All About the New Pinarello Dogma GR Gravel Frame on Zwift

Zwift’s latest update includes a new gravel frame from Pinarello, the Italian company’s first gravel frame in game. It’s the Pinarello Dogma GR, which is Pinarello’s race-focused gravel bike, sort of a “road bike in disguise” made for shorter, faster, less chunky gravel excursions:

On Zwift, you’ll need to be updated to game version 1.111+ to see this bike in the Drop Shop. You’ll also need to be at level 30+ with 1,100,000 Drops to buy it. Here’s how it’s described in the Drop Shop:

“End of Excuses. The Dogma GR carries that unmistakable Pinarello silhouette into gravel with lightweight carbon and race-tuned stiffness. It responds instantly when you surge and feels laser-precise at pace. Bold lines. Serious intent.”

See our master list of all frames in Zwift >

It’s rated 2 stars for aero 3 stars for weight, so we know it will perform decently well compared to other Zwift gravel bikes. But since Zwift’s 4-star system isn’t the most granular of performance measurements, we ran this frame through our precise tests to measure performance at nerd-level detail. Let’s dive in!

Note: test results below are from a 75kg, 183cm rider holding 300W steady using Zwift’s stock gravel wheelset on the un-upgraded version of the frame.

Aero (Flat/Rolling) Performance

Pinarello’s Dogma GR turns in a strong performance on the flats, beating all existing gravel bikes on tarmac apart from the new Cannondale SuperX LAB71 and Cervelo Aspero 5.

For comparison, the stock Zwift Gravel frame loses 145.4 seconds to our baseline Zwift Carbon frame across an hour of flat tarmac, while the (former) fastest gravel bike, the Cervelo Aspero 5, loses 111.2 seconds. The Dogma GR loses 112.8 seconds.

Climb Performance

The Dogma GR is a strong climber as well, essentially tying the Specialized Crux while falling just short of the new Cannondale SuperX LAB71.

The stock Zwift Gravel frame loses 161.8 seconds to our baseline Zwift Carbon frame across an hour of Alpe du Zwift climbing, while the new Cannondale SuperX LAB71 loses 118.7 seconds. The Dogma GR loses 122.1 seconds, putting it in 3rd (or tied for 2nd with the Crux at 122 seconds) among the gravel frames in our climbing test.

Jungle Performance

Of course, nobody really cares about how well a gravel frame performs on pavement, which is where we do our aero and climb testing (above). While those flat and climb tests help us tease out a frame’s aerodynamic capabilities and weight, when it comes to gravel bikes, people really want to know how fast they are on Zwift’s virtual dirt!

In that regard, the Pinarello Dogma GR turns in a strong performance, just 0.2 seconds behind the new Cannondale SuperX Lab71 and 0.8 seconds behind the Cervelo Aspero 5 across an hour of Jungle Circuit riding.

Upgrading Your Pinarello Dogma GR

Like all frames in Zwift, Pinarello’s Dogma GR can be upgraded in five stages. As a high-end race bike, each of the five stages results in a performance improvement. The Dogma GR upgrade stages are as follows:

1. Ride 200km, pay 100,000 Drops for an aero upgrade
2. Ride 260km, pay 200,000 Drops for a weight reduction
3. Ride 320km, pay 350,000 Drops for a drivetrain efficiency improvement
4. Ride 380km, pay 500,000 Drops for an aero upgrade
5. Ride 440km, pay 750,000 Drops for a weight reduction

You can expect a fully-upgraded Pinarello Dogma GR to be approximately 28 seconds faster on a flat hour and 36 seconds faster on an hour-long climb vs a “stock” (un-upgraded) Dogma GR.

Conclusions

As both a strong climber and aero performer, Pinarello’s new Dogma GR beats every gravel bike in Zwift apart from the new Cannondale SuperX Lab71 and Cervelo Aspero 5. And it holds its own quite nicely against those two frames anyway, so if you’re a Pinarello fan, riding this as your virtual gravel whip may just be the winning move.

We’ll be adding this bike to the following posts soon:

• Speed Tests: Gravel, MTB, and Road Frames on Zwift Dirt
• Zwift Shopping Guide: What To Buy from the Drop Shop at Each Level
• Master List of Zwift Bike Frames (added)

Questions or comments?

What do you think of Pinarello’s new Dogma GR in Zwift? Share below…