Then just say halo bike upgrades should not be based on mileage.
That is feedback without accusation of cheating.
That’s what I’m talking about. Nonspecific reports of widespread cheating are fine. Accusing individuals of cheating are not. That’s the difference.
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Thank you Paul. Obviously I see everyone who is doing these downhill hacks because I’m on the mountain routes where they do them a lot. Over the last twelve rides I’m at 18,500m+ from those.
Those of us who ride a lot uphill most of the time see these cheats happening and it’s not nice. It’s really frustrating. I know in a lot of teams this has caused furious arguments and bitter division.
The accusations of first “such an old topic” then the switch to the “off-topic” angle are what is not constructive. That looks like any attempt to shut down the talk of the cheating, and it is cheating.
75km in 1 hour with hardly any power output at all by way of just teleporting and descending is cheating, it’s not fair or correct.
People who are not racing should be able to ride without being impacted by unfair behaviour of others. The teleports and descents by folks who are not even riding is absolutely not right. Getting 500km in a single time via those methods is in no way justifiable.
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Did you report it through proper channels?
I actually climbed the V and saw a dozen people on the decent today. I took a few screenshots of this behavior. A few had their team name listed.
Was the purpose to upgrade a halo bike without riding the required kilometers? I can not say. However, none of the riders had even one half of the meters to reach the altitude they were descending.
I’m not sure why this would be a forum discussion. Is this the fastest way to get and upgrade a halo bike? Is this behavior acceptable to the Zwift company? Perhaps this has become the main question that fits into this thread.
Is ‘trenching’ a Zwift offense?
It would seem many on this thread would agree with you.
I would suggest that those individuals address this question with Zwift headquarters.
I would also add that Eric Schlange at Zwift Insider would be a better way forward with this issue than these forums. It reaches many more people and has a freedom of the press that these forums by design, do not have.
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I’m grinding my way to upgrades the “wholesome” way, based on the old adage of “treat others as you want to be treated yourself”. But conversely, I can’t summon any more “outrage” at folk gaming the system than smiling wryly and raising an eyebrow. Though I race a lot, I’m well accustomed to losing, and tend to take it as a back-handed compliment that anyone would go to the trouble of gaming the system to beat me.
Re upgrades themselves, I’m now at L4 on both the SL8 and the Aethos, thoroughly sick of the sight of Yumi and good friends with most of the Ventoux spectators!
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I’m doing my Tarmac SL8 upgrades by climbing up ADZ and previously Ventop. The teleporting folks will get all the upgrades much faster without effort but at least my efforts will make me fitter.
Nearly finished the SL8. It took a long time but is worth it.
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I’ve not noticed any fitness benefits yet, as cumulative fatigue levels are high. But I have been able to eat more without compromising race weight, which is a definite plus! 
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I hear ya…
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A lot of people are not in favor,yes, but upgrades to halo bikes only impacts races, and not even all races.
How did you come to that conclusion?
Let’s say I’m not racing, but I want to get a PB on a sprint or KOM, wouldn’t the upgrade to a halo bike affect that?
a) you won’t get them because someone will have done it cheating way more than you are prepared to.
b) they literally don’t matter.
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It wouldn’t affect your ability to get a PB.
unless you mean your ability to get to the top of the leaderboard? I which case possibly, but most of them have people doing superhuman w/kg anyway so probably other forms of cheating impact them much more.
not condoning it, just leaderboards are best served to race against your previous times in my opinion.
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Actually this is wrong.
They affect group rides due to the imbalance of speed to power now; since bikes are faster, and Zwift is still stuck with the poor choice of making the Classic wheel the ‘default’… it all actually makes a very impactful difference in speeds of groups of say 50 riders.
Folks on fully upgraded bikes are now having to hold back 5-10 watts (say 0.1 w/kg average) versus what they were prior to upgrades, messing with rides aiming for specific power.
Since I mentioned classics, the gap between a bike on classic wheels, and a fully upgraded with deep sections is probably in the realm of .25+ w/kg… which is a lot.
Which, again, I made a huge fuss about during the announcement, but it fell on deaf ears and “the difference wouldn’t be that big”
Alas, it is that big of a difference; especially forced bike rides and folks on the Concept getting stuck on the classic wheels, get dropped even more often.
Especially now that aero makes even more of a difference than it did prior to this update.
Nope. It could help you by a few milliseconds if you draft them but that applies to every bike.
So absolutely no impact outside of races.
No. That is totally false.
Races only, except neutral equipment.
Thanks.
I think this would matter if there were a level playing field to start with. In terms of all potential options for cheating, it’s insignificant.
For group rides, people manipulate their weight so the event will be at their target pace.
Racing, we’ve got whole “serious race teams” who have no commitment to transparency. In the last few ecro races, we saw teams “pretending” to dual on smart trainers but being found in-game using the power meter primary and then the same source dualling it.
What bike you are on is a rounding error if you’ve got a 5%-10% power boost from sloped pedals.
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0.2. Watts!
Marty, it would take a bolt of lightning to generate that much power. Unfortunately, you never know when one is going to happen.
But Doc, I have a halo bike now!
(sorry but I couldn’t resist)
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So, you’re saying that the better performance of these upgrades to halo bikes has zero impact on a rider’s ability to get a PB on a sprint or KOM?
Help me understand how it has no impact outside of races.
Just you saying it does not make it so.
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Is a PB a PB if the game changes the rolling resistance math?
Do time based PBs matter?
Why aren’t you on a TT bike for a PB attempt if they do matter?
Do you remember the game version, bike, and wheels your prior PB was on?