Are you interested in racing on Zwift? ZRacing is a great place to begin. These events are popular because they’re made to fit anyone’s schedule, delivering a solid 1-hour workout (including warmup and cooldown) on an ever-changing set of courses.
Here’s everything you need to know about Zwift’s “ZRacing” – the platform’s most popular ongoing race series.
September’s Routes
Here are the routes we’ll be racing in this month’s series:
- Stage 1 (September 7-13)
- ZRacing: Croissant, 2 laps (21.8km, 122m) Aero + Draft powerups
- Crit Club: The Bell Lap, 9 laps (17.8km, 152m) Draft + Aero powerups
- Epic: Big Foot Hills (69.9km, 714m)
- TT: Hot Laps (23.5km, 149m)
- Stage 2 (September 14-20)
- ZRacing: Ocean Lava Cliffside Loop (19.2km, 156m) Feather + Anvil powerups
- Crit Club: Mech Isle Loop, 4 laps (16.2km, 156m) Feather + Anvil powerups
- Epic: Makuri Pretzel (78.7km, 623m)
- TT: Neokyo All-Nighter (24.5km, 168m)
- Stage 3 (September 21-27)
- ZRacing: Electric Break (19.6km, 204m) Feather + Aero powerups
- Crit Club: Glasgow Crit Six (18.3km, 199m) Feather + Aero powerups
- Epic: Navig8 (66.1km, 423m)
- TT: Bologna Time Trial Lap (8km, 236m)
- Stage 4 (September 28-October 4)
- ZRacing: Loop de Loop, 2 laps (25km, 289m) Feather + Anvil powerups
- Crit Club: The Fan Flats, 3 laps (19.4km, 80m) Aero + Draft powerups
- Epic: London Pretzel (56.2km, 576m)
- TT: R.G.V. (24.9km, 133m)
See Women-Only Zwift Racing events >
See Range 1 Zwift Racing events >
See Range 2 Zwift Racing events >
See Advanced Zwift Racing events >
See ALL Zwift Racing events >
XP Bonuses
Zwift has replaced the achievement badges you could formerly earn for completing every race in a ZRacing series with XP bonuses. You will now earn a 1000 XP bonus for completing stage 1, then additional bonuses for each stage thereafter.
GC Leaderboards
Zwift’s web-based leaderboards track the monthly GC competition. Access the ZRacing leaderboards at zwift.com/racing/zracing.
Your GC ranking is based on your best finishing time for each stage, and you can race each stage more than once to try for a better time.
Choosing Your Category
Zwift schedules three different flavors of ZRacing events in order to encourage “Fairer, more competitive racing for everyone.” They are titled Advanced, Range 1, and Range 2. Read on for details!
Read all about Zwift Racing Score >
Advanced Category Races for 650+
One common complaint among top-ranked racers is a lack of participation in the top category of ZRacing events. Zwift is working to change this by hosting special “Advanced” category races targetting riders with a Zwift Racing Score of 650+.
Advanced races are held less often than the Range 1/2 races in order to focus participation and improve competition at the top level.
Tighter, Alternating Categories for 700-
For riders with a Zwift Racing Score of 700 and below, ZRacing events feature tighter categories that alternate hourly between two different sets of ranges:
- Category Range 1: 0-160 | 160-270 | 270-390 | 390-510 | 510-650
- Category Range 2: 0-210 | 210-330 | 330-450 | 450-570 | 570-725
A few interesting things worth noting:
Category ranges flexing across events has implications for riders competing in the overall monthly GC. More on this below…
Riders with scores between 650-700 have the option of racing in the new Advanced events, or in the top category of Range 2 events.
If you’re looking for a race where you have the best shot of winning, the alternating Range 1/Range 2 events give you access to an event where you are fairly close to the top of the category range.
Looking for a harder workout? You can always race up a category, or choose a category range that puts you near the bottom of the category.
Monthly GC Competition
Every race event is a competition itself, but each month’s series is also a time-based GC (general classification) competition based on riders’ finishing times on each stage. The rider with the lowest overall time for that month’s races wins!
Access the ZRacing leaderboards at zwift.com/racing/zracing >
With three different flavors of ZRacing events being scheduled (Advanced, Range 1, and Range 2 as explained above), riders chasing the GC need to consider the following:
- Field Size Matters: all else being equal, the fastest times will come from the largest fields. So riding in the most popular races can help your GC results. But also…
- Category Range Matters: a group of riders with scores between 330-450 will be faster than a group of riders at 270-390. So while Zwift may recommend either of these categories for you if your score is 350, and you may have a better chance at a race win in the 270-390 group, the upper category may very well give you a better finishing time. But also…
- Your Abilities Matter: neither of the above considerations matters if you get dropped from the front group midway through the race.
While the GC results pages at zwift.com let you filter by score range, those are really artificial groupings at this point since the actual events aren’t using those score ranges. It may be most helpful to see the GC as a way of ranking yourself against the entire universe of ZRacing participants, which means it’s up to you to choose your events and execute your races strategically to maximize your GC ranking.
Also worth noting: you can race each stage multiple times to improve your finishing time!
Questions or Comments?
Post below!
I didn’t realise that it counted towards the Tour of Watopia, I was quite surprised to get the cap after stage 1. I don’t know whether this had an influence on the riders. I did my normal 6:10 Tuesday race, and was delighted to finish 4th, which is far higher than usual. Then when I looked at the results, saw that the normal people that kick my butt weren’t there.
Tour of Watopia doesn’t start until October! You are supposed to earn the Dura-Ace cap after completing one stage though.
Not enough gas in the tank to participate in so many of these cool races. Hard to decide.🤔
Hello, no team GC by categories?
Nope.
There is a Team GC on ZwiftPower.
Information about being able to “race up” in Advanced is outdated if I’m not mistaken
Ah, correct! Removed.
Do you have to complete all the races up to a certain point to be included in the GC standings?
If you complete any of the races for the current month, you’ll be in the standings for that month.
But you need to complete every week’s race in order to have an accurate overall GC ranking.
I’m a novice racer and 75 years young. Is my age taken into account?
No, age is not a factor in event categorisation.
Didn’t see this: Do you have to do all four races for each stage or just one per stage to qualify for GC and any goodies given out for that stage? It’s not clear in the race description.
The GC only applies to the ZRacing events. You only need to complete one event (of any of the 5 types) per week to progress in the quest/campaign.
I love racing on Zwift but the advanced category is too large. My ZRS is around 775 and I just get smoked by riders with 950+ scores who can put out insane (for me) watts per kg. It needs splitting into 2 groups IMO.
Another bug for me, when a user is in mode private their ZRS is hidden, I like to check out the level of competition to identify the stronger riders before a race. I can see no reason to hide this sporting information from other users
For the rest of the profile, keep it private, no problem, I understand.
My score is a bit lower than yours, but I totally relate to the feeling of having absolutely no chance against 950+ riders. That said, I’m worried that breaking down the 725+ category even further will just make it harder for races to happen at all.
Instead of adding more categories, they should keep “Advanced” as is, remove the score caps for Range 1 and Range 2, and let 725+ riders choose between Advanced, Range 1, or Range 2. That way, we could decide whether we want to battle for the podium in Range 1/2 or try to hang with the big guns in Advanced.
Right now, the higher your score gets, the fewer options you have. It honestly makes getting a higher score feel like a punishment.
I’m seriously sick and tired of this category system. The advanced category has nothing but downsides for me: there aren’t enough events, so it’s hard to fit them in between work and taking care of the kids. On top of that, player counts are always low, and the few strong riders just attack and disappear, leaving me to do a miserable, empty solo ride all the way to the finish. With the current system, going over a 725 score feels like a “prison sentence” and getting “banned from actually enjoying races.” I really wish they would introduce automatic score decay over time so we can regularly get back into the “fun Zwift racing community” under 725.
The Advanced races are every other hour and the time alternates daily so I don’t understand the “not enough events” comment. I’ll look at the possibility of splitting the Advanced races into two categories. Numbers should increase from now on in to winter.