Lower trainer difficulty for racing?

If I have an 11-28 cassette on my bike, and a 50/34 compact, I’m riding that when the slider’s at Max.

What’s the gear range I have if I put the slider to “Off”?

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Neither of these change.

Of course, because you’re not riding up as steep gradients. The peaks and troughs are flattened out (although not in terms of what Zwift reports as your vertical ascent). You’d expect to shift less over rolling hills than larger ones.

You cited Trainer Road marketing, but Zwift describe their own slider as a gradient. It says “scale the feel of gradient changes” in the UI for example.

Well we do know that midway represents a 50% reduction in resistance.

To me, that suggests a linear adjustment.

I used to think it was a gearing adjuster too. I thought Zwift should be able tell me where to put the slider to emulate 48/34 12-32 on a bike that has 50/36 11-28. There are probably posts asking for exactly that on this very forum.

But I do believe now that it’s nothing to do with gearing. It’s all about how the game calculates the resistance to apply, and that’s a factor of the gradient it’s trying to simulate via the smart trainer.

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No it’s not. Turning difficulty to 0% means that there is no need to change gears. Selecting the correct gear over a changing slope requires skill and takes effort. There is a lag in changing gears especially when accommodating abrupt slope changes. Not having to shift at all is absolutely more efficient than shifting to accommodate a changing slopes. I’m not sure how anyone can in good faith argue otherwise. There is a reason why it’s called a “difficulty” slider.

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I think the slider should have marks or some sort of numerical read out so we know exactly what setting we have it on.

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Yes, The slider should have some form of reading.
I want to know if it is 50% or 60%.

Also I’d like some form of basic level trainer offset.
When doing basic training on flat roads, like the desert, I have to be in the 50 - 12 oder 13 gear and the flywheel of my Direto X is spinning very fast. That’s quite noisy.
On my old Tacx Blue Motion I could be in the 34 front ring for that, it was much quieter.

Yeah, sorry I meant to check as I was writing my response. I knew one of them started with a T. :smiley:

It’s great that after nearly 5 years we can still have a good discussion about what that slider actually does. :wink:

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Read the entire thread and there is nothing that adequately contradicts what I said. Your assumption tells me a lot though.

Zwift clearly states that a climb of 10% would actually feel as a climb of 5% when the trainer difficulty is set on 50%.

That said, the reason to make the trainer difficulty adjustable is to allow users of “smart trainer” to train with whatever cassette they want.

I know.

I was saying if you want to tamper with the resistance you should only be eligible for a result that compares you only to others who do so.

Many others don’t want to purchase a power meter either. Nothing wrong with this, power meters are expensive. But don’t expect to be placed in the official results with power meter users.

The Zwift Power website takes care of this for the most part. Some races only allow official result for those using power and heart rate monitors.

If you want to fiddle with the resistance, then you can race and compare yourself with other fiddlers. Easy.

You could even use it in the title. “Race for riders that don’t like resistance”. :slight_smile:

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Racing should be locked at 100%…anyone who rides in the real world knows that having to do a climb at 350w @ 65rpm is dramatically different than 350w @ 95rpm…not all watts are equal and that is from the training with power bible. Locking the realism at 100% will also keep people from going full gas on the downhills because they don’t want to shift 9 or 10 times. We can’t stop people juicing their power meters or lying about their size but I am pretty sure Zwift can force the realism to 100%.

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what about people that have 56/48 chainrings and 11/24 cassettes on their Zwift bikes. Not everyone use their road bikes on Zwift. some people don’t even own climbing gears.

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Race what you ride…I don’t change cassettes…there is no full-proof gearing…I have grinded up plenty of hills. 52/36 in the front and 11-28 in the rear…not ideal for long steep climbs…but I am not swapping out gears before every ride I make in the real world. With that being said I get making changes for a Cross or Gravel bike but if you leave the option the cheaters will abuse it.

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Hi Jim,

I’m not sure if I have read all your messages or miss read, them but I apologise if I have.
Saying that,
I think your idea would only be countered with Zwifters changing their gear set up.
If a Zwifter wanted to use a cadence of 95 as opposed to 65 to achieve the required 350 watts there is no way that Zwift or anyone can stop them.

All they would do would make the appropriate gear configurations, possibly even using a triple on the front, or custom making their own rear block and eventually differing blocks.

The really keen Zwifter racer, (not me) would eventually, if the put their mind to it know every gear setup for every Zwift race circuit and be happy to change their setup to get the win or placing.
The Zwift slider just means that ant Zwifter whatever there setup can have a usable set of gears to enjoy Zwift.
I totally get that many Zwifters want total realism, even more so on the racing side but in all honesty I feel it just won’t happen. (not that I can see)

I thought I had a great idea when I started Zwift racing. A Zwifter would go to their LBS to be weighed, height checked, power checked? gender checked LOL
but in reality it’s not going to happen.
The a biggest part of the problem I think is that the whole race system is weight based, which bears no reflection on real life, this is what need changing first in my mind.
Sorry to go on.

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But you could. You have that option.

Trainer difficulty enables people to so something similar by making the hills less severe.

Admittedly, many people riding on Zwift could swap cassettes out on their Zwift bikes too; but as more people start buying smart bikes it ceases to be an option as far as I know.

I can imagine the next generation of smart bikes you could pick your own gear setup. Can’t see why not if there is the demand.

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I do, or at least I did when I was racing, I had 3 sets of wheels with different gear ratios.

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I guess nobody should be able to use a dumb trainer with power meter, or a smart trainer that can only simulate 11 degrees…

/S

Dumb trainers allow racers to fly over the tops of climbs while others using smart trainers have to change lots of gears if their difficulty is set too high and can get dropped on the downhill.

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I’ve no doubt that some of the serious Zwift racers will have more than one setup.

There is no proper gearing for gradients over 10% at 167lbs…so the slider doesn’t change your gearing it changes the gradient…which is a major advantage…steady power and cadence is much less stressful than power spikes and cadence swings. Perhaps the answer is to create IRL Rules for certain events…in those races trainers must be on full realism. You better weigh 125lbs or have MTB gearing on your bike to spin 90rpms in Central Park, the Radio Tower, or the lower slopes of the Alpe. If the slider was an actual gear change you would pay a big penalty on flats and downhills which is not the case.

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