Now I haven’t read the entire thread, but here’s my take on a possible solution
Velodrome would be ****** great, but for me at least, it would be for racing purposes only. I think it would be a server-kinda thing as mentioned above. So there’s always one public, with a time limit (or 20 participants) for the given race (eg. one for points race, one for scratch etc.). Then you should also be able to make closed (with password, the good old way) friendly servers where people can spectate perhaps. But I don’t see this as a training thing, it should be racing purposes only.
I second the thoughts of using keyboard or phone or tablet for moving around, and there should definetly be an engine with collision control and (de)acceleration when moving on the banks.
All in all it would just be really cool to do some track racing, whether it’s points races, madison, team/individual pursuit/sprint and so forth (yay for hour records). I think it would be awesome to compete against friends on a velodrome, or when the weather is to bad on a winter-camp the team could compete a little on a Zwift velodrome.
I reckon it exists on BKool software, so why shouldn’t even more competent people in Zwift be able to create it
Agree. I’ve used the BKool velodrome for hour efforts. The power delivery is consistent since all gradients are removed. Even when using ERG mode in Zwift I can tell when I’m hitting an uphill or down hill section without looking at the screen as the resistance change momentarily. Besides racing and hour efforts I can also see it being useful for warm-up efforts before a ‘road’ race. I believe it could add value to what Zwift is offering. Maybe a user can spawn an instance where others can join up to a max number or you join an existing instance if it is ‘open’.
Elimination or points race could be great fun. Track cycling is lot of fun, but it is just so dangerous in real life. Of course it would be good to have some way to steer the bike so you could ride up the bank and drop in to take the lead.
I was just thinking the same thing today… It would have to be a 6-10 tiered Multi-Drome that you could sign up for various open times… What a great idea. Each tier could have it’s own theme :D. Or there could possibly be a Velodrome in each world (NYC, Watopia, etc.)… and one underwater, lol.
Sorry for the intrusion, I’m brand new to the Zwift Forum, so if I break etiquette I apologize and let me know.
All these ideas are awesome! As a track guy myself I totally agree that a race against Zwifters would be super cool, and I also agree that you could easily get 800 people on the “Velodrome” route which would be insanity! How do we balance the two?
To start let’s consider that most real-world track racing isn’t against other racers on the track: you’re often racing a personal, track, or world record, so the need to populate the environment with lots of other riders is unrealistic for most events (Keirin, Madison, and Points are exceptions of course!). All you really need is to overlay a “Record Line” on the track in front of you where those records are (think how they do this for the Olympic Track events on TV).
Secondly, the whole point of Zwift is to make the indoor/stationary riding experience fun, so I personally don’t ever see myself riding for hours on a virtual Velodrome. If I’m doing anything but a structured workout or riding for a PR I guarantee I’ll be on a beautiful, virtual road somewhere else in Zwift!
So here’s my suggestion:
Create a separate “Velodrome” world itself, where the routes are in fact track events.
When you pick a route (Flying Lap, Match, Kilo, 4k Pursuit, 1hr, Free Ride…) you show up alone on the track at the start line
When the route is a Race Route the clock counts down, the buzzer goes, and you have a simulated race.
When the route is Free Ride you can either ride like normal in Zwift or do workouts.
When you cross the finish line on a Race Route your time is recorded and you’re allowed to cool down for a few laps before your ride ends.
Riders can directly share their records with Zwift Followers
When Zwift decides to have “Zwift Olympics” riders would be put into heats based on previous track times, but any time other than an official Zwift event you would be alone on the track.
Here are the issues that need to be overcome:
Wattage. Many track riders easily exceed 1000w, and not all stationary trainers can provide the necessary resistance.
Warmup/Cooldown. You’d have to do this as a separate ride before doing a Race Route, which is clunky in the current Zwift ride-saving setup.
Cloud-hosting. If each person on the track had a separate VM running this could eat up a lot of processing power and space!
It’s not a perfect solution, but it makes UX development easier, and honestly the solitude of racing just the clock and myself is what I like about the boards the most!
It would be nice.
Have you ever tried the KISS Saturday 2 km races? It might give you some insight into a short race (there are 4 events in a row spaced every 15 minutes or so. I love the series but it usually doesn’t fit my schedule. Maybe a daily challenge like the Fuego Flat Sprint would be cool.
What we really need is a race organizer to showcase track length events (I’ve previously suggested sprints on the London course from the 1 km banner to the finish) If it gets popular, then I think Zwift will bump up the velodrome on the ‘to do’ list.
Yeah so much fun with a control bound in your face … man if i would love to play “super mario kart” i would. in this case i just want to race and smash every grain out of my body and not throw my smartphone across my training room … hey i’m new manager i have the idea of the year what about using our smartphone to steer. nice i will give you 100000 $ what a nice idea your in.
Why can’t this just be done on a route like Tempus Fugit? Why the ‘need’ for a velodrome? My feeling is that this will just bring a whole new set of comments about people ‘cheating’ because they are shifting. The running track makes sense to me. A velodrome, not so much.
It’s a lot of U-turns which is a PITA for a start. Much easier to go round in tight loops and sprint every 2nd, 4th, 10th loop for example if it’s sprinting for a line that’s being practiced.
If it’s “the kilo” then of course it more closely replicates the track even by putting it on a track. If 1km if 8 laps of a 250m track, it’s easy to meaningfully show whether you’re up or down against a PR or target time. Far less so when you’re just riding 1km of road. Similarly with the “Zwift hour record”.
There are loads of reasons people would like a velodrome. Not everyone will want it, many won’t understand why people want it. But that’s OK. They don’t need to ride on it or even care or understand. Just as many people don’t understand why people wanted Alpe du Zwift; or indeed the flat roads of the desert.
Sprint events for sure, but I love everything about a velodrome. Track cycling is a whole discipline far different from road cycling and mountain biking.
The running track is amazing. I’m so jealous, I may start running again.
I love track cycling, also, having raced for nearly 30 years. But IMO it should be on a single-speed, fixed-gear bike. There are a lot of other things I hope Zwift tackles before adding a velodrome.
A lot of U-turns? Isn’t a velodrome, effectively, just one U-turn after another? Some good thoughts about efforts of a certain distance, though. But for a velodrome to actually make sense in Zwift, at least IMO, there would have to be steering available. So much of track racing involves purposefully moving up and down the track and the current logic (outside of Repack Ridge) doesn’t allow for that.
Of course, there are multiple aspects to the idea of a velodrome. Some could definitely have steering.
But I think there are a few formats that would be fun even without steering. Devil take the Hindmost / Elimination races for example. 20 riders start, last one over the line ever second lap is out. Trivial to program in a velodrome context, but hard to do “for funsies” out on the open roads.
Maybe a Keirin with virtual derny. Keirin races don’t tend to use a lot of the banking other than overtaking. Of course there’s the argument that pushing someone up the baking forces them to take a longer line, and that’s true enough. But even without I feel there’s a lot of fun to be had.
Sprint racing wouldn’t work well as that really does use the banking, but pursuit could work.
Points races too.
Of course the congestion issue has to be addressed - but it’s easily surmountable. Zwift already has events that are hidden from view for example.
Some of those aspects of velodrome racing could definitely be fun. The primary issue I see with this is found in commentary elsewhere on the forum with regard to ‘what you see isn’t always what’s happening in-game’. In a Devil take the hindmost, for example, it could get frustrating VERY quickly to be pulled from a race when on your screen you are not the last rider, from from Zwift’s perspective you are. Same with a points race, I suppose: you think you’ve put out the effort to nip that person next to you, but Zwift says you were actually third in the sprint, not first. Perhaps Zwift will find a way to overcome these issues, but they would definitely be critical to track racing, since inches (or even millimeters) matter.
Sure, but these are exactly the problems that have been solved pretty well in the realm of first person shooters.
The same sort of problems exist there - getting shot when you thought you were behind cover, for example.
I’d suggest that people going round and round a 250m track with little (or no) control of steering are a lot more predictable than players in the typical FPS.
Plus of course there are plenty of online racing games already that make this stuff work. Assetto Corsa, iRacing, even old Xbox games like Blur.
Prediction, interpolation, correction, etc. are all possible.
Some good thoughts about efforts of a certain distance, though. But for a velodrome to actually make sense in Zwift, at least IMO, there would have to be steering available. So much of track racing involves purposefully moving up and down the track and the current logic (outside of Repack Ridge) doesn’t allow for that.