Zwift Racing League [September 2025]

Racing
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Zwift Racing League Round 1 begins on September 16, 2025!

If you’re looking to get in on the Round 1 action, there are many teams looking for new members!

You can find a list of teams recruiting riders by visiting the WTRL Teams page. When you find a team you’d like to join, get in touch with WTRL, and they’ll connect you. Alternatively, you can post your info on the ZRL Facebook group and have teams contact you directly. Team registration closes on September 13th, but you can join an existing team anytime.

Another great way to find a team is by taking part in one of the recon rides. These are hosted by community teams who are always looking for new racers, and they take place on the actual course in the week leading up to the race.

There are a few simple steps to get started with ZRL

  • Step 1: Get Your Gear Ready - You’ll need a power sensor to transmit your power to the game and a heart rate monitor. If you’re on a classic trainer or using virtual power, you can still race in the B, C, and D categories, but there is a points deduction.

  • Step 2: Get Your Category - Get a few races under your belt first. We recommend the ZRacing Monthly series as a great place to start, as this will help ensure you’re placed in the correct category.

  • Step 3: Sign-up - Go to the WTRL website to register. From there, you can either create a new team with your crew or find an existing one to join.

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Missed Round 1? If you’d like to enter your own team into Round 2 (starts November 4th!), head over to the Team Registration form. You’ll need at least 4 teammates with a maximum of 12.

Please note, that if two users are sharing the same machine, there is currently no way to log-out and log back in as the secondary user. To resolve this issue, you will need to open an incognito browser window and log-in as the secondary user.

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Team registration does not appear to be open yet.

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It seems to be open if you go to Zwift Racing League | WTRL

Possibly this changed after your post.

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The wording and description of these so called sub categories - Was it meant to be as patronising as it comes across?

Is ZRL now 8 categories, or is it 4 main categories and 4 sub/lesser categories? All the wording points towards it being the second which really doesn’t encourage users to move towards these categories through choice..

Novel idea, call them Div 1 (A+) to 8 (D inferior/sub) and actually give a nudge to riders to improve and move up divisions..

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As of 9pm EST last night (Aug 19th) it was still grayed out. That was 9 hours ago. I took a screen shot, but it won’t upload for some reason.

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Seems to be 8 categories.

Why wouldn’t teams register for the new “development” categories if most/all of their riders qualify?

Let’s hope that as time goes on it doesn’t encourage even more sandbagging to fit within those development categories. But I fear that it will.

I don’t blame WTRL for sticking with the old CE system given the abrupt ceasing of development of ZRS.

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Are they using the dire Racing Score system?

Are they neutralising frame performance, or are all the upgrades (especially from cheaters for ~5 months) going to be allowed?

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This is how it works or has been called / worked up until this point.
Which… I will argue has been AWFUL.

The ZRL system for Divisions is super poor by just flip flopping teams at the bottom and top to below and up a division if they can. So what’s happened, at least up until now, and why I’m potentially looking forward to the “low/development” Divisions, is a team could miss one race, and then drop to bottom of the division yet be full of riders right up against the barier for the next Pace Category (Think Cat B’s that could be A if they put in an effort another minute longer…), but if they miss a race and drop to bottom of scoreboard, would then be dropped to Div 2, and race against folks that are nowhere near Cat A; and they smother the entire field.

So for me, I doubt I’ll have a team to fill a development category, at least look forward to its implementation, since division shuffling up to this point has been … cheap.

Tighter racing encourages improvement.
But ZRL up until now at least, encouraged some teams that would rather “game” winning, to just not do a race per round, so they could drop a division to beat the competition who were below from the get-go.

after re-reading I realize you’re referring to divisions though as the actual category boundaries.
This is why ZRL is using Pace Categories and not ZRS…
ZRL still enforces people to be on “teams.” And there is no “upgrade” path if your team doesn’t offer a slot for you.

This is why ZRL needs to drop “teams” and make it “club” racing.
Race ‘for’ a team, but you can be upgraded or downgraded PERSONALLY based on output and results; regardless of whether your team captain made or has space for someone to move up or down.

In my personal opinion, the team system of ZRL, and the way divisions are handled are the poorest systems of ZRL.
It should be open to public, you should be able to assign yourself to a club/team.
There should be an upgrade path.

No, and No, still pace category, and upgrades count.
Cheaters have always been welcomed, so no change there.

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No, they’re using CE pace groups but splitting them in half. So narrower bands but still all the problems of w/kg favouring heavy riders, the watt floor favouring very light riders, zFTP being overinflated for people who haven’t done a Max effort 5min interval, and similarly 5min PBs causing zFTP to drop.

Frame upgrades are in effect for ZRL. Though looking at the round 1 courses that’s probably better than letting the cheats use their halo bikes. Hopefully they haven’t got those to stage 5 yet.

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You’ve manage to miss the point twice.

keep the boundaries as split by power (for good or bad) as they propose but don’t call one of the leagues by an inferior patronising name.

It’s either, we have 8 categories all billed at the same level and therefore treated the same, or we have this proposed sub category which is inferior and used to ‘improve ftp’ (are the standard categories not used to improve ftp? or is this recognition that standard riders hold back their power and therefore rarely improve their metrics?).

It’s patronising, as someone else pointed out riders are unlikely to want to go from the pointy end of the primary ‘standard division’ to the inferior sub category to race - it reads awful, looks awful and really goes against zwifts inclusiveness direction..

First off @shooj is ZRL now 8 categories or 4 main and 4 sub categories?

Edit to add - when TFC use this on Mad Mondays, they don’t rank a division as more important or greater than the others, they all have equal billing and it works, none are inferior or sub.. Why this 2 tier system has come about god only knows.

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The original promotion/relegation scheme was dropped quite a while back. It doesn’t happen any more.

I’m more concerned about all the returning racers who will be sandbagging their way into the new development divisions.

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I may well be missing something because I’m not following this argument.

Those at the “pointy” end of the existing categories won’t qualify for the development divisions so therefore won’t be able to enter, assuming they have up-to-date power information in Zwift.

However, some sandbaggers may well be encouraged to drop down if they are the right at the top of the old division but can now sandbag their way into a development division if they haven’t been racing recently.

I don’t see unattractiveness of these supposedly “inferior” divisions (where does it say that?). My own team never competes at the top of the old categories and we’d be more competitive in theory (sandbaggers aside) in the new development division.

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If you are pointy end of C, your next step up, is Development inferior division B. Do riders try to attain that, or hold their power and stay in the pointy end of the Standard ‘good’ C?

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The development division above should be more attractive than the standard division above. But sandbaggers will still try and stay where they are.

I don’t see this change helping reduce sandbagging, and I see it having the opposite effect. But it might help in some divisions to produce more competitive racing - I am putting that as a very big MIGHT though.

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I agree I dont think this improves the sandbagging element of ZRL - but If you call it by an inferior name, describe it as being below the standard division, it will never be attractive to anyone never mind the people you are trying to entice into going into it.

Give it equal billing, so winning that division is the same as winning the standard division (Thats why I suggested just naming them 1-8), it will encourage riders to move into those new divisions and there is no stigma to winning it.

Currently, id rather win a standard division, than win an inferior dev division. Describe them all the same and you make it all worthwhile.

This is engagement 101..

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@Lee_H what about range 1 vs range 2, do you think guys go into Range 1 thinking it is less the Range 2 ?

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They have equal billing, Range 2 is not described as inferior / development or improver to get you into Range 1.

To answer the question, no I dont.

You are also comparing Apples & Oranges.

Just to further help you @Bath_Salts as im guessing English isnt your first language.

Dictionary:

Range: a set of different things of the same general type.

Sub: at, to, or from a lower level or position.

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Range 2 is bigger Number. it apple to apple. maybe the size of the apple…..

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The last rulebook I had from this past season absolutely still had it, and it absolutely still occurred:

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We most certainly got teams that skipped a race and got relegated down against my B2 team, which then of course destroyed the field.

I know this isn’t what you’re after, but still the primary issue of ZRL:
If a racer upgrades from C, and your team doesn’t have a development B team… then that racer is potentially SOL.

While I REALLY like the concept of these development divisions, I feel it’s not helpful to the small teams, where we don’t have hundreds upon hundreds of people to register.

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how would club racing work then?