In the past few weeks, Zwift staffers have been doing a lot of experimenting with Pace Partners on Watopia and Makuri Islands. And they’re not done yet!
First, it was announced that Pace Partners would be removed from Makuri Islands altogether, and new Pace Partners would be added to Watopia. Then the decision to remove Pace Partners from Makuri Islands was reversed, partly because many Zwifters said they liked the smaller Pace Partner groups on Makuri Islands.
If you have access to the new homescreen UI, here’s what you’ll see for Pace Partners as of today:
That’s right – after 1.5 years with just 4 Pace Partners, we suddenly have 11!
James Bailey (a top-notch human who now works at Zwift but was a longtime Zwifter and event organizer before that) posted these details on the Zwift Riders Facebook page a few days ago:
Just a short update to let you know what routes are coming up next week.
Watopia
Anquetil (4.2) – Watopia’s Waistband
Brevet (3.3) – Big Foot Hills
Coco (2.5) – Ocean Lava Cliffside Loop
Danny (2.15) – Hilly Route
Diego (1.8 ) – Figure 8
Diesel (1.5) – Flat Route
Dorothy (1.15) – Volcano Circuit
Makuri
Bernadette (3.8 ) – Wandering Flats
Charlie (3.0) – Flatland Loop
Denise (2.0) – Neon Flats
Eddy (1.0) – Sprinter’s Playground
We’re also adding dynamic pacing to ALL Pace Partners. This will mean that they put out 10% MORE power when the gradient is equal to or more than 3%. They will put out 20% LESS power when the gradient is equal to or more than -3%.
A few noteworthy things about James’ post:
- We’ve got lots of new Pace Partners, mostly in the lower paces where Zwift says the largest portion of free riding is done in game.
- Lots of fresh routes are being used which have never been trod by Pace Partners in the past.
- Dynamic pacing has now rolled out to all Pace Partners, making the group ride experience over climbs and descents more realistic and natural.
- It’s refreshing to see Zwift staff posting directly to Facebook groups again. Feels like the good ol’ days!
Along with the fun Pace Partner updates above, there are a handful of “gotchas” worth mentioning when it comes to Zwift’s Pace Partners as of today. Plus a fun new challenge!
Home Screen Gotcha
If you aren’t yet seeing the new homescreen (it’s still rolling out to iOS, Android, and AppleTV users) you will only be able to see the list of Makuri Islands Pace Partners on days when the Makuri Islands world is part of the guest map rotation schedule.
Disjoined Joins
Some Zwifters (particularly on iOS, Android, and AppleTV) have complained that when they click to join a Pace Partner, they aren’t placed in the Pace Partner’s group correctly. This is a known bug, and it’s not consistent, so my best advice is to just end your ride and try rejoining the Pace Partner again.
Suspension Bridge Wormhole
This is a fun one. When riding with C. Cadence this morning on the Ocean Lava Cliffside Loop, at a certain spot on the suspension bridge descent all other riders disappeared.
They returned perhaps 20 seconds later. As it turns out, this happens on every lap in the same spot!
I checked with James, and this is another known bug Zwift is working on.
Route Badges with Pace Partners
Now that Pace Partners are riding on lots of new routes, some Zwifters have wondered if we earn route badges when riding with Pace Partners. The answer is yes, you do. But only if you join the Pace Partner from the home screen menu! Three gotchas here:
- You’ll only earn the badge if you join a Pace Partner from the home screen. Doing this sets your “route” before you drop into the game, so the game knows to give you the achievement badge when you finish the route. If you just see a Pace Partner while you’re out free riding, then choose to manually turn and stay in that Pace Partner’s group, the game doesn’t know you’ve switched routes and won’t give you credit for the new route, even if you complete it.
- Chances are you won’t be dropped in with the Pace Partner just before the start of the route. You’ll probably be dropped somewhere in the middle (or just after the start if you have bad luck). You have to pass the route start point and ride all the way to the route finish line in order to get the badge.
- There’s no route progress bar when riding with a Pace Partner, so you may need to look up the route you’re on in order to figure out how long you have to ride. Refer to our Master Routes List if you need a little help.
Expect Change
In talking with James and others at ZwiftHQ, they’ve repeatedly stressed that Zwift’s Pace Partners are in flux, with lots of parameters and options being tested so Zwift can deliver an optimal experience.
Zwift is changing Pace Partner behavior and reviewing rider stats and feedback related to that behavior.
So we know what Pace Partners are doing this week. But that may change next week! Our guess is the summer months will see a lot of experimentation with Pace Partners before they settle into some regular patterns for the fall/winter.
Ride With All!
Lastly, here’s a fun 1-hour challenge: try riding with each Pace Partner for 5 minutes! I did it last week, and it was fun to pop into each group, say hello, then move on. If you go from the top of the Pace Partner list to the bottom you basically work from a low pace to a high one, peaking twice (once in Watopia and once in Makuri Islands).
Questions or Comments
Share below!
Eric.. The bridge bug is a long term bug.. We had it since 2 months or more… If u do the bridge uphill is longer.. And not nice
Weird. I’ve never seen it! Maybe I need to ride up the Epic KOM more often. 🙂
Don’t worry bro… I m sure of it… Happened 1 month ago during our endurance ride.. Both ways happens, obviously uphill is longer and tidious
Just experienced all this, including the disappearing act on the bridge. Liking the additional routes and more importantly different power to weight ratios. Great improvement Zwift
Brevet on Big Foot Hills with dynamic pacing seems like it’ll be an excellent workout.
I was just thinking the same. I only just started using the pace partners for base miles and I really enjoy the accountability of not getting baited into sprints that destroy your planned workout. Two laps would be a touch over 80 km and fit very nicely into a two hour slot.
I thought that too! I will be giving it a go tommrow!
I rode Big Foot Hills with Brevet yesterday, and yes, it was excellent. I have a new goal. Stick with Brevet for the whole 60k!
Thats what i did today john and was a good challange. I really like the dynamic part, faster on the hills and less so on the flats. I really had to try hard to not fall off the back a few times, certainly less forgiving than coco for me.
I would like to see that a pace partner is riding longer than 1 hour, so you can train endurance riding. Is that possible?
You can definitely ride with a pace partner for longer than an hour — I haven’t seen any limits at all. Don’t know what would happen if you happened to be riding at the point where they switched routes; maybe that’s what you bumped into?
You can ride aslong as you want with the pace partners, just choose one that keeps you comfortable and in zone 2. Ive done up to 2 and a half hours with coco but plan on doing a 4 hour centuary at some point! 😆
I rode with C. Cadence for three hours yesterday. They’re there all the time – how long you stick with them is up to you.
Should work fine. Had a couple instances where the pace partner announced was shutting off for a bit for maintenance. Not sure if that’s random or scheduled thing or if it still happens.
Bit weird and unnecessary that the bots change colour when they change pace. But okay!
It’s an unnecessary experiment, but I bet most of the D bots don’t change, and I also bet Charlie doesn’t change. They probably only change when their pace changes to correspond with a different category. It’s probably just C. Cadence who changes a lot.
C. Chaser as well. Only happens when they go up or down a category as their output changes on a hill. I don’t think it’s something easily controlled. Their cat letter also changes in the list of pace partners when they’re in one of those areas.
I think it is good that they do – or at least B Brevit does. When it goes blue you know you can back off a bit, then when it turns green you’ve got to be back on the pedals.
Danny Draft managed to drop me from the group 2 evenings in a row i.e. group goes around the corner at a junction but I kept going straight. Not great for the confidence at all I can tell you 😜
Nice to see some innovation in the pace partner world, certainly one of the most popular features rolled out over the last couple years. Given how many low-power options there are now, it would be nice to see one filling the fairly large gap between Coco and Bowie in Watopia.
I’m glad they’re trying new things and that there’s more variety (and new partners in the big gaps between some of the old ones). I wish they had kept a constant 2.5 (or so) W/kg pace partner on Tempus Fugit for people who just want to power out some distance at a constant pace. The dynamic pacing also doesn’t work as well with the way I have used pace partners for race warmups in the past, but I suppose I can adapt. For Z2 riding or just general free riding, the dynamic pacing is a nice addition to keep my… Read more »
Agree with Coco on Tempus every day, I like the consistent pace and mileage without encountering elevation change
I thought Tempus Fugit was pretty flat … for how much of the time is C. Cadence away from her standard W/kg over the course of a lap of Tempus Fugit?
The issue is not whether, when Coco Cadence is on Tempus Fugit, she is going at a constant pace. The issue is that Coco is only on Tempus Fugit about one week a month, and it would be nice if there was always a pace partner on Tempus Fugit running that pace.
RGT has loads of bots – many more than real riders – don’t know why Zwift has so few, or is apparently unable to have more.
I did not see Charlie as an option yesterday but I will look for him in the future, for I have been wanting something between C and B for a while (though not for long rides). Yesterday Brevet was advertised at 3.6 in the GUI, so a drop to 3.3 for him sounds good too.
I think the 3.3 vs. 3.6 was whether they were on the flats or on a hill and the output was different as a result.
Brevet is 3.3 normally, 3.63w/kg on the uphills, 2.64w/kg on the downhills.
Just did one with Charlie and it was a perfect medium for me. Coco always was a bit too slow and Brett could be a struggle if you hopped in with cold legs.
Love the “Ride With All!” challenge – I was actually thinking this would be a great competition a la the old “ZwiftQuest.” An exercise in mapping, planning, and distribution of physical effort! Maybe somewhere in the back-end the Dropz bonus could be detected to “prove” that you visited each PP.
You’re taking it much further than me! I just did a fresh activity for each Pace Partner. 5 minutes apiece.
I can’t wait to ride with Anquetil on Alpe du Zwift Downhill.
This is a really nice addition to Zwift. Well done! Whoever was in charge of thinking this through and implementing it should be in charge of making the new home screen more logical and useful.
Why are they changing the pace? Diego has gone up to 2.0. Bring back the 1.8 so I can keep up
He is still 1.8. He only does 2 (or 1.98) on gradients of 3% or more.
He is 1.8 on average, but the advertised paced in the Pace Partners menu changes based on what pace the PP is going when you start up Zwift (or pull up the PP menu or something like that. Haven’t figured out the trigger). I’ve seen Diego Duke have everything from 1.5 to 2.0 in the Pace Partner menu. It shocked me yesterday when I saw 2.0, but I joined as he was going up the Hilly KOM.
Can confirm he’s 1.8. The PP menu doesn’t advertise the base pace but rather the pace that the bot is at when you open Zwift (or something like that). I’ve seen Diego as listed everywhere from 1.5 to 2.0. But 1.8 is his constant on flats. (Rode with him yesterday)
I think it’s the pace they’re going right now because I saw C. Chaser change cat from C to B and back to C while I had the pace partner menu pulled up and then got my kit on (sometimes Zwift takes longer to boot than others for me, so getting it started is the first part of my routine).
When riders disappear, you can still see their “dot” on the mini map. Had this happen on a race this morning. Apparently you still have the draft as I could keep track of the other riders via the mini map and I did not get dropped.
Is Anquetil also going to ride at +10% up >= 3% inclines?
On routes with half-decent hills (e.g. Big Foot Hills) I imagine periods of 4.62W/kg will be fun!
Answering my own question here, I rode with Anqetil again this morning and she was showing as 4.6W/kg on the short, steeper bits of Watopia’s Waistband. Assuming her weight is unchanged at 65kg, I can’t see how this is going to work too well for heavier riders on routes with longer hills. Before dynamic pacing, heavier riders already had to increase their power significantly to keep up on the inclines. It will be interesting to see how many can keep up with a dynamically paced Anquetil uphill. Those that are able might not find the the flat and downhill parts… Read more »
Agreed Martin. I’m 110kg and long hills are brutal. 4.6W/kg at 110kg is 500w+ sustained just to hang on. Can’t do THAT for very long!
Nobody can, Kevin. That’s why 110kg riders don’t win mountain stages. 🙂
You could of course change your Zwift weight so that you are able to keep up. 😀
Still no faster bots??? Unfair!
Avg Pace with the 4.2 bots always well below 3 avg. Not a great incentive for those who are extra fit and looking for a faster non race challenge. It’s ok though, I’m cancelling my zwift membership until the fall so they have time to improve…
You could always ride a MTB, gravel bike or buffalo bike to make it harder. That was a common trick to bridge the gap between bots when there were only 4 of them.
Another thing to know: when selecting a pace partner from the home screen, the w/kg number will vary when dynamic pacing is enabled and the pace partner is going downhill vs uphill vs flat. You can’t know from the join screen what terrain the pace partner is currently on, so it’s unclear what you’ll get when you join one.
Yeah, found that out the hard way when I selected a partner expecting an easy warm up only to find out it was so low because it had been going down a hill. Of course, it started up a hill shortly after I joined and was way more than I was expecting.
All these new pace partners are great; having a way to switch between them without having to restart would be really useful. I might want to have a hard ride, but Im not going to drop in with Anquetil or whoever from the off. Being able to switch to a harder partner after a warm up would really help.
Hi Eric. Have you ever done any testing riding with the PacePartner using different bikes? It would be interesting to know whether you could effectively plug the gap between, say, C. Cadence and B. Brevet by riding a gravel bike that meant you needed to ride at more than 2.5 W/Kg to keep up due to the different Cda of that bike. Having mistake joined a PacePartner still on a gravel bike from a ZRL race, I had to pedal a lot harder to keep up than on my usual choice of road bike! Would there be a list of… Read more »
I’d love to see an option where you can stack the pace partners in sequence (like several meetups in a row) and have it automatically swap you to the next partner after a predetermined amount of time. It’d be nice to warm up at a slow pace and automatically swap to the next pace without having to end your ride, choose a new partner, etc.
I can not seem to join the pacebots any more which is frustrating. Instead of spawning me right near the pacebot with powerassist, I spawn in the middle of no where with no pacebots around
A pacer’s route should be a hill climb …
Hi! This is cool. I figure that C. Cadence on Volcano Circuit is also a great way to score the Warmed Up, Hothead, On Fire and 100km badges!
Btw Eric, is there another place where the Pace Partner schedule is posted, apart from Facebook?
Updates have been posted in this zwift forum thread lately https://forums.zwift.com/t/changes-to-pace-partners-may-2022/583400/293 but if they don’t post an update the only way to see if to log on to the game and see what routes they are riding. It changes on sunday night weekly.
I post weekly updates to Zwift Riders & on the Zwift Forums.
Anyone else having an issue getting set up on a ride with a pace partner. Since the updates I have only gotten linked up twice and one of those it did not have me follow the same course so lost the group. I saw they know there is a bug and say to just try again but I have rides where tried three times and just give up. Sorta frustrating
Sounds like it’s a known issue on AppleTV, iOS, and Android. Zwift is working on it.
also had some problems and what I found is that you must choose the same exact course that the pacebot is riding on as well as choose the pacebot. That is the only way it seems to work, and that is even spotty. A antequil rides on watopia waistband which is not a course you can choose, so i was not able to ride with A antequil, but maybe that was a blessing.
Love the changes
Except for the dynamic power changes
I’m sure some people like that change, but I prefer the pace bots to you know… be a pace bot.
My reasoning: If I’m reading this correctly, won’t the A bot be 4.6 on the hills and 3.3 on the downhills? When I ride with the A bot riders pretty much do 3.3 on the downhills/flats and 4.5ish on the hills anyway. Although I don’t see that change reflected in the screenshot?
Anyway- I much prefer a pace bot to actually hold a steady w/kg and you know… pace
That was the reason for their name initially. They would ride around at a constant “pace” for you to match. Wish there will still some that did.
James Bailey is AWESOME!
Hear, hear!
When will PC users be allowed to join their friends again?? Ever since the update, I have not been able to ride with any of my friends unless they quit their rides and “Join” me from an IOS device.
I know Zwift is working on it. No idea on an ETA.
That’s good to know. Up until this comment I wasn’t sure they viewed that as an issue to fix or just the new status quo with the new home screen.
Good to see some changes. I would still love to see a variable pedal assist time, to give you time to get warmed up before having to pedal full power to keep up. I’m guessing the reason this doesn’t exist is it messes with stats and people might collect route badges using pedal assist the whole way, but surely you could solve that by just saying time spent with p.a. doesn’t count towards anything?
Hi. Last night I tried to join Danny Draft on Makuri, and the weirdest entry sequence unfolded! I pedalled in a straight line through walls, grass banks, brick walls, under water, all sorts of hitherto never seen “scenery” before finally ending up on the right road … but only after going straight thru a small swarm of riders twisting around each other in endless circles like bees around a hive! And after all that I ended up alone, and never joined up with any pace partner at all!! I have a video of the first part of this weirdness if… Read more »
Be careful with the new extended “pedal assist”: I’ve joined a Pace Partner on 2 occasions since the recent changes then realized I had less time to the start of a race than I thought (since Zwift has been reeeeeeally slow loading on my PC recently!) and went to Join Event and both times I was still in Pedal Assist and it did the ‘switch to X location/race’ thing but then I was deposited flying around in the air at like 50kph without pedaling and having to end the ride and start again!
Have you considered interval sessions or burst of tempo/race pace and recover pace partners? I would love that.
Heads up that the joining issue should be fixed and stealth mode should be fixed in the next release (early June)
Fabulous update to the pace partners
Dynamic pacing lets you catch your breath back and ride for longer
I’m excited to ride a Zwift Futureworks with a bot up Alpe du Zwift on Thursday! This is something I was hoping Zwift would do. Any chance they will extend this concept to the longer and harder events like the Four Horsemen, Full PRL, Mega and Uber Pretzel rides? Especially to have something like this in the winter offseasons to help us earn those badges!
Word on the street is C Cadence will be riding the Four Horsemen next week!
It would be nice to schedule switches to new pace partners without having to end a ride to start a new one. I like to warm-up with a slower pace partner then switch to a faster pace partner, and even then a cool down at the end before finishing. It would be cool to schedule the swaps and finish one continuous ride.
It’s something Zwift is looking into. One big hassle with it is how it messes up the Strava activity when you jump from one location to the next…
But I know it’s being looked at, because jumping between pace partners is a common request.
Rode with Eddy Echelon today at 3.0w/kg pace. That was the advertised pace and I enjoyed the ride but why? EE is a D pace bot, strange
I met Echelon with ca. 3.5 w/kg today… wmm, he must be a chameleon…
Hey Eric. If I want to ride with Pace Partner 3.3kg/w I usually need warm for about 5 minutes. My question is for Zwift, can there be a way instead of pedal assistance, Have a optional WARM UP ASSISTANCE to stay with the Pace Partner for a period so I don’t have to do a lower warm up ride first and its really cold in Australia at the moment so it takes I while to warm up
Diego Duke appears to have changed his name to Diego Disc. Did a recovery ride a couple of weeks ago with D. Duke. Went to join him today (somehow remembered the name but not the watts) and he was no where to be found. When I looked at the watts, Disc was the bot for the job, or maybe I’m still suffering from my big ride, lol.
I believe “D Duke” was considered a little too close to the name of an infamous American Nazi
James, you can place as many as Pacers as you want for variations of routes or w/kg. Please 🙏 just bring back permanently our darling Coco 2.5w/kg on flat on @Tempus/Tick Tock. We miss here so dearly *sob sob* 🥹
I love the new dynamic pace partners. I’ve gone from riding about 1 in 20 rides with a PP, to about 1 out of three. I think the different power levels are spread about right, especially since you can always do a gravel bike to bridge a gap.
One request: any plans to roll pace partners out to France? I am darned tired of riding the volcano circuit, and France would be so nice 8n a group with a pace partner!
James Bailey should be promoted to CTO or COO
Dynamic pacing was long overdue. SO much better
After my registration for Zwift Academy, and with the new banner for this on my main screen, I can no longer find the Pace Partners
Each pace partner should have its own tile on the home screen now, instead of a single tile for all pace partners
For some reason Choose A Pace Partner does not appear on screen lately.
I rode with S. Smith (Steve Smith) on Lutece Express in Paris today. He had yellow wheels but no beacon. There was no one with him. He rode EXACTLY at 3.1 w/kg the entire time, even on hills. I am 99.9% sure he is an undercover bot. Anyone willing to validate this?
I would like to see a 2.0w/kg partner as the 22% increase from 1.8 to 2.2 is too wide. Riding in zone 2 is popular but I find myself in-between with these two.
The wormhole effect happened to me on the D. Miguel ride, too.