What if in parallel to PowerUps, our worst nightmares came true and there were PowerDowns in Zwift?
The closest thing to a PowerDown we currently have in the game is if you misuse the Anvil powerup in a climb, making you 50kg heavier for 30 eternal seconds. If you don’t believe me you can ask Edu, my former Jerbos teammate, who is still having nightmares about the day he mistakenly activated the Anvil at 9% gradient in Box Hill while he was Top 10 in a ZRL race. Dropped to 25th in a few seconds:
Imagine PowerDowns are randomly assigned and triggered during a race. I have already seen some violent spontaneous reactions when not assigned the optimal powerup. Imagine if you were assigned the worst PowerDown?
Can you imagine the riders next to you accelerating when they see you have been cursed with a PowerDown? How cruel would that be?
Here is my list of 11 nasty imaginary PowerDowns (plus one bonus extra).
#1: No Pedal
Your clip-in pedals disappear, you cannot push on them as you normally would, 25% less power for 10 seconds.
The irony, of course, is that none of our in-game bikes have ever had pedals…
#2: Inflation
Additional 5% gradient for 15 seconds.
It could bring you up to 23% on NYC KOM. Too bad if you are a heavy rider. Have fun!
#3: Wind Blower
Within the pack or not, your draft disappears and you have a 60km/h headwind for 15 seconds.
Don’t complain, your Zwift avatar is just experiencing the feel of the four massive fans you have in your indoor setup.
#4: Quicksand
Rolling resistance x4 for 30 seconds.
By chance you are on a gravel bike? Then you are safe. If not, you are going to be swallowed and digested by the dirty road faster than Homer Simpson with a donut.
#5: The Torque
Your cadence is limited to 60 RPM for 30 seconds.
No matter if you spin faster, it does not take it into account. You’d better shift those gears to the highest development if you don’t want to be dropped.
#6: The Spinner
The trainer difficulty is set at 20% for 30 seconds.
Now you need to increase your cadence big time in order to produce the same amount of watts. HR spike guaranteed!
#7: Cruise Control
Speed limitation at 35km/h for 20 seconds.
You are on a hill? No problem. (Unless you are racing with Pogacar the probability your competitors are above 35 km/h is minimal.) You are riding Greatest London Flat? Say a prayer and prepare yourself to sprint to rejoin the pack.
#8: Autopilot
ERG mode is blocked at whatever power you are for 15 seconds.
It is really like flipping a coin. It can go utterly crazy. If you were in the middle of a huge effort you would need to burn tons of watts. If you were supertucking or at 90w, prepare yourself to be dropped.
#9: The Fall
You lose 10 positions.
That would be quite OK if you are at the front or middle of a big pack. But if you were hiding yourself at back, tail gunning and trying to benefit from the draft to the most extent… you have a problem. You might just fall next to the guy who forgot to start and is still in the pen!
#10 No friends
This is kind of a reverse ghost power down. All other riders disappear for a minute.
You don’t know what is going on. Has someone attacked, has the pack accelerated? You have no friends, exactly like IRL.
#11: The Loop
Double U-turn. The notion of uselessness brought to the maximum level.
As you do your double U-turn, you come back to the exact same place you were 5 seconds ago and the pack is gone. AAAARRRRGGGHHH!
#12 Bonus Extra Nasty Power down: Stop & Go
Like a Formula One pit stop, your avatar decelerates and stops. You need to start as if you were in the pen.
Do this to me in the middle of an intense effort and I might implode into a million pieces of frustration. There is nothing worse for me than stopping when I’m flowing!
Your Ideas
Got ideas for painful PowerDowns? Share them below!
Absolutely brilliant idea for racers.
But you forgot “The Dreaded Knock”. No power output for 5 seconds as you take a gell to recover.
I would love to see these come into effect on Zwift.
Imagine if you could pass it on to someone else randomly in the pack. Ouch. 😮
Hahahah. You can throw power downs to others,
!
It s zwift, not Mario kart 🙂
I took out a part where I was mentioning Mario Kart! Banana slipping!
I’ve seen people using #11 doing donuts!
How about “The Parachute” with a small drag chute opening up behind you
Nice! I would definitely send you a trash talking message through the chat to increase your frustration!
well that’s kinda the anvil effect
There’s an option to throw away the power-up, so negative powerups wouldn’t really impact anyone unless they didn’t realise and hit the button to activate.
To have them randomly triggered would simply put people off racing and the backlash on Zwift would be big. Imagine being in the top pack and then one of these drops you out of the race. A fun idea in theory but not for competitive racing.
how would it be to be able to throw these power downs at other racers..? Think red shell in Mario Kart.
We all thought the same
! Banana!
Love it. You missed one, though – the flat tire. Costs you two full minutes.
1 minute if you are on rim brakes, two if you are on disc brakes hahahahahahaha. Wonderful!!!
Well…no ! Anything having as a result to make me loose all the precious efforts I gave would be a good reason to quit Zwift. No way I will ever enjoy a game where an arbitrary or random thing as those power downs could make me get dropped. I would not mind if it wasn’t too hard to get back into the pack after, say, a 5 sec gap, but most of the time it just needs for too much watts to come back into the peloton (especialy with double-draft activated).
OMG!!! I laughed all article long… seriously, that has to remain a joke… would be awful 🤬🤬🤬
If one day Zwift creates those, I will need to hide in a bunker for the rest of my life.
Please … DO NOT GIVE ZWIFT ANY IDEAS!!! It’s hard enough holding the wheels of 60 yr-old zpower riders pulling everyone along at 6w/kg.
the “Sneaky Seat Grab” for 10 seconds you require no power output to maintain the same speed of one rider you are drafting. said rider loses 100 watts while you are holding their seat.
Mouhahahahahaha! Utterly cruel but sooooooo goood. MOuhahahahahahah! Love it!!!!
What about “The Cardboard”
Makes you,your entire team and one or two other random teams hit the tarmac and have to catch back on injured.
Too soon?
Hahahahahaha. I would call it the Bernal then (ie yesterdays accident hitting a bus)
Nice one Luciano!!
How about The Garmin……suddenly every record of your ride disappears for eternity…….
If Zwift touches any of my data there is a high likelihood I become violent. I mean really violent 😂
How about a “Bjarne Riis”. Your bike is thrown in a ditch.
😂😂😂
Stop and Go should just be renamed ‘Puncture!’
Should have a Pile Up Power Down – which makes you and nearest riders around you Stop for 10 seconds too! How evil hahaha
Hahahahaha. A burrito power down on the power. Interesting
I love the idea of a PowerDown race (but let’s keep it short) where EVERYONE gets a random PowerDown at some point. I wouldn’t race it all the time, but it would be fun. Sure would make the live stream interesting…
I would race that. Make the last several kilometers off limits so everyone has the chance to recover for the finish, but you have to be ready to react at any time before that.
The Inverse – your gradient is inverted. A 5% climb is now a 5% downhill or vice versa until there is a +/-2% change. Use on a flat at your own risk!
Nervous Breakdown guaranteed!!!
How about The Signal Drop, The Swerving Rider(s), and The Flickering Peloton?
Oh wait…
Power transfer = 20% of power you produce will be transfered to five nearest competitors or team mates for 15 sec.
Here is also tactical element for teams to use.
Follow the right guy!
Funny you should mention the Anvil. Seems like multiple timezones in zrl had that experience on Box hill. First time I encountered the Anvil., luckily racing in front group of 5, last rider sitting on the wheel. and then the mistake to overwrite them all. 6. rider used the anvil- and we left her in the dust. Awesome race 😉 lol – Happy to learn from others mistakes
The mistakes of others are always the funniest way to learn. !!!
There are some more realistic IRL power downs — flat, missed shift/dropped chain, stuck brakes….
We could have another burrito… Bad burrito … food poisoning reduces your power by 50%.
Dropped chain. Unfortunately, got that power down without Zwift’s assistance a few times. 🙁
The Dumoulin! Your character will jump off the bike for a number 2!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Difficult to implement thouh.
What no banana…na…na…na…
Or
The 1 in a million end of the world … Snap half the race participants get dropped Xanos approves
How about “The Lance”, allows you to cheat during a race and apparently win, only to be stripped of your ill gotten glory even after years of lying about it.
I think rather than them being randomly triggered which would make racing too much of a lottery it could work if you were given a short time, maybe only 2-3 minutes to activate them so you’d have the opportunity to minimise the damage that they would inflict and if the timer runs out then they are automatically deployed
I like it! So you need to tactivcally manage the PowerDown. So the same way we look for PU optimization, we would look for PD mitigation… that’s really a good idea
Hey missing one power down.. do not forget next time for Power Downs VOL 2 ! 🙂
Late to the party here…the overheat power up. Turns off all fans in the pain cave for 1 minute. Probably only works with the Wahoo Kick’R headwind.
I need this ingame asap
Most would be buggers except The Torque as my cadence is under 60 rpm anyway – IRL and in the virtual world! They’ll probably have a high cadence penalty for me!