And see this as constructive, but your best attempts are pathetic at best. Let’s use just one simple easily verifiable example:
Sticky draft
We all know what it is like to draft somebody IRL. It’s pretty nice when you need it and it is a real thing but there are two things that have never EVER happened to me:
a) Going up an incline of >7% at a speed of <20Km/h producing ~0.5W/kg more than the rider in front who you are rapidly reeling in and then as you get behind them…boom we first need to sticky draft for a bid before we slowly creep out of the ‘draft’.I mean really, tell me with a straight face that this is a real thing!
b) Doing >30Km/h on a flat at the front of a group pushing ~3w/kg catching a small group where the front is doing ~2w/kg. Rapid catch and then…boom we get stuck behind a rider doing 2.1w/kg while those behind you leave you for dead and you need to produce >4w/kg just to break free of the sticky draft to catch up again.
Oh and then I won’t go into detail of how a rider 30sec behind on a >7% decline producing 1w/kg start reeling you in if you sit at 2.5w/kg but as soon as you stop peddling the gaps starts opening up i.e. riding at 2.5w/kg actually slows you down compared to coasting.
Just level the playing field and leave all these stupid attempts to prove that you understand the science behind what happens out there in the real world. I might not understand the math behind all of this and I could not care less I just know that it does not emulate anything in the real world. Spend your brainpower on fixing the GUI experience and bring it into the current century. We all know you had to rush your product to market so your MVP is crap but that was years ago, it’s time to start fixing the mess you created way back.
Hi Anton,
I totally agree, I have been on about these sticky situations for a year or two now.
I had thought that the uphill sticky draft had gone but the sticky draft on the flat sections of Watopia are still present.
I have no idea why Zwift has not fixed this as I would have thought that those Zwift users at Zwift HQ would have thought it needed fixing asap. Nothing worse than having to find some extra watts every time you come across another Zwifter just so that you don’t loose the group you are in.
As for the uphill problem it would be great to just slip past as you meet a fellow Zwifter.
Nothing worse than having to find some extra watts every time you come across another Zwifter just so that you don’t loose the group you are in.
Why would sticky draft put you at risk of losing your group? Do the other members of your group not have to find some extra watts every time you come across another Zwifter?
Serious question—how (without the option of touching your IRL brakes, etc) would you be able to configure drafting in Zwift without some sticky? Every time you bridge up to someone (now you’re traveling faster and putting out more watts), what would keep you from always drifting directly through that Zwifter and ending up out front instead of settling into the draft?
@xavier_nihilo Both the questions you ask are exactly the ones that makes their ability to emulate real world physics such a joke.
I don’t know how the ‘logic’ works behind their drafting but I found it would depend on where you are positioned, almost like where you would experience different drafting effect depending on where you are behind a rider in real life except of course for the fact that it is not like I apply brakes when I come up behind a slower rider IRL, which is essentially what happens in zwift.
Like the title of the thread says, just remove it if you cannot do it properly. I never proclaimed to have the answers to these complex problems, all I am saying is that it sucks and it would be better to just remove it i.e. we all ride without the benefit of a draft and other complex physic of real-world cycling. Or as a minimum simplify it. I mean how difficult is it to disable sticky draft going up a 6% incline below a certain speed. FFS how much draft does somebody riding at 10km/h on a 6% incline really provide to a rider coming up from behind going at 13km/h? IF INCLINE >= 6 and SPEED <=10 THEN DISABLE F*** DRAFT. The same logic can be applied when the speed and power difference between riders fall outside specific parameters on a flat road. I have NEVER EVER experienced a decrease in speed at the same power output when overtaking a rider until AFTER I have passed them and by then I would have pulled a gap already.
Sticky draft is definitely annoying at times. But it does serve a purpose.
Personally, I’d like a toggle I can press. Press D to turn sticky draft on. Press it again to turn it off.
That way, if I’m approaching a group I can decide whether I want “magic brakes” (sticky draft), or want to fly on by.
To me, that seems the best of both worlds.
Removing sticky draft entirely would necessitate the addition of braking I think. Not that that’s a bad thing - and the button I mentioned could indeed be a press-and-hold brake or something. Both are harder for people not using keyboards though.
Hi Daren,
I’d rather see the system run automatically, but I think there should be a slight delay, so that if you are travelling faster than the Zwifter/Group of Zwifters you come across the slight delay would give you enough time to go past rather than getting stuck.
It is a really strange system. If you are obviously in a group and enjoying/needing the draft you are presently, why on earth would Zwift think that you would rather latch on to the slower Zwifter/Group of Zwifters?
The idea of a brake could be worth looking at though, especially if we needed to use the brakes to stay rubber side down on the down hill sections.
Hi Xavier,
As Anton says, it all about position. If you are positioned on the left of a group and the slower Zwifter is on the right you are fine, but if you are on the right, beware, as if you get “stuck”, you will have probably lost your current group, which is a nightmare if your group is travelling fast or you are only just hanging on to your current group.
I generally ease up as I approach a Zwifter I want to draft, just as you would irl.
If you have never experienced “Sticky Draft” you are lucky. To be fair to Zwift, depending on what riding you do you may never experience it. Using a tt bike for example.
This is where an automatic system fails though. If I’m catching a group of course I am travelling faster. But if I want to sit on and draft to recover, either the sticky draft needs to slow me down, or I need to be able to tell the game that’s what I want. Braking does that. Any slight delay would mean I’d overshoot.
Hi Daren,
if I want to join a slower group ahead I just ease off my power. I decide to slow down, rather than Zwift deciding I need to slow down, LOL when I don’t want to. LOL
Easing off the power doesn’t always work. Especially when going downhill. And it makes it much harder to get “just right”; ease off the power too soon and you won’t make the catch.
But a compromise might be that the sticky draft only kicks in if power is below some limit or something. If you’re doing FTP, no sticky draft. If you’re doing <half of FTP, sticky draft will kick in.
I don’t know; like Anton says, it’s complicated. What I do know is that I curse the sticky draft a heck of a lot, so for me the current implementation is more frustrating than effective.
If you are positioned on the left of a group and the slower Zwifter is on the right you are fine, but if you are on the right, beware…
Not convinced at present that “right and left” are 100% relevant; I do simul rides with my son sometimes where on my screen I’m on his right, but on his screen I’m on his left (same moment, live action).
Anyway, I’m firmly in the camp of don’t fiddle with something at the risk of making it or something else worse, unless you have a clearly developed solution from the outset. Have experienced sticky draft plenty—the number of times I feel it has been clearly detrimental has been very very small. Sorry if you haven’t had the same experience.
I’m pretty sure about the Zwifters position in the over taking group. I don’t bother to add power if I’m clear of group or rider being overtaken.
I agree, you are totally right, I wouldn’t want it to be any worse.
You are again, as far as my riding is concerned, right again. I haven’t noticed it in a while. As I said in my first post, I thought the uphill sticky draft had actually been fixed. (maybe it just waiting to catch me at a really crucial moment)
I agree with Anton though, it needs fixing, as I still always power up to ensure I never get caught by it. Totally unrealistic and a pain in the butt if I forget and get caught.
I know we want draft, but tell me this… why does it have to be sticky?
One last thought, maybe the format a Zwifter uses has a differing effect on Sticky Draft.
Anyone know of any objective testing (using bots) that’s been done to show how much affect the sticky draft actually has? i.e. given rider A at constant wattage/speed, as rider B approaches at a fixed (but greater) wattage/speed, what affect does the sticky draft actually exert in terms of rider B’s passing? Does rider B actually slow down if the watts remain constant? If so, how much or for how long?
I think maybe the point I am trying to make is for zwift to stop trying to emulate complex real life physic that won’t really add any value to my rides. But if, as they do, insist on doing it then there are very basic measures you could put in place to mask those grey areas where you cannot emulate real world. For example in my view it should be very easy to implement so logic that looks at speed/power differences and use these as parameters to disengage the sticky effect or as mentioned apply a delay that allows you to pass as you would IRL before you need to add 0.5w to maintain you speed. But these are day dreams… For me personally just not wasting valuable development time on this is a win win, nobody gain an advantage or are being disadvantaged and we might get some features that have been top of the log for years
@xavier_nihilo I’m sure zwift has something like this but I have been trying to pay attention to see what the effects are on my speed and/or power but it is very difficult because as we all know the drafting in very finicky in zwift. You will be pulling at the front at 3.5w/kg when the peloton doing 2.5w/kg will just start overtaking (almost like an elastic broke) and spitting you out the back if you do not lift your power to ‘stabilize’ your position. Again very unrealistic but this type of behaviour makes it difficult to quantify the actual effect.
I pretty much agree. The drafting dynamics are so bizarre and irritating that they’d be better off just not trying to model draft at all at this point and just leave it out of the game completely.
In addition to the “draft” issue, I’ve also noticed a “slingshotting” issue - if I’m riding a TT bike with someone on a road bike in my draft, and we together approach a third rider, then the rider in my draft will suddenly pick up a “double draft” as we approach the third rider and slingshot past me (on my TT bike, since I don’t get the benefit of the third rider’s draft), without them increasing their wattage. Once we’re past this third rider, the “slingshotted rider” will again slow down (since they’ve lost the draft) and once again fall in behind me. Its just plain irritating and like nothing that happens in real world physics.
Either understand and model real world drafting effects, or leave drafting out entirely. The weird parallel physics model you use is just wrong.
