Just completed ZA Race 1 (D-Cat). It was a sprint from the start and didn’t let up. About 1.5 km from the finish I was surprised to see an 11 year old keeping with the front 30 riders (140+ total). At the end of the race I wanted to check and see how they did and found they were disqualified with a WKG.
Doesn’t make sense to me, since they were 40kg, 126 watts average on a 22 minute race. 3.0 category wkg, but I wouldn’t think they would be dq’d if they are under the 150 D-cat watt limit.
I am only wondering as my kid is C-cat because his zFTP is below 200. But he can put out 3.8 wkg on a 20 minute race.
I guess he should register for a B level race?
I suspect this is a configuration error with the event. Chances are it will be corrected. Normally Zwift do not disqualify riders in their events for this reason.
I don’t see a reason to enter a different category based on what happened.
A very quick results search suggests WKG disqualification might have been removed for Academy races since at least 0900 GMT today.
Monday 1800 GMT still showing WKGs, but perhaps James and others are now working their way back through the older events and it will perhaps take some time for Zwiftpower to re-process results.
The correct answer is hard to tell.
Zwift is designed to function using a specific range of data.
Riders under 45 kg are outside of the expected parameters and their behavior in game is unpredictable and unrealistic.
They are “unsupported” users and should have limits similar to unsupported ZPower trainers.
I dont recommend that I am a lightweight rider (54kg) and I often have to do 5w/kg to stay in the front group or podium 25min cat B races. Getting dropped in the 1st 2 mins is never fun.
I would guess under 45kg would be quite unusual aside from junior riders.
Even the lightest person I ride with in Zwift - she is 49kg. She also has lots of problems in group rides that are flat. Her FTP isn’t huge but she is light so has fairly high w/kg.
Throwing hands up and lumping them in with Zpower can’t be the final solution. Hard to tell if that was tongue in cheek comment or otherwise.
Oh, he just needs to compete. Doesn’t need to win or even get close. The ZA races have quite a few riders. Only the top 30 to 50% of any category (B-D) is finishing within a minute of podium. As long as there are enough riders to settle into a group and have a bit of sprint finish, then all is good.
Just enter the lowest available category and don’t worry about the DQ on ZwiftPower. It doesn’t matter. It’s not like it will prevent him from completing Zwift Academy. Ignore it. Plus it will probably go away.
This is a very good point. Do you have any tips that you can share with us for riding safely on Zwift? I think that it’s an area that many of us overlook.