The second edition of Zwift Games, a massively popular 5-stage race series for community and elite racers, has just been announced for March 2025. Last year’s inaugural Games broke all the records for previous Zwift race events, and this year could be even bigger! Below, you’ll find everything you need to know about indoor cycling’s premier race festival.
Table of Contents
New This Year
Zwift’s learnings from last year’s Games have been applied to this year’s events, leading to a swath of improvements including:
- Zwift Racing Score Categorization: community races are categorized into Racing Score bands for a fresh level of competition.
- Web-Based Leaderboards: a new interface is launching at zwift.com to browse community race results and filter leaderboards based on various criteria (see below for details).
- In-Pen Powerups, 1 Powerup Per Race: racers will receive just one powerup per race, and it will be given at the very start of the event. Use it wherever you’d like! (See below for details on which powerups are given for each race.)
- New Unlocks: unlock new sunnies, shoes, a helmet, and the ZG 25 kit as you finish each stage (see images below).
- Fresh Routes: five new routes have been added to the game to host the 5 Games stages (see below for details).
- Route Chaser Challenge: earn an extra 1000XP by completing the new Route Chaser: Zwift Games mini-challenge featuring the new routes. Do it as part of the games, or do it beforehand as race recon!
- No Split Events: everyone at every level will take on the same courses, unlike like year where A/B racers were on longer routes than C/D for some stages.
- Modified Elite Race Structure: a revamped prize and overall race structure incentivizes hard racing throughout for all elite riders (see below for details).
- Elite Races Broadcast by GCN: this is the big time! GCN has 3.6 million followers on YouTube. Smile for the camera!
Community Races
Stage Details
This year, Zwift Games is an escalating challenge! Stages get progressively more difficult, with each route longer and more climby than the one before:
Stage 1, March 3-6: Sprint
- Makuri Madness (16.1km, 88m elevation)
- Aero Boost powerup at start
- Sign up at zwift.com/events/tag/zwiftgames2025stage1 >
Stage 2, March 7-9: Sprint
- Scotland Smash (18.1km, 167m elevation)
- Draft Boost powerup at start
- Sign up at zwift.com/events/tag/zwiftgames2025stage2 >
Stage 3, March 10-13: Climb
- Downtown Eruption (19.9km, 275m elevation)
- Aero Boost powerup at start
- Sign up at zwift.com/events/tag/zwiftgames2025stage3 >
Stage 4, March 14-16: Climb
- London Uprising (20.9km, 357m elevation)
- Aero Boost powerup at start
- Sign up at zwift.com/events/tag/zwiftgames2025stage4 >
Stage 5, March 17-23: Epic
- ZG25 Queen (44.8km, 894m elevation)
- Feather powerup at start
- Sign up at zwift.com/events/tag/zwiftgames2025stage5 >
Make-Up Races: March 24-30
See all upcoming races at zwift.com/events/tag/zwiftgames2025
Standard Race Schedule
The largest Zwift Games fields will be found in the standard (mixed) Community races which will be held hourly, 24x daily, at 10 minutes past the hour. Like recent ZRacing events, these races will alternate each hour between two different Racing Score ranges:
- Range 1: 0-159 | 160-269 | 270-389 | 390-509 | 510-649
- Range 2: 0-209 | 210-329 | 330-449 | 450-569 | 570-699
The two range options give racers a choice between a stronger category that may help them get a faster course time (great for the GC competition) or a slightly weaker category that gives them a better shot at a race win. They also effectively give racers 10 category ranges compared to last year’s 4, which should make for much more competitive racing.
Advanced Race Schedule
Racers with a racing score of 650+ can jump into the Advanced Races held 10-11x daily at 15 minutes past the hour. (These races are open to riders with lower racing scores as well, but be ready to go hard!)
These races happen every two hours on a schedule that shifts by one hour each day, to help riders find a time that fits into their plans. The only timeslots that will not feature advanced races are 17:15, 18:15, and 19:15 UTC.
See Advanced races at zwift.com/events/tag/zwiftgames2025advanced
Women-Only Race Schedule
Women-only community races will be held 5x daily to increase field sizes. These races will use their own Racing Score-based bands: 0-199 | 200-299 | 300-399 | 400-499 | 500+.
If you’re a woman who hasn’t raced yet on Zwift, see our Women’s Racing homepage for a bit of inspiration >
Women-Only Race Times
- 8am UTC/3am ET/12am PT/7pm AEDT
- 12pm UTC/7am ET/4am PT/11pm AEDT
- 5pm UTC/12pm ET/9am PT/4am AEDT
- 6pm UTC/1pm ET/10am PT/5am AEDT
- 12am UTC/7pm EST/4pm PST/11am AEDT
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Notable Rules
There are two noteworthy rules which apply to community and elite racers:
- Neutralized Equipment: like last year’s Games, Zwift has set up all the Zwift Games events so frame and wheel performance is neutralized, just like the Elite races. This means you can ride any road bike frame or wheels from your garage (even the Buffalo or Safety Bike!) and it will perform the same as everyone else’s frames and wheels.
- Steering and Braking Disabled: all riders will be steered automatically, including riders with steering devices such as Zwift Play connected.
New GC Leaderboards
For the first time ever, Zwift Games race results will be delivered via a new section of Zwift’s website! Final results will live here, and not on ZwiftPower.
This new interface includes:
- Global leaderboards for 4 classifications:
- Overall
- Sprint (Stages 1 and 2)
- Climb (Stages 3 and 4)
- Epic (Stage 5)
- Results broken down by stage
- See your filtered ranking by Gender, Racing Score band (buckets of 100), and Country. These filters can be used in combination.
See Community Leaderboards at zwift.com/zwift-games/races
Community Unlocks
A total of four in-game unlocks are available to all Zwifters:
- Any one stage: Oakley Velo Kato Glasses
- Any two stages: Nimble Shoes
- Any three stages: Oakley Velo Mach Helmet
- All five stages: Zwift Games 25 Kit (and if you sign up for the Route Chaser: Zwift Games mini-challenge you’ll also receive a 1000XP bonus for completing all 5 stages)
How to Register
No special registration is required – simply join any Zwift Games event to participate. Registration is live on February 24th, at which time events will be available for signup and we’ll have more info on features like the new web leaderboards.
See all upcoming races at zwift.com/events/tag/zwiftgames2025
See all upcoming Advanced races at zwift.com/events/tag/zwiftgames2025advanced
Elite Championships
Schedule
The world’s best racers have to meet strict criteria to qualify for the Zwift Games Elite Championships. (Final qualifiers are being held on February 22nd, and we will publish the final start lists here once they are shared.)
The Elite Championships will take place on three consecutive Saturdays at 5pm UTC:
- Sprint Championships, March 8
- Stage 1: Makuri Madness (16.1km, 88m elevation)
- Stage 2: Scotland Smash (18.1km, 167m elevation)
- Sprint Showdown: Glasgow Crit Circuit (3.3km, 34m) for the top 5 riders from stages 1+2
- Climb Championships, March 15
- Stage 3: Downtown Eruption (19.9km, 275m elevation)
- Stage 4: London Uprising (20.9km, 357m elevation)
- Climb Showdown: ZG Climb Champs (5km, 156m) for the top 5 riders from stages 3+4
- Epic Championships, March 22
- Stage 5: ZG25 Queen (44.8km, 894m elevation)
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Prizes
Elite men and women will be awarded equal prize purses, making for a total prize purse of $112,700. That’s Zwift’s biggest prize pot ever! Prizes will be awarded thus:
- Per Championship: prize money for the top 3 in the Sprint, Climb, and Epic Championships, plus each championship winner will also receive a Gold Concept Z1 (Tron) bike in game.
- Overall Individual: prize money down to 30th place, and winner receives Gold Concept Z1 (Tron) bike in game.
The overall men’s and women’s first-place winners will be determined by points earned based on finishing positions in each of the 5 stages. Each race awards 70 points to 1st, 69 points for 2nd, down to 1 point for 70th.
Race Broadcast
The Zwift Games Elite Championships will be broadcast live by GCN on YouTube.
Zwift Games GCN Playlist >
See fan guide, start lists, results, and more at zwiftgames.com/elite >
Questions or Comments?
Share below!
Does that mean results won’t appear at all on zwiftpower?
I’m all for a new web results to replace zwiftpower but please zwift make sure the basic results are still posted to zwiftpower until such time as you can convert all races to whatever the long term replacement is
My guess is we’ll still see them on ZwiftPower, since they’re on the public calendar as races.
Exactly what I was thinking.
I love these races with neutralized equipment. I’m gonna do them all on the atomic cruiser. The Big Spin is also coming soon, right?
Yes, Big Spin is in March too.
If only there was a penny farthing 😂
If the Big Spin promo images Zwift has been posting on Strava are any indication, there might be one soon.
It’s funny though. I just got the email about unlocking the Shimano C50 group set. In that email it says “time to put your upgraded gear to the test in the Zwift games”. Think someone didn’t get the memo 😂
LOL. Fixed!
Any chance of a few more time slots for the ‘Advanced’ races? Most of us are old Cat B’s and there it’s very frustrating not having and races at convenient times
Ditto. I haven’t done a zrace since December because the new bands make it impossible.
Exactly!
I’m glad I’m not alone. Racing on Zwift is my favorite part of the platform in the winter. It’s like a reward for all the heat training and long slow rides I do. Now I can’t race because there’s only a few time slots throughout the day. I would have to race at 3:15am to participate. I would be stoked if they at least rotated the times. 3:15am Monday, 4:15am Tuesday etc. then they could keep field sizes bigger and not lock out people that love racing.
zwift in their lame attempt to be inclusive have worked it for many to miss out. i also feel your frustrations.
It’s doing exactly what it was meant to do. It increases pen size. On a Monday you might have still been ok joining at most times. On Tuesdays and Wednesdays you’d see a sharp fall off. The new system is more limiting and you have to plan around it but even on a Wednesday/Thursday I never had fewer than 20 people in the race … Almost unheard of before the change. Maybe redistribute the races a bit but please don’t add more slots per day. In my view it’s working well.
Who races on a Monday?
For the weekly Zwift races: I’d say most people. I wouldn’t be surprised if you could fit an almost perfect exponential decay graph to it. Highest number on Monday, less on Tuesday, even less on Wednesday, … hardly anyone was doing them on Fri, Sat, Sun. The weekend is usually taken up by other popular race series. Some things which could distort this was when there was live coverage on youtube for a particular race … that would attract a lot of attention.
So, for the ELITE races, the last qualifier on Feb 22th, is it still open to everyone? how can I register to that? Is it a open race on Zwift? Thanks
I’d be curious to know that too. Anyone have any info?
Is that advance race schedule right? Hourly races during the middle of day when USA time zones are at work, and nothing earlier or reasonable in the evening. I’m in mountain time with a score of ~710, and I haven’t raced anything but ZRL since December because I’m locked out by the new scoring bands.
It is right. And yes, it is also terrible.
My guess is that the 4th timeslot is listed incorrectly. If you go by the listed AEDT time (11:15 am), it would be 12:15pm UST/7:15am EST/4:15 PST for the other time zones, providing an actual early morning option for many riders in the Americas.
Fixed above!
Same issue here in the UK. Cant do the zracing anymore as they arent at convenient times either during the working day or when kids are going to school, having dinner or going to bed. Very disappointed with the ‘improved’ racing bands and that I am now not likely to be able to race the zwift games
Today Zwift added a new advanced time at 2:15am UTC, FYI.
Argh – an eight hour gap between advanced races every morning?!? What are they thinking?!
Whoever culled the less populated races clearly wasn’t talking to the person in charge of event scheduling.
It was the same guy. But he seems to think that only super elite racers could be over 700, and they apparently all must live in Europe
Yeah Zwift clearly.dont understand that their highly flawed ZRS system means that we’ll soon ALL be 650+ as scores constantly go up regardless.of how poorly you do, and I’ve never even once had my score go down, not even when I finished 50th and over 3mins behind the front group whilst doing my very best!
Any system that ranks you higher on EVERY result regardless of performance is faulty!
ZRS definitely does not just rank you higher every race. Just look at the results sheet and you’ll see plenty of down arrows.
Well this looks very exciting, and I love these big events on Zwift, but … a few things I don’t like (probably just me):
Yes, community GC will be time-based. I understand your complaint, but the alternative (points races) isn’t any better, IMO. If you can race in a small field and get first, should you get the same points as someone who races in a field 2-3x larger/more competitive?
The best alternative would be an equivalent to Zwiftpower Racing Points, or Zwiftracing.app Ranking Points.
So points, but they scale with the strength of field
Well the only alternative is that I race at 4am, which isn’t going to happen. It works for Tiny Races! 😜
Or if they ran some dedicated ‘series’ races at specific times (suitable for various time zones) where if you entered e.g the 19:00 races you were part of that points series (and you couldn’t enter later stages in that series event unless you’d entered all the earlier ones at that time) that would solve this problem, as you’d all be racing the same cohort each time?
UPDATE: This week in the Shimano series (Jurassic Coast) on average UTC evening time slots (e.g. UTC 18:00 with 100+ rider) have a winning time that is ~1 minute faster (220-330 ZRS cat) than the UTC morning time slots’ (e.g. UTC 7:00 with ~40 riders) winning times. The winners across both time slots appear to have a similar range of w/kg (high 2s, low 3s).
Surely Zwift has enough data to create an adjusted time for everyone that takes into account the number of riders in a race and the average draft benefit. They literally have all the draft data … and millions of rides to base this adjustment factor on. Alternatively (or additionally) they could use effort/intensity data similar to that in strava, if they want to make sure riders in smaller population races deserve a better GC.
I just think the GC system is ridiculously simplistic.
I like the Black jersey from last year. It’s on my top ten list.
It sounds like a big month of Zwift Madness.
Zwift swag details soon. Yeah!
LOL. Fixed!
So no ZRacing in March I guess ?
That is my understanding.
Last year, Zwift Games showed the big failing of Category Enforcement in pen D at least, when Andre Jones didn’t get a pen promotion because his FTP was under 150W and denied Petr Sliva.
This year, unless there are major changes to Racing Score before Zwift Games starts, it will be even worse.
The 85% seed score floor has to go and be replaced with 100% seed score, so many racers are at or near their floor and allowing many to race in a lower pen.
The scoring system is flawed, finishing well in a large ~100 field gives less points than the same position against just one other racer… There’s been suggestions that being the only finisher in a pen gives points!
Point changes don’t just look at how many finished in a pen, it looks at the number of signups, more signups means lower score changes!
Etc.
…also it never seems to reduce your score.if you are.performing badly in your new ZRS band, so we’ll all be heading for.650+ scores the way it’s going!
My ZRS went down from (initially) 609 to 380 and now back up to a (more realistic) 438, so numbers do go down…
I hope they add more womens race times. Its not good for north american evening racers.
I’ll have to ride on the weekend.
I wish I could still qualify for the Elite races, but there was no news how to do so. Clear and early communication would have been nice. I can’t find the event for February 22.
Last year’s was good fun and this year sounds like an improvement too – great that we can compete for community championships in the sub categories of sprint, climb and epic as well as overall. Guessing you need to stay within a set Racing Score range to achieve a GC ranking, as it wouldn’t make sense for it to be an overall GC across all ranges?
Actually, everyone is dumped into one giant leaderboard table based on your best time for each stage. Then we will be able to filter that table based on age, country, gender, racing score as we wish…
These are all scratch races, right?
Yes.
@Eric Schlange don’t want to be dirty in the text with 69 LMAO
Unfortunately all, except last one, extremely short. More 30+km routes/races please… Short ones are not worth getting on bike for, and 2x 30m races isn’t the same as an one hour race… (Apart from severe lack of available of A races nowadays!)
It’s because the Zracing series are aiming at the “one hour” crowd. 10-15min warm-up, 35-40min race, 10min CD.
I agree though, it would be múch better if at least 1 race per month would be longer and on a more difficult parcours. A 1h15 race is an entirely different beast then a 40min one. I would also love it if Zwift did more custom finishes like on top of a KoM or at a sprint banner instead specifically doing a full lap… it would open up a lot more possible routes rather then recycling the same old 10 routes time and time again.
Custom finish at a sprint banner, OK, but please noooo to atop a KOM! 😭😂
What are these games? I read the article but there isn’t an explanation anywhere as to what this is. It only speaks to changes from last year.
At the elite level it’s a race series with prize money. For everyone else it’s a slightly reformatted version of the monthly zRacing series, with extra kit unlocks.
With a ridiculously too long final stage for most in pens D and E…
~45Km and ~895m climbing will put many off in lower pens. Who wants the agony of ~2+ hours on a turbo?
Lots of people are doing it with FRR, so the answer is probably “more than just a few”
What’s the story with coffee doping? Will it be disabled please?
Where does Zwift stand on gender? Do you need to be biologically a female or can you just identify as one? Thinking the purse might be easier on the female side.
Asking for a friend.
I’m quite happy to see them neutralize the equipment to level the playing field They’re also going to be kicking out cheaters, people on terrible trainers, and weight dopers right?????????????
In terms of the leaderboard can you compete in different ZRS split events (i.e. the womens race for stage 1, range 1 for stage 2 and range 2 for stage 3) or do you have to stick to the same range or event for each stage to appear on the leaderboard? Thanks
You can compete in whatever events you wish. It makes for interesting strategy – do you compete in a group with stronger riders in hopes of getting a faster overall time for the GC? Or in a weaker group in hopes of making the podium?
Yes, I was thinking about this strategy to somehow overcome the timezone GC handicap … but now that you’ve told everyone!!!!!
What about those who race WTRL? Am I correct in thinking, those races are not having an effect on race score? If so, there’s potential for those riders to hoover up everything 😬
It will be a great shame if the results can not be filtered by age group like in Zwift Power. When you get to 70+ and 80+ competing against younger age groups is a different ball game, so it’s much more motivating to see where you stand against your contemporaries.
None of the links are working for me. Do I need to sign up or just be there before the race starts on Zwift?
Eric do you use steering in other races or your regular rides ? I ask because only TT are no steering. Sometimes I wonder if I should not use steering like most everybody . But its a nice feature to have and use . Plus its not free , we pay for it . Because I see in the races starting 3/3 no steering . Plus all bikes are the same ?
Yes, I use steering all the time. Especially fun in races with lots of turns. It’s a bummer that Zwift Games is disallowing steering, IMO…
Hi, will it be possible to ride one route multiple times?
If so, can I ride once in Range 1 and second attempt in Range 2?
Yes!
I think a lot of riders didn’t read the description and burned their aero boost right before the first sprint banner, even while in the middle of the pack.
Ride smarter, not harder.
Last year, they had team standings for Zwift games. Will we see the results aggregated by team this year?
No, not on the community side at least. You can see what filters we have here: https://www.zwift.com/zwift-games/races
Any idea why they don’t offer an “Age” filter?
The “special” table released for Zwift Games shows all racers that finish, albeit the Racing Score filter doesn’t work correctly.
The table includes everyone DQed at zwiftpower, at least for lack of heart rate monitor or height flag.
ZwiftPower has nothing to do with Zwift Games, as I understand it. Use it if you’d like, but the results are at https://www.zwift.com/zwift-games/races/
Any idea when they fix the filtering by racing score in the new results page? There are people waaaay up a category being shown as leaders in the lower one. For example he new score page shows a guy as 193 RS and in reality he has 364 and it’s not one – it’s most of the results are like that
Seems to be working correctly for me. The scores shown at https://www.zwift.com/zwift-games/races/results/sprint are the results they earned at the end of the race, not their current racing score. So it would make sense that some riders would have a lower score shown there, but their current score could be higher…
I see the rider you’re referring to, I think (https://zwiftpower.com/profile.php?z=3485585).
Looks like he got a seed score upgrade in that race (see results https://www.zwift.com/events/view/4857242/6146658). Odd that the boosted score of 364 isn’t being shown in the leaderboard… I do think that’s something that needs fixing. Reported to Zwift.
But here’s the thing – now that he’s up at 364, his results for future Zwift Games events won’t show up in that 100-200 score filter (assuming it’s working properly). So at least as the Games go on, this shouldn’t be an issue. But we’ll see how it unfolds…
Not just him most are not showing proper score. And if they got an upgrade they need to be moved to their bracket anyway. Yes, I also hope that after stage two the results would clear, but if this bug persists it can be easily exploited on race 5.
And to dig into this deeper – that rider in question actually entered into the 330-450 range, even though his starting score was much lower. So he didn’t cheat in any way… it’s just that the Zwift Games leaderboards filter based on your actual result, in bands of 100…
My Zwift internal contact tells me “Seed score updates do not appear in the Zwift Games rankings. We save the score for the results right after the race, not after the activity.” So that makes sense…
I do not accuse of cheating, only that the score system is not working properly. That comment by Zwift does seem to be how the system actually works. I wish it stayed on ZwiftPower where it always updated properly
Hi there!!
Does anybody know how the Sprint and/or Climb leaderboards work?
Thanks!
Sprint leaderboard is active, but the climb one won’t be active until Stage 3 starts
Alright! Does that mean that there will be sprint sections in the middle of the race like in ZRL?
Thanks!
No intermediate segments in Zwift games… not for community races, at least.
Sprint leaderboard will combine stages 1+2, Climb will combine stages 3+4.
“No special registration is required – simply join any Zwift Games event to participate” — This does not seem to be the case. I posted about it here https://forums.zwift.com/t/zwift-games-march-2025/649295/74 and also sent Zwift a support request (which has not been answered). It seems that a registration via the client was needed prior to participating in the first event.
Nah, that’s just a bug Zwift is fixing (or maybe has fixed, by the time I post this?)
I just now got a reply from the 4th Tech Support Specialist at Zwift with no resolution so far.
After getting caught out with the hill near the end of stage one, by not looking at the course beforehand, I took a gander at Scotland Smash before riding this time. Why is it advertised as 1 lap when it’s not? It’s two laps of a circuit that bear no resemblance to the course layout I looked at on insider. Bit miffed tbh.
Would be great if results were also categorised by age group. I’m 67 and realistically cannot compete with the vast majority of riders but in an age category I would have a much more realistic idea of how competitive or uncompetitive I am. Currently I rank 38064 out of 39944 which is kind of depressing.
Do we get badges for those routes?
I did the firts 3 stages but i don’t have the badges ou my companion.
Yes. Check your badge list in game…
Just a word of warning (I found out on Tuesday the hard way) neutralized doesn’t mean that bikes that can’t do something normally can do it in one of these rides. I road the Scotland race on the BMX bandit and had a good time freaking people (who obviously didn’t read the bit about neutralized bikes) out as I passed them up corkscrew climb. Tried it again on the Downtown Eruption and discovered to my dismay that, like any flat bar bike, it can’t supertuck. That was a painful learning experience.
Question.. can we ride stages on demand/free ride? or do I have to be riding it in an official event? Thx
This is a race series, so to complete the stages you have to ride the events.
Would be cool if Zwift Games organisers gave silver & bronze Tron bikes to 2nd & 3rd respectively.
Eric, can women race any race and be on the women’s ranking or just women’s only races count?
I believe the women’s ranking aren’t based on what race you enter, but just your gender. So a woman could race a mixed gender event, while another races a women-only event, and both would be ranked together.