One year after we kicked off the hugely successful Tiny Race series, Zwift Insider is spinning up a new series unlike anything you’ve seen before on Zwift.
In contrast to our Tiny Races (4 races in 1 hour), the Epic Series is all about going big. Tackle Zwift’s toughest routes with us. And do it as a group ride or a race. You choose!
Series Structure
The initial series comprises six 4-week blocks, and each block’s routes are tougher than the previous block. Each 4-week block is structured like this:
- Week 1 – Mini Epic Ride: a group ride on a challenging 3-bidon route from our Printable List of Zwift Routes by Difficulty.
- Week 2 – Mini Epic Race: a race on the same route as Week 1.
- Week 3 – Epic Ride: a group ride on a very challenging 4+ bidon route from our Printable List of Zwift Routes by Difficulty.
- Week 4 – Epic Race: a race on the same route as week 3.
The series is structured this way for a few reasons:
- Holding group rides and races helps racers and non-racers alike earn the harder route badges and push themselves to new limits.
- Mini Epics provide a challenging option for riders who aren’t yet able to take on the full Epic events.
- Group rides give racers the option of a recon ride one week before racing.
- Routes get more challenging with each 4-week block so you can build endurance and conquer Zwift’s six toughest routes.
Routes and Event Times
Epic Series events are scheduled each weekend starting August 19th, with six timeslots to choose from:
- Saturdays: 6:30am, 12:30pm, 6:30pm UTC (11:30pm, 5:30am, 11:30am PDT)
- Sundays: 9:30am, 3:30pm, 9:30pm UTC (2:30am, 8:30am, 2:30pm PDT)
See upcoming Epic Series events at zwift.com/events/tag/epicseries
| Date | Event Type | Route | Distance | Elevation |
| Aug 19-20 | Mini Epic Ride | Mountain 8 | 32.5km | 677m |
| Aug 26-27 | Mini Epic Race | Mountain 8 | 32.5km | 677m |
| Sep 2-3 | Epic Ride | Quatch Quest | 46.2km | 1683m |
| Sep 9-10 | Epic Race | Quatch Quest | 46.2km | 1683m |
| Sep 16-17 | Mini Epic Ride | Bigger Loop | 53.6km | 678m |
| Sep 23-24 | Mini Epic Race | Bigger Loop | 53.6km | 678m |
| Sep 30-Oct 1 | Epic Ride | The Pretzel | 72.7km | 1333m |
| Oct 7-8 | Epic Race | The Pretzel | 72.7km | 1333m |
| Oct 14-15 | Mini Epic Ride | Lutscher | 24.5km | 828m |
| Oct 21-22 | Mini Epic Race | Lutscher | 24.5km | 828m |
| Oct 28-29 | Epic Ride | Mega Pretzel | 111km | 1659m |
| Nov 4-5 | Epic Race | Mega Pretzel | 111km | 1659m |
| Nov 11-12 | Mini Epic Ride | Road to Sky | 17.6km | 1046m |
| Nov 18-19 | Mini Epic Race | Road to Sky | 17.6km | 1046m |
| Nov 25-26 | Epic Ride | Four Horsemen | 90.4km | 2111m |
| Dec 2-3 | Epic Race | Four Horsemen | 90.4km | 2111m |
| Dec 9-10 | Mini Epic Ride | Tour of Fire & Ice | 28.1km | 1184m |
| Dec 16-17 | Mini Epic Race | Tour of Fire & Ice | 28.1km | 1184m |
| Dec 23-24 | Epic Ride | The Über Pretzel | 128.8km | 2381m |
| Dec 30-31 | Epic Race | The Über Pretzel | 128.8km | 2381m |
| Jan 6-7 | Mini Epic Ride | La Reine | 22.9km | 1205m |
| Jan 13-14 | Mini Epic Race | La Reine | 22.9km | 1205m |
| Jan 20-21 | Epic Ride | The PRL Full | 173.8km | 2628m |
| Jan 27-28 | Epic Race | The PRL Full | 173.8km | 2628m |
See upcoming Epic Series events at zwift.com/events/tag/epicseries
Epic Series Rules
Epic Series group rides are open-paced events with only one category. Just jump in and find a group going your speed. You do you!
Each Epic Series race event is a standalone event (no series GC) using the following rules:
- Only Feathers: only feather powerups will be given. Because mountains.
- Zwift’s category-enforcing pace groups are used. All categories will start together and be visible to each other, to give riders a maximum chance of having others to ride with on the long routes.
- Heart rate monitors are required.
- Smart trainer/smart bike or power meter required. ZPower/Virtual power is not allowed.
Questions or Comments?
Share below!
Sounds interesting! Why not have these rides and races during the week also? Due to frequent weekend traveling, I regrettably miss a lot of Tiny Races too.
We might try it at some point, but typically people save long rides for weekends. The Tiny Races would be a better candidate for midweek times, I suppose…
On one hand, my legs hurt just looking at this lineup. On the other hand, I’m already daydreaming about the baked goods I will be refueling with over the holidays…
Sounds fun, longer rides are great.
Is there any possibility to remove the 199.9km limitation on rides? There are ultra cyclists who would like to put longer rides into the schedule.
Thank you.
Brilliant idea. These are going to really hurt but already excited about the prospect.
Bye bye legs 🙈🥵 … see you next year again 😉 … perhaps from February on 🤣
Where do I report that Iám sick and won´t be able to do any of them.. 😉
You’ll need to call the Wambulance for that report! 😆
I think I’m washing my hair on those last two weekends.
Great idea. Hope these are popular. Lately Zwift races have been getting shorter and shorter, hopefully this is a step in the right direction.
Yeah, I think short races are great, but you need longer ones too. There are some long-running longer races (KISS 100, DBR Sufferfest) but I think we could use more. We’ll see who turns out!
Eric, you and the OverTheEdge club are thinking on the same wavelength! They have a similar series called The Buildup that just finished Stage 3 of 8. The eight longest routes in Zwift over 8 weeks. https://www.zwift.com/uk/events/tag/ote
Good to see this longer form racing taking off!
Hopefully the PRL Full route bring in a lot of riders. That’s the only one I don’t have the route badge for, and I just can’t get the motivation to suffer through that one alone.
There was thousands of riders the last time Zwift Insider organised a badge ride a couple of years ago, so should get plenty of draft to make it a little less painful. The laps still totally grind you down though…
I got up at 2am local to do that zinsider ride last time. There were people all over the course, it was an awesome way to get it done!
Am I right in saying that although the Four Horsemen ride will start from the Pens it will still count for the Veloviewer Leaderboard? But the Mountain 8 Epic Ride still won’t because the Veloviewer segment is from the spawn point rather than the Pens?
Yes, I believe you are correct.
Love this, thanks Eric! Great to have longer rides and races with bigger fields and where half the field won’t drop out after an hour, given the added publicity and motivation this will provide 👍🙏
I still “fondly” remember the PRL Full event a couple of years back and the (just about) successful battle with cramp for the last hour of it 😆
That was a great ride. My best time on the PRL Full… just under 5 hours! Kept really consistent ~25 minute laps with a good group.
It certainly was a great ride – being on the course with several thousand other riders was amazing (and very helpful in completing it!)
I also did it that time, got up in the dark, finished by lunch. Think averaged under 2wkg, but with all the people it was a great way to draft and get that badge! Only have 2 more badges to go 🙂
Great initiative and looking forward to join them.
but especially the longer racers it would be great if all other categories would be visible. Because when I’ve paced it wrong in the first hour (what is very common in a race by clamping on) it is a long solo to the finish. And when all other categories are visible there are bigger chances of multiple groups. (And hopefully there are enough A’s joining?)
I would normally agree but I suspect there will be a VERY high turnout for theses events and so it should work well as your cat only being visible but from a hardware performance stand point and not having to contend with C’s drafting B’s etc etc.
these* and both* need an edit button 😳
Yeah… I’m pondering making all categories visible (and maybe even having them all start together). It will depend on race signup numbers. Thanks for the feedback!
Would help lower grades a lot on the routes with multiple laps especially. Not aware that having anyone drafting you actually slows you down if you are the lead rider? Could only see it being issue for ‘serious’ racers in lower grades. Maybe have the ‘rides’ mass start and see everyone, and the ‘races’ grade only?
Rides are mass start, and races are grade only, currently. The question is whether all the categories should be able to see each other and/or start together for the races.
Maybe it’s also worth considering making open world riders visable to all for the rides? (If that still possible at all today, it used to be possible a few years ago) Especially for a ride like the PRL full this could be beneficial as this way people could pretty much join in 2 hours after the group ride started and complete at least some laps with the pack before finishing the event on their own, or with others that joined in later. Maybe I’m just underestimating the amount of people that would show up for that one and dreading getting… Read more »
Love it! I just wish it didn’t overlap with CX season…
Will double draft be activated, as was case for badge hunting ? Or has this become irrelevant since PD4/4.1 were introduced ?
PD 4 has dd built into it, so it’s not needed as a separate setting any longer.
Really good initiative. I’m also dreaming of doing my first 100K. But all these longer Epics seem to involve a lot of climbing. Maybe that’s what is the idea by Epics?.. but could something similar be done for flat distances to be able to ride 100, 150 and 200K?
Maybe, but I’m more into epic routes, not just many laps of flat stuff. There are quite a few group rides that do that already on a regular basis.
I wish the Epic Series race had a GC overall. Good to see longer races 🙂
I’m not a fan of GC-based series when the series has multiple timezone events. It really just becomes a question of “which timezone has the fastest group” (which is often “which timezone has the largest group”). If we had just one event each week, a GC would feel better… to me, at least.
The La Reine link takes you to “Lutscher” Route Details (Innsbruck)
Fixed!
I do like this idea. I plan to tackle each one but if I can, do the reccy and race. I think 52kms is my longest race but some of these are barbaric 🙂
Cool, I can finally check off my last 3 routes (Quatch Quest, Über Pretzel, and PRL Full). Though I will not be doing those again twice in a row!
Why are these events not showing on my event calendar in the app? How do I register for this event?
I was hoping for another PRL Full event of some kind this winter. It’s the only badge I lack. Maybe I’ll see you on Jan 20! That gives me plenty of time to slowly lose my mind enough to give it a go.
Did you decide if categories will be visible to one another? I understand the rationale for and against…but I am cheering for the former. 🙂
For now, categories start separately and aren’t visible to each other. That may change for future events, though.
10-4
I see tomorrow’s Quatch Quest Epic Series Race has combined all categories. Thank you kindly Eric the Wise.
It will be great if pace partners can also be deployed on the route in the event which will make it much easier to follow and complete the route. Is that something that is possible?
I haven’t asked, but I highly doubt it, since that would be a custom setup on Zwift’s side. They’ve never done that for a community-run event.
If you’re talking about pacing and ignoring the pointy end of the race… for example for Quatch Quest, then do it yourself at least once (e.g. this weekend) and then you’ll have a Holoreplay available for the race (next weekend).
If you’re worried about completing at all, or are talking about being on a wheel to help complete… finding a buddy ‘on the road’ is usually easier than you might think particularly for longer rides. As with so many things, the trick is to be a bit patient and respectful when you find someone and to do your part too.
HoloReplays will only show up during free rides. They are not visible in workouts, Meetups, Club Events, races, or any other “official” event.
No go for my own cunning plan then! Better to know now though, thanks!
It was the latter for me. Thanks for the advice, I am normally a good company 🙂 Will definitely test myself out
Wow! if i get a couple of these in, it will make Zwift Grand Fondo easy (or a little bit easier) Any talk of when the grand fondo will be this year?
Haven’t heard anything. I bet it starts in November, though.
Just FYI – the group rides also require HRM to get a result, not just the races
when doing the group rides are we going to be able to see the riders in the world not in the group ride? I just don’t want to be riding alone for most of it because I’m slow!?!?!?!