Pace Partners Weekly Update - W/C 4th July

RoboPacers
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Hey everyone,

I hope that some of you have managed to join our “chatty” Event Pace Partner rides this week. There’s still a few left if you’d like to join in on the fun - they’ve been pretty popular so far with some nice groups!

A few pieces of news this week - firstly, the Makuri Pace Partners are going on holiday :slight_smile: They are heading off to France to go and watch the Tour, so you’ll be able to join them on some French routes (details below).

I’m making some slight changes to dynamic pacing. Currently, they increase their power by 10% when they hit a hill with a gradient of 3% or more and decrease by 20% on a negative gradient. I’m going to introduce some intermediate levels, and I’d be grateful for your feedback. These are:

Uphill
1% gradient = 3% more power
2% gradient = 6% more power
3% gradient or more = 10% more power

Downhill
-1% gradient = 6% less power
-2% gradient = 12% less power
-3% gradient or more = 20% less power

We’re going to be holding some Event Pace Partner Chase Races (not to be said quickly after too much wine). From Tuesday to Thursday next week, we’ll be holding Chase Races on RGV, with a Pace Partner as a Beacon in each of the 4 categories, riding at 4.59w/kg, 3.99 w/kg, 3.19w/kg and 2.49w/kg.

And finally, our Running Pace Partners will be moving from Jungle Circuit to Volcano Circuit. Their numbers take a bit of a hit last week, so I’m keen to try out a few more routes to see how they get on.

Here’s the schedule for the week:

Anquetil (4.2) - Flat Route
Brevet (3.3) - Beach Island Loop
Coco (2.5) - Hilly Route
Daniela (2.15) - Tempus Fugit
Diego (1.8 ) - Sand and Sequoias
Diesel (1.5) - Tick Tock
Dorothy (1.15) - Volcano Circuit CCW

Bernadette (3.8 ) - Tire Bouchon
Charlie (3.0) - Petit Boucle
Denise (2.0) - RGV
Eddy (1.0) - Douce France

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Hi James, great work! Had trouble following Daniela on Big Foot Hills through Titans Grove, trainer wouldn’t give enough resistance to properly stick in descents at some points. Will probably have to play around with my settings a bit.

The extra power increases and descreases worry me a bit when looking at doing endurance training with pace partners, just because its gonna vary a lot more this way, but will see how it will turn out.

Question though: Is there something like an API endpoint to get the current route of the Partners? Like the current settings as they are also shown in the pace partner selection screen?

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really interested in these. Are you setting off bots at intervals so they are on target to finish approximately together?

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Thats the hope!

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Not currently, but we are hoping to do so in the future.

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Hey James! Diego Disc feedback from a ride yesterday…

Context: 75kg “D+” rider, can’t keep up with Cat-C. Bike has a 52/34 compact crank up front, 11-34 cassette rear, Tacx NEO2T, “trainer difficulty” set to 100%.

I was leaving Diego Disc far behind on climbs, in lowest gear (34/34). If I pedaled any slower my cadence was just uncomfortably low on hills.

Maybe the Diego needs to be on flatter ground, or not throttle back as much on climbs…?

Also: would it be possible to post these types of updates as a change log in tabular format? (old mechanic versus new in different columns)

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Just an idea, James, but with 11 pacebots could their paces be spread out more evenly?

For example, start with 1.0 and then 1.3, 1.6, 1.9, 2.2, 2.5, 2.8, 3.1, 3.4, 3.7, and 4.0?

Or something along those lines, so that we don’t have riders of very similar paces

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or by ~17% increments (given 10 PPs)
1, 1.2, 1.4, 1.6, 1.9, 2.2, 2.6, 3, 3.5, 4.1

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I may be missing common knowledge info here, but W/Kg doesn’t tell the whole story for me… Is there anywhere the actual wattage for each PP can be found ?

Thanks!

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It would be cool if pace bots would be client-sided color coded by power zones. Say your FTP is 3.0 W/kg, a pace partner at 2.5 W/kg will have a green beacon, signalling it’s your z3.

That’s not important if you start your ride as a pace partner ride from the menu, but it would be handy if you’re on a free ride and see a pace partner approaching.

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We’re likely to end up with 8 Pace Partners.

We don’t want to add more than that at a risk of further dilluting the experience, otherwise we’ll never end adding more and more because someone isn’t happy that their exact request isn’t taken account of.

Nice idea, but probably a big chunk of work. We’re currently undecided on how the Pace Partners are going to be coloured in the future (we may move away from categories, we may not).

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They tell you in the chat while riding. Or you can do the math.
Denise drops: 75 kg, rides at 2.0 w/kg= 150 watts.
Diego: 75 kg, rides at 1.8 w/kg = 135 watts.
Etc…

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But, not all PPs weigh 75 kg.

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So… how does one tell the wattage? :thinking:

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Currently not easily but possibly in the future ?

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All the new PP are 75kg .

Diesel - 81kg
Cadence - 65kg
Brevet - 81kg
Anquetil - 65kg

I don’t know how will the wattage help except if you weight the same as the PP

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Diesel and Brevet are 81kg, Cadence and Anquetil 65, rest 75.

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Anquetil (4.2) - 65kg = 273 watts
Brevet (3.3) - 81kg = 267 watts
Coco (2.5) - 65kg = 162.5 watts (does it round up to 163?)
Daniela (2.15) - 75kg = 161 watts
Diego (1.8 ) - 75kg = 135 watts
Diesel (1.5) - 81kg = 121.5 watts
Dorothy (1.15) - 75kg = 86 watts

Bernadette (3.8 ) - 75kg = 285 watts
Charlie (3.0) - 75kg = 225 watts
Denise (2.0) - 75kg = 150 watts
Eddy (1.0) - 75kg = 75 watts

8 Likes
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@James_Zwift please could you add another A pace partner that stays on hilly / mountain routes permanently. I had a great ride with Anquetil yesterday on Bigger Loop and would like to see more of the same to help push us A riders. 4.6wkg on the +3% gradients is awesome! Or failing that, add a 4.5 PP when the flat routes are in the rotation.

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Not such a good idea for those of us who are red, green, brown colour blind though

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