alpe, you can see over to the radio tower and picture riders over there. That is missing from Makuri IMO. Maybe the Fuji expansion will help.
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@James_Zwift
UK times L39ION crit series
07.30 Zwiftpower category overrides wkg All riders must wear a HRM
10.00 Nothing/blank
19.00 Zwiftpower category overrides wkg
00.00 Zwiftpower category overrides wkg 5 min and 20 min ZADA limits apply
03.00 Zwiftpower category overrides wkg
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I’ll see if I can get these fixed.
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Meant to add when I went through the blue arch it still had 0.1 km to finish line.
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Thanks for sharing our feedback with the events team, providing timely updates, and explaining the reasoning behind decisions. Communication and responsive go a long way to engendering trust and goodwill; so kudos for being the point person on that.
I hope that in planning future Zwift events that E Cat will be used for beginning racers and that events teams will always have someone with racing and Zwiftpower experience onboard from the outset.
Thanks again!
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Perhaps it’s just the way I look at things, but I find the logic applied to the rule set odd, If it was me, no HR outside of A cat wouldn’t get a DQ if you were encouraging first time racers.
Seems at odds with breaking down barriers to enter races.
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I think we can take away a lot from this series to review and see what we can bring to the next.
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The HRM thing has always seemed weird to me anyway. I mean, is that really an indication of someone cheating? How exactly? One of the top ZRL riders in our division (A1 and got promoted to PD so supposedly taking validation seriously) had a badly functioning HRM giving silly numbers for some races and no-one cared. Just another bit of technology to occasionally fail through no fault of the rider. I’m sure we’ve all had them bug out sometimes.
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