Constance is at 4.2w/kg, and 315W on the flat, on a hill can be 20% higher. That is 5w/kg, so a 100kg rider would need to do ridiculous watts to keep up to Constance on that hill, a much bigger spike than you’re seeing yourself.
Constance does not go to 5w/kg. Only 4.6, which is 345w.
While I have to go above 5w/kg frequently to avoid getting dropped. My friend who is 120kg doesn’t have to surge quite as much in the same group.
We are getting away from the original request from the OP to put robopacers on mountainous routes again.
There are flat alternatives so people can ride with them if they wish. Let’s have some steady robopacers back on the mountainous routes again.
The robopacers can go 20% over their base, 4.2*1.2 is 5.04. This would be probably close to what they would do on the alpe given the slopes involved.
Show me a screenshot or video of Constance doing 5.0w/kg.
I have ridden with that group a lot, Constance doesn’t go higher than 4.6w/kg at 345w, even on the section going up towards Epic KOM which goes 10%. Trust me.
Maybe I got it backwards? I thought it was up to 20% uphill, -10% downhill? Maybe it’s the other way around, still that would be an insane amount of power shift for a larger rider on the uphills.
This convo has gotten a little off topic admittedly…
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I’m going from 3.6w/kg on the flat to having to push 5w/kg or more otherwise the group gets away.
I think what you are experiencing here is for 2 main reasons:
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sudden dramatic shifts in gradient lends itself to momentum being important. if you are in the front of a pack going into a short ramp with speed (like those ramps out of the ocean seen in the flat route) the group can come from behind with the draft, momentum, and you have to kick up the power.
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when this happens people ride infront of the bot. Usually on the flats people dont ride infront of Constance because the bot is already doing almost 350w. However when a ramp hits people have momentum and know the bot will kick up the power so they also kick it up. They get infront of the bot using momentum, draft, and a kick to power and end up giving the bot a draft. Giving the 75kg bot doing 4.7wkg a draft means anyone in the draft will also need to be doing similar w/kg (more if lighter) if they want to keep up.
I believe with a “true” climb (not a 20 second kicker) the momentum will die, draft will become less important as speed goes down, and as the climb carrys on the desire to pull the bot becomes less. If you have Constance go up the epic KOM for example you shouldnt have to do 5wkg to follow him at 4.6 even if someone is giving him a draft unless you are like 50kg or something. Which at that point if thats the case you should just realize you are not average weight and consider picking an easier bot even if ur w/kg is showing similar on the right of ur screen.
On another note can eliminate dynamic pacing and end the confusion
But that prob wont happen…
Perhaps add more pacers and climbing routes, but not at the expense of current pacer/route selections. Adding capabilities seems better than subtracting.
I agree, there should be more variation of the routes, and worlds, that the robopacers use. The last couple of times I decided that was I wanted to do for my Zwift session, I ended up riding by myself because I couldn’t find anything in the selection of robopacers + routes that day that inspired me to join in. It is somewhat frustrating for me, because by nature I am a climber, but on some days, especially on ones that I want to make it recovery ride, I’m not able to find anything that works for me. I’ll also chime in about the dynamic vs. static pacer bot situation - sometimes I would like to have a choice for that. For me a good recovery session would be a static paced bot in a world like Scotland, where the terrain isn’t boringly flat, but the energy fluctuations would be limited because of the static bot power output. But I get that there can only be so many pacerbots available at a time. Food for thought…
My club tends to just ride mountainous routes, the robopacer groups are just too boring. Good for people who want maximum distance with minimal effort but not what we are after.
I ride on Zwift often enough that most of the routes feel the same to me. However, I’d love to see AI introduced to the RoboPacer system. Right now, they’re static and predictable, but it would be amazing if, in the future, they became more dynamic and engaging. I don’t necessarily need real people in group rides as long as there are smart, interactive bots to keep things interesting. Ultimately, I don’t think the issue lies with the routes but rather with the pacers’ behavior.
What would be really cool would be if you could have a custom holoreplay for a given route so rather than a random or your previous you could set an average pace for a route. I know some people like the pacers.
I am totally with you! I am at a point, where I am barely joining the Robo Pacers. It’s so boring, I can’t even stand them for a WU or CD.
I usually create an Event with myself (second Zwift user ID, it doesn’t have to be an active, paying account) and do a route of my choice with some nice hills in it. I use those then for some intervals. I find this much better and entertaining than riding along these dull robo pacers. However, there’s loads of people riding with them for hours each day (junk miles really).
Says who?
In the days of anquetil bot which used to go at steady 4.2w/kg at 65kg on routes that included Epic KOM and Radio Tower, then 70-80km of that was worth it. You really had a big variety in the route.
Now on the majority pancake flat routes - I kind of see his point.
I know that the fans of 3 hours / 120km at 2.5w/kg on Tempus won’t be pleased by that.
That’s from The Inferno, isn’t it? The 6th level or something?