I’ve been riding Zwift for nearly five years and have seen things change quite a bit in that time. Racing is taken more seriously now and resources have been brought to bear by ZHQ. Not always to our liking but for the most part the changes have improved the experience.
CE changed things a lot so we didn’t have the bullies from Cat A & B in the D & C races sandbagging and fouling up the entire experience for the little kids. Speaking of my Cat C experience before CE, some of the C riders could hang with the baggers and they would ride away from the rest of us. Those races were an exercise in futility and it took a solid coupla years of bitc…complaining before it got fixed and we had real races. Yeah, sandbagging isn’t cheating but it is extremely *$$h013ish behavior. Oddly, I spoke with a one of the perps and he didn’t see how it was such a bad thing until I pointed out that he only saw what was going on in front of him; it was the stuff behind him that was the train wreck.
ZRS is an upgrade from CE, IMHO. I was a high B/low A rider with good 20 minute power, which was how were seeded in CE. I have little to no short game though so I was spat out the back at the first engagement with the enemy; anything less than about 5 minute power burst. Even then, I couldn’t sustain the first blast so I was chasing the rest of the race. ZRS V1 with the 10 minute and 30 second metrics put me in Cat C (ZRS 520ish) and we suddenly started having fun with racing. I didn’t win any races but I was in the mix and even chased down breaks and so on. Finally a good experience in every event.
ZRS V2 (655) & 3 (615) put me solidly into B along with a bunch of Zwifters with the same 5 minute power but big sprints. And we’re back to the CE racing experience: Dropped at the first hint of punch followed by chasing my balls off and cruising in with the other little kids. There needs to be some kind of initial seeding accounting for the long game AND the short game. It isn’t going to be fun for a lot of Zwifters until Race Result categorization is a fully populated reality.
If this is to be included it needs to be thoroughly thought through before it’s implemented.
Short term power is certainly relevant, but the important part of short term power is very difficult to include in a seeding metric.
It’s the ability to keep producing increased short term efforts that matters most. That repeated effort is not a maximum possible effort. The maximum effort is only relevant to a race if you’ve already made it to the point of the race where you can use the maximum effort, and have done so with enough energy left to be able to do it.
Including a seeding metric based on a maximum effort over a short interval risks instantly favouring those who haven’t recorded a representative maximum effort over that interval.
The ability to put down short power multiple times is important of course but less so in Zwift races because other than the Deca Dash, it doesn’t happen more than a few times in the typical Zwift race. In my case, I can’t even do it once so any kind of short power metric would be welcome.
The same thing applies to the 5 minute power metric too. If you do a very short race, the Tiny Races come to mind, you’re going to get an inflated 5 minute number as opposed to one taken during a climb on The Alpe. That’s kind of why the 10 minute power metric made more sense than the 5 minute.
The reality of all this discussion is that we’re going to get whatever they roll out. Hopefully they’ll figure out something better than what we’ve got right now.
Here’s a thought: The only thing that matters is getting riders into appropriate categories for racing. Sandbagging doesn’t matter anymore because the only bagging going on is people trying to fool the system. Other than Elite Racing, there’s really no cheating that matters either.
Why do I say this? Because we’re racing in a VIDEO GAME! If riders are categorized correctly according to past power and results, nothing else matters. Even if they’re 95kg bodybuilders that can sustain 500 watts for 10 minutes and they’re saying they weigh 75kg, it doesn’t matter because the only person they’re cheating is themselves and they’re not going to be in the same cat as me or you. All I care about is racing against like performing AVATARS. That’s all we are. And if we cheat to win a Zwift community race, we’re the loser.
Think about it: All that matters is getting into a blob and trying go faster than the other Zwifters. If we’re in the right pen according to our capabilities then it’s going to be entertaining. Isn’t that all its about? IRL, we don’t want to attempt to race against riders outside of our category. All we need ZHQ to do is figure out the metrics and set it up.
Didn’t you just changed your Trainer…how much loss in Watts are you experiencing. You can also give estimated % maybe your ZRS v3 should be much lower after your power reset.
I’m down about 1.0w/kg. After the Tiny Races last weekend, my ZRS dropped to 585. I probably should be in the mid-400’s. I haven’t heard back for Zwiftpower about a reset as of this evening.
The interesting take away from this entire sordid affair was the realization that it doesn’t matter how fast someone is IRL but how fast they are on Zwift. We are racing each other with avatars and as long as Zwift put us each in the correct cats, something that didn’t happen until recently and then went away IMHO, your actual abilities are essentially immaterial. We’re racing in a video game and as a game, the primary requirement is fun. If you can race and contribute to the mix, which was happening with ZRS V1 for most of us, then we’re happy.
This may not have been the experience of everyone but when they rolled out ZRS V1, I saw solid tight packs with very few Zwifters off the back. We had great races and most of the participants were happy with the result. Those of us on the forum here need to realize that we are a very small subset of Zwifters; probably less than 5% contribute here and most of them are disgruntled with whatever is happening at the moment. I rarely hear about someone having a great time especially when it comes ot Zwift Racing. IMHO, of course…
What happened when v1 came out everyone had a starting point at there SEED and you couldn’t get lower. That meant that good racers where gaining points and move up but the racers that finish in the bottom they stayed in the same Pen.
After all the complaints about 30s seeding racers to high (btw i agree with this that it was an issue). They introduced so called Floor (Seed -15%) and this now allows racers to manipulate there ZRS. So now you have again this problem with strong racers dropping there ZRS to enter lower Pens and blowing up the race.
I have been as vocal as anyone about adjusting/removing the floor:
option 1: to a fixed number of -50 and not more than -75 (% just doesn’t work across the full 0-1000 score)
option 2: to remove floor completely and encourage racers to gain points and not drop points with ingame prizes. (This removes the option of manipulation of ZRS)
@Chris_D9 how the heck do you keep your weight at 60kg at 174cm? I’m 5ft7 (171cm) and weigh 83kg Admittedly I do a lot of weights at the gym too, but even so! I get told I look too thin at 75kg (which I went down to after losing my wife and not eating … not sure I’ve been anywhere near 60 kg since I was a teen haha. I bet climbing is a lot more fun for you
Re sandbagging in the old CE pens : whilst some did monitor their power and actively try to stay in a lower cat, much of it was actually ‘accidental’. A couple of years ago I was in C and at the top, winning races on my sprint. On flatter courses I could do this with an FTP below the cat boundary easily - reason being, C races were at 3.4 w/kg max for those pulling at the front and hence by sitting in the pack and drafting (race craft?) I never needed to get anywhere near numbers to promote me to B cat.
I actually didn’t have the power over 20 minutes to get into B numbers, so for me I wasn’t managing my numbers I genuinely couldn’t go above 3.4 w/kg for 20 mins. In fact, any races with climbs and I was shelled out the back as those at the front could push boundary numbers whilst I was losing the draft effect and only able to hold 3 w/kg
I used to race up to B in crit races (loved those, don’t see enough of them these days). Never won any. My aim was always to see how long I could hang on before getting dropped haha
I got to B numbers as my training bike (wttbike Atom) started to make horrible noises - realised it badly needed a service. After the service I lost my B super powers and been nowhere near B since.
Point of the post? Not everyone ‘sandbagging’ is doing it intentionally. Many are just hanging on and using the draft to get to the end of flatter courses.
2021 - 34,000km riding including a 1000km outdoor week and plenty other weeks similar to that, 2020 also a big year. 2022 was crap, crash and emergency surgery and long recovery. But then back at it again properly in 2023 and this year at 19,500km of a lot of IRL riding.
I don’t do much in the gym so looking at me I’m typical pro cyclist upper body build and thin arms but big cyclist legs.
One thing, never confuse Zwift kilometres with outdoor distance. Zwift distance is easier, the typical 2.5w/kg three hours for 120km isn’t realistic.
Zwift is great for workouts or focused training but you have to get out and get on a real bike outside, that’s where those 4-5hour IRL rides are great.
Yeah, climbing mountains is great for me, used to be wicked fun before my crash because I was really quick and had lots of power.
With my body (the left hip) so messed up now things are harder. Still light and fairly quick uphill but lots of other functional issues like range of movement, etc. Max power is also half what it used to be, though 20 minute is getting back to within 30w of old level.
All that aside, I refused to sit down feeling sorry for myself and giving up on riding. I wanted to do that again. So I worked damn hard to do it again.
If we take the it’s just a game let’s all run bots and cheat attitude then eventually people get fed up and leave. Then slowly the platform dies.
That’s why I’m so against any form of cheating and “bots” or the “e-bikes okay as long as not in racing…” or the let’s make everyone 75kg tongue in cheek nonsense.
The person who works hard to get a real 43 minute ADZ lap isn’t going to be pleased when Mr or Mrs Dot comes along and does 31 minutes at 120bpm average. Or when someone does weight doping to go faster.
that’s on zwift who have marketed it as a game rather than a training tool, many people are more interested in gaming the game than actually improving their fitness
BlockquoteHow far do you take that though? So it doesn’t matter how strong/heavy any of us are, and we can just run a bot and “have fun” with that?
Actually, yes, for me too that’s the case. I don’t care if the people I race against are weight doping, faulty trainer etc, couldn’t care less, so long as the power they are using puts them in the right pen and I’m competing on an equal basis. It’s about my fun, and the more riders in a race the better, and the more who finish roughly together to make it enjoyable, again the better.
Not wanting to be pedantic, but if someone is “weight doping” to any material extent then they’ll likely end up in the wrong pen for their actual ability. And you wouldn’t be competing against them on an equal basis, as they’d have an un-natural and unfair advantage over you if they “doped” to go faster.
But obviously, what one wants out of a race is very personal. For me, if I could break away at the half way point and solo to victory unchallenged then I’d be ecstatic! (I’ve done this once in a Ladder race, and it felt very good indeed.) That the rest of the field finished a minute behind did not detract from my enjoyment at all.
As long as the results don’t feed into any aspect of proper racing, I don’t see any harm in a type of event that aims to equalise folk as much as possible so they can enjoy a race-like situation, and get to play around with tactics.
Ten-pin bowling doesn’t seem to suffer from allowing families and groups of friends to play with the siderails up to save the duffers from repeatedly lobbing their ball straight into the gutter, even though “proper” ten-pin bowling wouldn’t allow such a thing.
Admittedly I do a lot of weights at the gym too, but even so! I get told I look too thin at 75kg (which I went down to after losing my wife and not eating … not sure I’ve been anywhere near 60 kg since I was a teen haha. I bet climbing is a lot more fun for you 