Reason for Disqualification in Beta Crit

I did a beta crit race today in the B category. I was riding with two other guys off the back of the lead pack when we went up the bricks for the second to last time. I pushed hard at the top of the climb and probably hit 500 or maybe 600 watts very briefly.

A huge window popped up on my screen saying that I either “missed my calling as a pro cyclist” or that my equipment was out of tolerance. I was given an orange triangle and was informed that I would not appear in the results. So there.

I hit 600 watts on almost every race, so that’s not out of the ordinary. I ride a 5-month old Wahoo Kickr that I recalibrated two days ago, so I wouldn’t think that would be the issue. There’s no wattage spike on the ride file at that point in the race which is odd.

Any ideas?

Pretty sure its a 5min avg that is monitored for those races and given its a Crit race, you likely tripped that. What does Zwiftpower have your 5 min w/kg at?

My best 5 min power on Zwiftpower is 3.84w/kg.

I looked at my power curve on Zwift prior to exiting the app and it was under my best curve at all points. It was just below my best from 20 minutes down to 5 minutes, but it was significantly below my best for one minute down to 5 seconds. This was because after it flagged me as a cheater and told me I wouldn’t show up in the results, I let my group go and cruised the last lap and a half. i.e. there was no hard one-minute effort or a sprint.

Maybe my smart trainer sent some spurious data? It’s not like I’m close to the top of the category or anything.

I’ve seen a few others complain of similar symptoms so given its “beta”, maybe they are still tweaking/playing with algo’s. I dont race the Beta Crit’s as knowing my luck, I’d be finding all their bugs and that would just frustrate me more than I am already am with the platform. Would be great if they communicated a bit more about what the thresholds are/tweaks they are playing with.

Someone else will likely chime in with better knowledge than me to help you …

I’ve done a bunch of the Beta races as B and usually get dropped from the front group and ride with group 2. Twice I got green coned even though I was off the back. The first time I gave up thinking I did something wrong and didn’t want to interfere with the race. The second time I received a green cone I just kept going and it felt easier rather than power restricted. I actually won the group sprint which never happens. Both time my results posted in ZwiftPower. The Beta races are still beta so unless it happens to you on a frequent basis I would just chalk it up to a glitch. Just my two cents.

I’m the same. I go out with the front group and hang on as long as I can and then either time trial the rest of the race or fall back into a chase group. Despite Zwift’s “you missed your calling as a pro cyclist” verbiage, there are no 3.9w/kg B racers who tremble when they see me in the starting pen. I’ll probably just avoid the beta crit races going forward.

Thanks for the comments, fellas.

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