How to Lead A Zwift Group Ride – Friday Pacific Sprintapalooza

June 8, 2021

LAST UPDATED March 14, 2023

Group events are the beating heart of Zwift, and while some of these events are leaderless, many are led by volunteers.

Over the years I’ve taken part in hundreds of group rides (on Zwift and IRL), and I’ve led my fair share as well. I’ve seen the full spectrum of leadership along the way: upbeat leaders and Negative Nellys, experienced leaders and rookies, those who make the experience smooth and enjoyable and those who make me want to click “Quit Event”.

The crazy thing is, some of those rookie leaders were pro riders! Yep. Being an expert cyclist doesn’t make you a good Zwift ride leader.

There’s not much guidance available online for Zwifters who are just starting out as ride leaders – it’s not a large demographic, after all. So I thought a quick video and post may prove helpful to some.

But first, I want to answer the “elephant in the room” question and offer a disclaimer…

Starting Your Own Group Ride

This article isn’t about “How to get your group ride on Zwift” – that is, how to organize an event that shows up on Zwift’s event calendar. That’s another topic entirely. It’s also a question I see often, so I’ll offer some quick guidance…

If you’re part of an established Zwift team that is already hosting events, you stand a good chance of being able to create a new group ride, as long as your team leaders support your ride idea and it has a unique selling proposition such as:

being held at a time when other rides aren’t held
having a unique (or popular) ride structure
offering the possibility of attracting new Zwifters to the platform, or getting those “lone wolf” Zwifters to take part in group events

If you’re not part of an established team, you’ll probably only get your group ride on the calendar if you’re connected to a brand Zwift wants to work with.

In summary: with hundreds of events happening every day, Zwift is far from desperate for more group rides. If you want your ride to happen, you’ll need to sell it to Zwift! (And if you can’t do that, you’ll need to settle for hosting a Meetup or Club Event. Luckily, many of the tips in this video apply to Meetups and Club Events as well.)

Disclaimer

The video below contains my advice for leading group rides on Zwift, and it’s delivered in the context of a particular ride I lead: the Friday Pacific Sprintapalooza. We’ve also got an article with ride leading tips from well-known community ride leader Tim “Bacon” Searle if you’d like to check that out.

Every group ride is unique, and every ride leader has their way of doing things. It’s impossible to exhaustively cover the topic of Zwift ride leading in one short video, so I tried to keep things fairly high-level and applicable to all group rides.

Watch the Video: How to Lead Group Rides in Zwift

Some of the topics addressed in the video:

Set the Stage: join the pens early, message riders a bit, then message at the start of the ride to set expectations. You’ll always have people there who are first-timers, and it’s entirely possible that they joined without reading the event’s details. Make sure everyone is on the same page.
Dealing with Flyers (4:49): despite your event’s well-written description, people will join the ride and fly off the front of the group. This may or may not be a big deal, depending on the structure of your ride. Have a “flyer plan” before your ride begins. Do you let them go without saying a thing? Give them a bit of good-natured ribbing then ignore them (usually my approach)? Or ceaselessly badger them (and the rest of your group)?
Banter Level: how much text message banter do you want in your event? And what sort of tone do you want that banter to take? As the leader, you set the tone, and your messages prompt responses and discussion. So think before you type!
Heads Up at Pinch Points: if your ride is going to change pace, be sure to warn people beforehand and just before it happens. This is super-important on a ride like Sprintapalooza, where we go from social pace to all-out sprinting several times throughout the event. Again, it’s about setting expectations and meeting them.
Keep It Positive: offer congratulations to anyone and everyone you can. Build others up, keep it positive, and others on the ride will do the same.
Give Ride Ons (10:22): part of encouraging your riders is giving Ride Ons to as many participants as possible. Zwift makes this easy with the Companion App, which you can tap every few seconds to give Ride Ons to nearby riders.
Beware “Gapping the Beacon” (12:13): this awkward situation can easily happen in a fenced ride. I offer a few tips to avoid it.
Greet Newcomers (13:02): let first-timers know you’re happy to see them! See the video for a quick trick that makes this easy.
Ride-End Housekeeping: don’t be surprised by the ride ending! Message your group before things end, and have a plan for anything else you need to handle before your event wraps up and you sign off.