Zwift has been tweaking and testing Pace Partners for the past few months, and this Monday they officially graduate out of the FutureWorks program.
The graduation includes some special events, plus a completely fresh set of Pace Partners. Let’s dive into the details!
Graduation Events
Zwift is hosting two different types of events to celebrate the Pace Partners’ graduation.
- Trivia Rides (ending today): 45-minute events on Wandering Flats in which the Pace Partners ask cycling trivia questions, then answer them after a bit of a wait
- Graduation Ceremony Rides (Saturday and Sunday): these 45-minute events on Tick Tock will include several Pace Partners, each riding at their own pace. Find a group going your speed and enjoy the ride!
See upcoming Pace Partner events at zwift.com/events/tag/pacepartners
Cycling Pace Partners
A new set of Pace Partners is being launched now that the feature is moving out of FutureWorks. These Pace Partners will be live from Monday, September 6 onwards.
All of the Pace Partners will now weigh 75kg and be 175cm tall. They will use dynamic pacing, increasing power by up to 10% uphill and decreasing up to 20% when descending.
Pace Partners only have first names now, and only “Coco” remains from the original set of Pace Partners. Here’s the new list of Pace Partners, sorted by pace:
- Taylor – 1.1 W/kg
- Bernie – 1.5 W/kg
- Miguel – 1.8 W/kg
- Maria – 2.2 W/kg
- Coco – 2.6 W/kg
- Yumi – 2.9 W/kg
- Jacques – 3.2 W/kg
- Genie – 3.7 W/kg
- Constance – 4.2 W/kg
Routes
Pace Partners will ride the following routes, changing every Monday at 0700 UTC.
Watopia Routes:
Running Pace Partners
A new set of 11 Running Pace Partners will also be spun up for graduation:
- Billy – 6.0 kph
- Louis – 6.7 kph
- Maggie – 7.5 kph
- Dean – 8.0 kph
- Lizzy – 8.6 kph
- Roger – 9.2 kph
- Audrey – 10.0 kph
- Jesse – 10.9 kph
- Kat – 12.0 kph
- Carl – 13.3 kph
- Joan – 15 kph
They will run on the following routes, rotating weekly:
Questions or Comments?
Post below!
I hope they bring back the AdZ 1 hour pace partner.
Hoping to do this periodically
When will they add drop multiplier for run pace partners
We would need a drop shop for running before we could start talking about multipliers…!
This is just sad. Me and Eddy were becoming quite good friends and now he’s been fired. And Dottie was always good for a brisk ride up the volcano. It’s sad to see them put out to pasture. They didn’t even get their Tron bikes! Eddy is probably so miffed he’ll start riding at RGT.
Eddy tried really hard. He even turned up to Watopia for a couple of weeks doing 3.0 but I think him and Coco had a bit of a falling out after he tried to show off a bit too much.
Oh noooooo … a big big friendship will come to an end soon … R.I.P. my best buddy DIESEL … I will miss you sooo hard after 2 years with round about 200 rides of 37 minutes
Diesel wasn’t meeting emission standards…
This is cool, but I wonder how challenging it will be on ATV to select the pace partner you want? Currently almost unusable. I wonder if ATV interface ever be updated? Very frustrating for sure.
It already has updated…. Very easy to select race partners now
Update: After reaching out to Zwift their response is that there is no timetable for updating the Apple TV Zwift App. Zwift suggested using the Apple TV Remote iPhone App as a workaround.
Have they fixed the ordering of pace partners in the main UI? Presently they order it based on current actual wkg, or sometimes it’s just purely random I believe. They should be listed based on their designated pace.
It should show their “current” w/kg and be in order based on that. In the future it will be done on average.
R.I.P. Diesel , you will be missed.. At least the Cadence crew will only have to adjust their name now..
Great to see more options, though in my humble opinion they should adjust the gaps. Going from Genie at 3.7 W/kg (to 4.07 up hills) to Constance – 4.2 W/kg (up to 4.62 up hill) is quite a jump
Genie and Constance are already a closer space from the original four – used to go from 3.2 to 4.0. Genie is pretty much exactly the same as Anquetil used to be up hills, but is far more relaxed on the flat. Which I am not a huge fan of, as I found Anquetil not too bad to ride with on the flat but a challenge on the hills. The pace partners aren’t supposed to be for absolutely everyone to be able to ride right on their limit – but I think this spacing should be able to give most… Read more »
Brevet was 3.3, Anquetil 4.2 (flat pace).
Eddy was sadly very underused – barely ever had anything with him (albeit in Makuri – would generally have about 400 daily, with Coco over 6k in the winter). I’ll keep an eye out for feedback and potentially make adjustments/additions in the future.
Hi James, in my opinion Taylor (1,1W) is slow enough for fresh beginners or for coming back after Covid or surgeries aaand also for cooldowns after finishing brutal races like Erics Tiny Series 🙈.
The smaller gaps between the other RoboPacers look good, also the offered routes.
One feedback I can already give you at once. I think that Diesel has a big big fanbase (similar to Coco … not Cadence 😉) … so keeping “Diesel” (and not Bernie) at 1,5W would be an awesome adjustment for many of us … I hope for many likes/subsribers for my request 😎
oh yeah you‘re right Carsten 🙂 … I already miss Diesel so much 🥺
Love it! Great to see that there will be Yumi at 2.9 W/kg. I was concerned there would not be a pace partner between Coco at 2.6 W/kg and Jacques at 3.2 W/kg. Yumi I think will help many, including myself, in their attempt to bridge up from being a category C rider to being a category B rider.
Any idea on how the Pace Partner route sel tip / rotation will work?
Where will we be able to see the rotation calendar as we do on Zwiftinsider for the partner world calendar?
I’m glad they kept Coco. Everyone likes her
good stuff. love the name changes. still not a fan of dynamic pacing but its alright i guess
First ride with Miguel this morning. Thought it would be a challenge riding an average 1.8wkg as I am 60.5kg. My ave wkg was just under 1.8, expected it to be closer to 2.0. Also lost (dropped) Miguel after about 15mins. finished the ride at 30mins and rejoined Miguel. Stayed with Miguel until I was sent up Titans Grove when everyone else went straight on. Positive was that I equalled my PR on Titans Grove KOM.
Oops, looks like the activity sync to Strava not fully working yet “1:23 PM on Monday, September 5, 2022 Zwift – Pace Partner Ride: Wandering Flats in Makuri Islands with”
Hope to see an international representation of PP; particularly a Canadian, Dutch and others forming a fair chunk of rider community. Thanks
RIP Brevet, always good # of riders with you, and now only 1 B bot, that is a real drag, nice step backwards 🙁 Should have had a 3.4 and a 3.8. Feels like they are trying to stuff Makuri Island down our throats. The PP rider count was always significantly lower compared to Watopia, there is a reason why. That whole world is significantly over-hyped – actually that is all it is – hype, I tend to avoid it. Ex: Coco in Watopia: 124 riders, Coco in Makuri: 40. On top of it, running clones of bots will dilute… Read more »
One big reason Makuri Island bots see lower participation is because AppleTV users don’t have access to them most days. This should change in the next month or so as the new UI rolls out to everyone who doesn’t have it yet…
I am a big fan of the dynamic pacing. It feels much more realistic. If you want to fine tune the difficulty of a pace partner ride, you can ride a slower bike. The steel bike requires approximately (+0.1W/kg), gravel bike (+0.3W/kg), and MTB (+0.5W/kg).
It will be a nice addition if we are able to see the current routes for pace partners without actually having to log in into the game (maybe in Companion or maybe zwift insider page?)
Bowie was my best friend! 🙁
Do you think they will introduce more pace partners?. I would love some in-between the numbers of the current ones. the jump from one to the next is too big for me.