On this Father’s Day weekend our elite dad squad took a break from combing our thinning hairlines to combing the Zwift events list for the best dad-themed events. (Of course, all of our picks are open to everyone – but it’s fun to poke fun at dudes and the sort of events we gravitate toward!)
DIRT Community Father’s Day
With our Father’s Day focus, this first pick is a no-brainer. These two events from DIRT are mostly about making it easy for riders to unlock the DIRT Community Kit (which ironically isn’t used in the event image). Complete the 20-minute ride, unlock the kit. Painless and short – the way new clothes shopping should always work!
2 event times on Sunday: 11am BST/6am EDT/3am PDT and 6:30pm BST/1:30pm EDT/10:30am PDT See events on ZwiftHacks
Herd Summer Racing League – 100km in Bologna!
This race is just sort of… crazy. Only a true dude could look at this event and think, “That’s a great idea!”
100km of Bologna’s Time Trial Lap route works out to just over 6 full up-and-back laps, by my calculations. Points are earned for your segment time on each climb. Good luck to all the crazies. Note: it’s a drafting race… be sure to pick the right bike.
What’s more manly than gathering a few of your friends and challenging the world to a race? That’s exactly what GCN presenters are doing on Saturday in what’s sure to be a fun chase event where GCN presenters set off a handful of minutes before the rest of the world.
Created by Kiwi Greg “Coach Hendy” Henderson, this ride actually happens on Monday morning for New Zealanders – but that’s Sunday for most of the world. A 45-minute ride at 2-2.5wkg that ends in a 10-minute blast, this ride sort of embodies how many of us guys tend to live: take it easy, except when going all-out for glory.
Nothing says “I’m comfortable with my manliness” like a big pink banner! Zwift is revamping their daily Crit Races, mixing up the routes used, implementing Category Enforcement, and enabling a custom mix of powerups based on the race route. Saturday’s races are on Downtown Dolphin while Sunday’s are on Neokyo’s Rooftop Rendezvous. If you’re looking for a quick race effort, give one of these events a try!
Zwift’s May update included the first frame in-game from US-based Quintana Roo, a company which specializes in triathlon bikes. The frame is QR’s flagship V-PR, and it’s easy to spot on course thanks to QR’s signature “leading edge absent technology”: a non-driveside aero chainstay.
Here’s how it’s described in the Drop Shop:
Re-designed from the ground up, the V-PR is Quintana’s most variable condition-favorable triathlon bike ever. Carve roundabouts, attack rollers, descend, corner and climb in confidence. The V-PR is built for triathletes and is one of the best-handling bikes in triathlon.
The Quintana Roo V-PR in real life
This frame is priced at 638,600 Drops and level-locked at 16. Like every TT frame in Zwift it is rated 4 stars for aero and 1 for weight, so we had to run it through our normal tests to learn exactly how it performs.
Here’s everything you need to know about the performance of the new Quintana Roo V-PR frame in Zwift.
Aero (Flat/Rolling) Performance
The V-PR turned in the same flat test time as several other frames, meaning it ranks right around the 50th percentile in the universe of TT frames on Zwift. Its test time matches the BMC Time Machine, Canyon Speedmax, Specialized Shiv, Diamondback Andean, Scott Plasma, and Specialized Shiv S-Works.
Its test time of 49:58 is notably 3 seconds slower than the Cervelo P5, despite Quintana Roo claiming the V-PR is faster than the P5 at all yaw angles. By comparison, the current fastest TT frame (Canyon Speedmax CF SLX Disc) turns in a time of 49:41 on our test course, which is two laps of Tempus Fugit totaling 34.6km.
Climb Performance
The Quintana Roo V-PR’s climbing performance places it mid-pack, much like its flat test performance.
Note: all test results above are from a 75kg, 183cm rider holding 300W steady using Zwift’s stock 32mm carbon wheelset.
Conclusions
Quintana Roo’s V-PRO doesn’t turn in particularly remarkable performances on Zwift, with several other frames available at lower level locks with comparable (or better) performance. Still, it’s one of the cheapest TT frames available and locked at a fairly low level (16), so its performance is in keeping with its pricing and availability.
It does include a functional color slider, so if you’re a QR fan in real life and/or simply want a frame that stands out from the crowd, this may be the one.
The Quintana Roo V-PR will be added to the following posts, and it can also be found on our Master Zwift Frames List:
Important note: this post contains speed test results for Zwift frames or wheels. These results may change over time, and a bike's performance relative to others may also change. We don't always revise posts when performance rankings change, but we do keep current, master versions of our speed test results which are always available. See the frame charts, wheel charts, and Tron vs Top Performers for current performance data.
Tomorrow: Join the Elite Pro Series – June Edition Race
This month’s Elite Pro Series event gives you the opportunity to race against 24-year-old Italian pro Marta Cavalli. Marta is in fine form after recently taking victory at Amstel Gold Race and La Flèche Wallonne Femmes, so expect a competitive event!
Her victory at Amstel Gold was very Zwift in style, attacking a group on a climb and riding away from the small group with 1.7km remaining.
Marta is no stranger to Zwift and attended the inaugural Midweek Mountain Massif event, which is sponsored by Elite, so expect some good racing.
She is currently undertaking a high-altitude training camp in the Italian Dolomites in preparation for the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift, which begins 24th July.
Other riders scheduled to race include Carlos Verona, who finished 101st in the Tour de France in 2021, Chris Hamilton who races for Team DSM and just completed the Giro d’Italia, finishing 39th in the GC, and Megan Jastrab, also from Team DSM, who is currently competing in the Tour of Britain.
About the Zwift Race
The race is hosted in Makuri Island, on the Wandering Flats route, and is 25.1km long with 145m of climbing. There is just one timeslot available, at 6:30pm BST/1:30pm EST/10:30am PST.
This race does not use Zwift’s category enforcement tools
HRM is required to be included in the final results on ZwiftPower
Steering is enabled
Riders will unlock the Elite kit in-game upon completing the event
More on Marta
If you are interested in learning more about Marta’s victory and her thoughts on cycling, I was fortunate to catch up and interview her in preparation for this event.
Tomorrow sees the launch of a fresh Zwift mission created to celebrate the new 2022 Kask Protone Icon helmet. The very same lid worn by the INEOS Grenadiers, this helmet is the next iteration of Kask’s winning Protone line and features the latest technological advances in safety, ventilation, and aerodynamics.
Mission Details
This mission is all about climbing! To complete the Kask Protone Icon mission riders must sign up (see below) and then accumulate at least 2500m (8,202′) of elevation between 8am PT June 16, 2022 and 11:59pm PT June 30, 2022.
Get Signed Up
Sign up by clicking the mission card at the top-right of your homescreen. Click to accept the terms and conditions and you’re ready to go!
All signed up!
Mission Events
Kask ambassadors will be leading group rides while the mission is active – see a list of upcoming mission events here. It’s important to note that all Zwift rides count toward completion of the mission.
Completing the mission will unlock the in-game Kask Protone Icon helmet. One lucky Zwifter who completes the mission will win the same helmet in real life!
SISU Racing announced two exciting race series last week which are worthy of a special mention due to their innovative formats. Separate 5-stage Men’s/Mixed and 3-stage Femmes (women’s) series will be replicating classic 2022 Tour de France (TDF) stages in Zwift at the same time as the world’s top pros are fighting it out in the IRL races!
The Big Idea
SISU Racing le Tour Men’s/Mixed includes a Grand Depart group ride through the French countryside and five race stages, including an ITT on Stage 1, Alpe du Zwift on Stage 4, and the iconic finish on the Champs-Elysées on Stage 5.
SISU Racing le Tour Femmes is a three-stage series, with Stage 1 on the Champs-Elysées, Stage 2 through the champagne countryside of Douce France, and finishing with the Queen Stage, a mountain top finish on the La Reine course in France.
Route Details – Men’s/Mixed
Grand Depart (Wednesday, June 29) R.G.V. Group Ride – 24km, 133m elevation
Stage 1 (Friday, July 1) Beach Island Loop iTT – 13km, 48m elevation
These races use Zwift’s new category enforcement rules to enforce a minimum category for each rider.
A heart rate monitor is required to be included in the results; Z power riders will be removed from the results. Event results and GC standings will be available on ZwiftPower.
Need More Info?
Complete information is available on the team website, including all stage details, rules, and Zwift Event links (events are also available in the Companion app).
There is a French theme this week to the events I have highlighted, given the fact that the Critérium Du Dauphiné race is taking place in France. This is considered a “tune-up” in preparation for the Tour de France!
Climb Alpe du Zwift with Event Pace Partners!
Pace Partners have been a big hit since their introduction and it’s probably fair to say that many of us have ridden with them at some point… or at the very least have seen them zip past as us.
Zwift have just started trialing a Pace Partner-led event up the Alpe du Zwift. I have ridden with their latest addition “Andrew Alpinist” and it was a lot more difficult than I’d anticipated!
So, if you want to be paced up the Alpe du Zwift, then give this event a try and see how you get on. The Cat A pacer will get you to the top in 49 minutes.
When scrolling through the Companion app, you become familiar with the branding and logos of clubs offering events, such as “The Herd,” “Race3R,” “Mountain Massif,” or “AHDR”. So when I saw the logo of “Group Ride Bikes France” I was intrigued, as I had not seen it before!
A quick look on their Facebook page and it’s a well-established community with 3400 members, yet strangely I have never ridden with them or promoted any of their events, until now.
Their event is a 44.2km ride of the “Surrey Hills” route and is not a race but an endurance ride, where you tackle the famous Box Hill (after my recent experience of riding it in real life, my guess would be you will probably have more fun on Zwift). One thing I can assure you, it will certainly be safer!
When I first started on Zwift, I rode with L’Equipe Provence every week, taking great pleasure in learning the new routes and collecting the badges along the way. Their rides are really inclusive and I learned a lot about how Zwift worked. It was and still is one of my favourite group rides.
This week they are tackling the “Big Foot Hills” route which is 70km in length and features the Volcano climb.
It is also worth noting that since I last rode with them, they have teamed up with Stages Cycling and are offering discounts on their products. Click the below link for more information about that.
As Zwift’s event description notes “PRIDE ON 2022 is bolder, the music is a little louder, and we’re moving forward—together.”
This special Pride On event is the last one of the month in support of the AIDS/LifeCycle event which honors the 1.2 million people living with HIV and supports the San Francisco AIDS Foundation and the Los Angeles LGBT Center.
Riders will enjoy a 50-minute spin on the “Beach Island Loop” route, in Watopia where if you finish, you unlock the 2022 Pride On kit.
Saturday is the final race in the Rebel Race series hosted by Zwift Insider! Full details can be read here.
Thanks to Zwift expanding their Club limits, Zwift Insider’s club has exploded to over 4200 members as of today. Join the Club for easy access to upcoming Zwift Insider events, giveaways, and more fun!
This weekend’s race is hosted on the Watopia’s Waistband route. A flattish route that will surely end in a big pack sprint!
Functional Threshold Power (FTP) was on the rise as a top cycling fitness metric even before Zwift arrived in 2014. Power meters were becoming more affordable, TrainerRoad had already been around for a few years, and cyclists were reading books like Training and Racing with a Power Meter.
But it’s safe to say Zwift’s arrival and explosive popularity helped make FTP an even more popular metric – the de facto fitness metric for cyclists, in fact. This happened because Zwift races used FTP for categorization, and Zwift was always watching, ready to give you that glorious popup:
But what is FTP, really? How is it best measured, and how should it be used? Let’s dig in!
FTP: A Definition
Many cyclists understand FTP to be the highest average power you can sustain for an hour, but that’s not actually what it is.
It’s called functional threshold power because it’s based on your lactate threshold. LT is the intensity level where lactate begins to accumulate in your blood. Ride above LT and lactate will accumulate, forcing you to reduce power within a few minutes or less. Ride below LT and you should be able to sustain your effort for a significant amount of time.
The confusion lies in defining that “significant amount of time”. Here’s a dirty little secret: we can’t all ride at our FTP for 60 minutes. Some may only be able to hold it for 35 minutes, in fact! As this post from TrainerRoad explains, “The pain tolerance and mental fortitude experienced under extreme discomfort are both things that must be trained and well paced.” What I’ve seen is that, generally speaking, more-experienced cyclists can sustain their FTP power for longer durations than less-experienced riders.
So what’s a good definition for FTP? I like what Zwift says in their blog posts: “FTP is the wattage you can stay below and sustain for longer durations, while going above it causes fatigue to occur very quickly.”
Testing/Detecting FTP
It’s important to know your FTP if you plan on doing any training with power (indoors or out), since training with power typically involves executing particular intervals at a percentage of your FTP (such as a VO2 interval where you might ride for 4 minutes at 110% of FTP).
So how do you determine your FTP? Well, that’s our second dirty little secret – there is no standard method for determining your FTP! Crazy, right? But it’s true. Even Dr. Andrew Coggan, who is sort of the father of FTP, says the historic “gold standard” of lab testing isn’t always the best approach, and outlines several FTP detection options in this post, “all of which provide very similar estimates of your FTP”.
Let’s take a look at various methods of testing or detecting your FTP.
Software/Data-Based eFTP
Software/apps such as intervals.icu, XERT, TrainingPeaks WK05, and Strava will estimate your FTP (often referred to as eFTP) based on the power data you feed into their systems. Each of these tools estimates FTP in its own way, so each will deliver a different number. I don’t use WK05, but here are my current eFTP values, all based on the identical data:
intervals.icu: 310W
XERT: 312W
Strava: 300W
In general, I’ve found that intervals.icu and XERT track together quite nicely.
Zwift’s FTP Estimator
Zwift estimates your FTP as well. Any time you do an effort more than a few minutes long, it is plotting your data on a power curve to estimate your FTP. If Zwift detects a value greater than the FTP currently set in your profile, you’ll get the “FTP Increase Detected” pop-up.
Example: if your current FTP is set to 200W, then you do a Zwift ride where you average 250W for 30 minutes, you’ll be notified of an FTP increase.
Zwift’s FTP Tests
Zwift’s built-in FTP tests are both very close to the standard Coggan 20-minute test format. Both their “FTP Test” and “FTP Test (shorter)” are solid FTP test formats and the most accurate way to test your FTP in Zwift, especially if you are an experienced rider who can pace themselves well for a 20-minute maximal effort.
Zwift’s Ramp Tests
Zwift’s Ramp Tests start you at low power, then increase the power incrementally every minute until you aren’t able to push further. Ramp Tests are an excellent first FTP test because they’ll give you a ballpark figure without the need to worry about perfect pacing or a 20-minute sufferfest.
The downside of Ramp Tests is reduced accuracy. To be precise, anaerobically strong riders will be able to push further into the red (and thus get an inflated result) while aerobically strong cyclists may actually see artificially low results.
The Ramp Test trades accuracy for convenience, and in some situations, that’s a smart trade. As Shayne Gaffney from GC Coaching says, “If you have absolutely no clue what your FTP is, or are returning from injury or a long hiatus off the bike, you can use the ramp test results to predict a sustainable pace for the 20 minute FTP test.”
Lab Testing
Riders can pay to visit a lab for a lactate threshold/FTP test in which blood samples are drawn at various effort levels in order to determine that line where your body isn’t able to clear lactate sufficiently, leading to increased accumulation in your bloodstream. Coggan says there are two drawbacks to this method:
“Few people have access to such testing on a regular basis”
“Power at LT as determined in this manner is often significantly below what athletes and coaches tend to think of as a ‘threshold’.”
Outdoor FTP Tests
Some riders find it hard to produce the same numbers indoors as they do outside (Hunter Allen talks about this more). These riders might prefer outdoor tests, especially if they’re wanting an accurate FTP number for outdoor riding.
So head outside for an FTP test! Just make sure you follow a valid protocol for your test and plan your route so traffic and road issues don’t negatively impact your results.
My preferred outdoor method is to follow Coggan & Allen’s protocol as outlined in Training and Racing with a Power Meter, and time it so I’m on a steady 20+ minute climb with no stoplights or bad traffic for the 20-minute test section.
Coggan/Allen FTP test protocol:
20 minutes endurance-paced warmup
3×1-minute on, 1-minute off fast pedaling (100+ rpm)
5 minutes easy
5 minutes maximal TT effort
10 minutes easy
20 minutes maximal TT effort
Cooldown
Which Method Is Best?
With so many methods to test/detect FTP, your results can vary significantly depending on where you look. Take me, for example. I did a Zwift Ramp Test last Friday that pegged my FTP at 318W. Yet Strava says it’s 300W, ZwiftPower detects it at 295W, and XERT says 312W!
That’s a difference of almost 0.3 w/kg, which is a big deal if you’re on the cusp of a race category.
For your personal use, my advice is to find a test/detection method and stick with it. I’ve been happy with both intervals.icu and XERT because they automatically detect my eFTP with no need for actual testing. But you’ll need to find what works best for you.
Some users have asked why the homescreen rollout has taken so long (going on 6 months since it first rolled out to initial PC and Mac users). While we agree that the rollout has taken much too long, we can also confirm that Zwift has a list of bug fixes and improvements they’re working through on the new homescreen UI. They rolled it out to an initial audience iOS and Android users and received a lot of feedback from that initial small rollout. Our guess is they’re focused on improving the iOS and Android experience before rolling it out further.
As for the much-requested “Ride with” feature, a recent forum post says “This iteration of the new home screen lacks the ‘Ride with…’ feature for the time being. We are actively working on bringing it back for all OS platforms so you can join another Zwifter as on the legacy home screen. We thank you in advance for your patience.”
“Share to Club” Dropdown
A new dropdown menu added to the End Ride screen allows you to attach your activity to a particular Club:
“Sharing” your ride with a Club essentially tags that Club in the activity, giving the Club “credit” for the activity. So what’s the point?
While this feature isn’t currently live, initial early iterations of Clubs included a leaderboard/tracker showing total Club miles ridden, etc. We expect that feature to return, and we hope it includes more advanced metrics to give Club owners better insight into their members’ activities, and perhaps stir up a bit of competition between Clubs.
Pace Partner Change: No More Color Changing
According to James Bailey at ZHQ, Pace Partners will no longer change color when their power numbers dynamically shift on gradients.
The Pace Partners joining dialog on the homescreen will also show consistent colors, although it still shows their power numbers in real-time, instead of their “standard” power. This will be fixed in a future update, so you’ll be able to easily see all the Pace Partners and their typical power output.
Ride Leader Fence: Now With More Kick!
We reported on this last week, but today’s update includes further improvements to the ride leader fence. According to Zwift, they’ve made “the ‘kick’ feature now usable on all routes and available for use in events that want it.”
Today’s update includes improvements to how the fence appears when you approach intersections. These improvements, incidentally, will also carry over to the arches used in structured workouts.
TT Improvements
Time trial event reminders “now show time until your personal start time rather than time until the event starts.” So instead of joining the start pens then waiting around for your time to start, you can ride longer in your warmup before joining the start pen. Excellent!
Zwift tells us this is just the start of additional improvements to the TT and TTT experience. That’s great to hear!
Phased Rollout: 90-Day PRs
Based on a fresh forum post from Flint at ZHQ, we now know that Zwift is moving from displaying 30-day segment PRs to 90-day. This is a phased rollout, so not everyone will see it right away.
Bug Fixes and Misc Improvements
Here’s Zwift’s list of fixes and improvements included in this update, with notes in italic from us:
Fixed a bug that caused Zwifters to earn half stars for short intervals in a workout. Is there anything worse than finishing an interval properly, but only earning half a star?
Fixed issue with critical power curve display after doing a workout.
Fixed issue where intersection arrow buttons on Zwift Companion would flicker for a moment at each intersection.
Fixed an issue when showing remaining distance for a given lap in a lap based event on Greatest London Flat route.
Runners will now have workouts listed on the new home screen.
“View entire plan” link added back to “Next Up” training plan popup.
Group Ramp Tests In Zwift: Suffering With Clubmates
Last week Zwift rolled out, for the first time ever, the ability to hold group workouts using Zwift Clubs. While sweating through structured workouts with local clubmates sounds like a good alternative to lonely garage time in the dead of winter, what really grabbed my attention was the ability to hold a group ramp test.
The ramp test gets its name from its workout structure: you begin with a 1-minute interval at 100 watts, then increase by 20 watts each minute until failure. Once you stop pedaling, Zwift automatically computes your FTP as 75% of your best 60-seconds of power during the test. (So if you finished right at the end of the 400W interval, your FTP would be 400x.75, or 300 watts.)
The Ramp Test seems tailor-made for group events, because it’s all about pushing yourself to the limit. What better motivation than having other riders around you pushing hard, with everyone trying to hold out as long as possible?
So I created two Ramp Test events under the Zwift Insider Club. Here’s how it went…
Low Turnout Mystery
First, I want to mention a strange phenomenon I’ve noticed with Club events thus far: fewer riders show up than sign up. Far fewer. Since launching our Zwift Insider club a few weeks ago, our private Club events (that is, those which can’t be seen on the public Zwift calendar) have had about twice as many sign up as show up.
Why is that? Not sure. I think with public events, more people “stumble in” to the event at the last minute, and that doesn’t happen as much with Clubs. And perhaps people sign up for Club events thinking it looks like fun, but change their mind later.
Not sure. But it’s odd, and it’s happened every time. So far around 50-60% of those who sign up actually show up.
Late Join Caveat
Late Join is currently allowed for Club Workouts, and in fact is enabled by default. This probably isn’t ideal, because when you late join a group workout it drops you right into the same spot in the workout flow as everyone else.
In some workouts that might mean you start off with a hard interval. It almost certainly means you miss the warmup.
But on a Ramp Test workout, it essentially destroys the functionality/reliability of the test. You can’t drop into a Ramp Test at, say, the 260W interval, and expect your results to be accurate.
My recommendation to Zwift: either don’t allow late join at all for Club Workouts, or at least disable it by default so ride organizers can decide if it’s a smart thing to enable.
(Or make it super fancy, where ride organizers can customize the late join window. If your workout begins with a 10-minute warmup, organizers might allow for 5 minutes of late joining. Maybe a bit too fancy, but it would give ultimate control to the ride leaders.)
The Group Workout Experience
We had 37 riders signed up for this event. 18 actually joined, and as we started off, I sent a few group messages since I was the designated ride leader with the yellow beacon. Mostly I wanted to get three points across:
This was sort of a test event, so nobody knew exactly how it would unfold.
Once you hit the wall and stop pedaling, please try to message those who are still pushing and encourage them to keep going. Make it a team effort.
This was the first of two ramp test events I’d scheduled for the day, so I wasn’t going to push to the max. (Had to make sure everyone knew that, to preserve my immaculate mid-high B racer reputation.)
Messaging Confusion
One issue I noticed right away was the visual confusion of having automated workout messages on screen along with my ride leader messages. Here’s an example – the first bit of text is what I wrote. The second bit below that is an automated message from the workout which popped up just before I sent my message:
Not a huge deal, but I think Zwift should differentiate system messages from human ones a bit more obviously, perhaps with a different font color.
“Keep Together” Needs Work
The biggest annoyance of this workout (and the biggest annoyance of all group workouts on Zwift, for me at least) is the slow and/or wildly-fluctuating rider speeds. When Zwift first released group workouts, everyone stayed together, but pack speeds were fairly high – realistically high (in my experience) but higher than some lower-powered riders were used to. Zwift received complaints from slower riders that they were setting new segment PRs in group workouts, which meant the speeds must not be realistic, so Zwift slowed down the group workout packs. A lot.
If you watch the video above, you’ll see our pack speed is slower than it should be – 32/33kph when everyone is riding at 200w, for example. That speed should be closer to 40kph.
But when it really gets janky is when a rider drops off the back, or we hit slight uphills. (I saw my speed drop to 20kph instantaneously as we high the slight incline in the oasis, for example.) It just makes the whole experience feel very artificial, and there’s nothing a cyclist hates more than feeling like you’re going too slow. I’m not sure what the fix is, but a fix is needed.
Dropping Like Flies
I had imagined that riders would drop from the group as they stopped pedaling and finished the test, but what actually happened was most riders didn’t stop pedaling for long, and they were magically whisked back into the front group!
You could tell who was still in the ramp portion of the test vs who was in the cooldown based on the color of their avatar’s workout screen (red for ramp testers, blue for cooldowners). Those still in the ramp test were at the front of the group putting out big watts, while the rest sat on their wheels. This is what it looked like:
Enforced Erg Mode
Toward the start of the test, one rider asked if he should have Erg mode enabled for the Ramp Test. The answer is yes, of course you should – without Erg mode forcing you to hold particular wattage, a Ramp Test really doesn’t work. In fact, I’d say a Ramp Test is pointless if ERG isn’t enabled.
Zwift should probably enforce Erg mode for Ramp Test workouts, including those used for Clubs. Otherwise, you end up with weird situations like I saw with our second Ramp Test event this day, where the final rider who was “still going” clearly wasn’t in Erg mode. Their screen was showing as red, but they weren’t putting out the required watts – not even close. That leads to a poor test experience for the rider, as well as those participating who are watching which riders are still going near the end.
Timing Your Finish
Speaking of the end, here’s something I hadn’t even considered until I rode in this first event: the ramp test ends at different times for each rider! Once you stop pedaling it pops you into the 10-minute cooldown section of the workout. And of course, every rider stops at a different time, which means everyone is hitting the end of the workout at a different time.
What happens once you hit the end of the workout? Does it boot you out of the event, or just finish the workout but keep you in the event until the allotted time is finished? I was curious, so I spun my legs for the full cooldown – and was promptly booted from the event when the cooldown ended:
Back in free ride mode after finishing my cooldown, with Boone on my wheel. Note that I’ve been riding for 34 minutes, although the event was set to 43 minutes long.
That’s less than ideal, especially when you’re the ride leader and people are still in the event after you get booted!
But it’s only going to be an issue with Ramp Test events, as all other workouts are a set length and blocks can’t be skipped. So perhaps it’s not a problem worth a lot of dev time.
Still… It Just Works
While I noticed a few niggles here and there (all described above), the overall feeling from me was that the Club Ramp Test format worked quite well. Yes, it could be improved. But the new Clubs Workouts lets everyone gets the workout they signed up for, in a group setting.
The workout UI shows up in Companion as it should, and the workout UI on screen is the same that you’re used to in a solo workout. Once I finished the test, Zwift automatically updated my profile’s FTP setting with my new result.
Conclusions
Several hours later at the second Club Ramp Test event of the day, Boone joined me here in the Zwift Insider Pain Lab so we could push each other to the limit. I figured my FTP would test out at 310-320W, so my target was to get into the 440W interval (finishing the 440W interval would earn me an FTP of 330W – a higher result than I’ve ever earned).
By the time we reached 380W there were just a few red riders left in our group, and I was having doubts about my ability to finish even the 400W block. But I did it! Then knocked out the 420W (just barely). And with Boone yelling in my ear, “Keep pushing, every second counts!” I pushed a few more seconds into the 440W block, finishing with an FTP result of 318W (3.83 w/kg).
I wasn’t the last rider standing, but the idea of everyone pushing together certainly pushed me to go further than I would have alone. Next time I need to do a ramp test, this is the way I want to do it.
Your Thoughts
Have you ever done a group FTP test? What do you think of the idea? Share below!
But Zwift’s involvement in real-world cycling events isn’t limited to those few mentioned above. They are directly involved in the Global Bike Festival, “the ultimate weekend of bikes, riding, music, entertainment and much, much more hosted by the world’s largest cycling and mountain bike channels: GCN, GMBN, and EMBN.”
When and what is the Global Bike Festival presented by Zwift?
The Global Bike Festival (GBF) commences on 16th June and is a festival of cycling lasting until 19th June. It is hosted by Zwift, the Global Cycling Network (GCN), and the Global Mountain Bike Network (GMBN). The event series celebrates all things cycling.
It is taking place in the beautiful Austrian mountains, in Saalbach, which is an Alpine resort town 80km southwest of the city of Salzburg and. The programme looks mightily impressive.
Highlights
The highlight on opening day is the “GCN versus Rest of the world” Zwift Race at 8pm CEST, whilst over the weekend there is the opportunity to take some escorted bike rides with the hosts of GCN and even learn from Park Tool’s Master Mechanic Calvin Jones, who is coming over from the US to share his expertise and knowledge. Headlining the event are people you may be familiar with and even may have had the pleasure of riding with on Zwift: multiple Grand Tour Stage winner André Greipel along with multiple Olympic and World Champion, Ed Clancy.
Tickets for the event are still available if you fancy a weekend break in the mountains, but be sure to bring your dancing shoes because at night there will be parties courtesy of DJs A-Skillz, Norman Jay, and DJ Yoda.
If you fancy a race, on Sunday there is the KOM Challenge, a blast up one of the nearby mountains very much in keeping with the style of the Mountain Massif events hosted on Zwift.
If you like cycling and fancy something a bit different, then book your tickets and I’ll see you there.
Wrapping up
The evolution of Zwift’s marketing and the range of events they are involved with is fascinating. Parallels can be drawn with the Red Bull Energy Drink company, which started off selling energy drinks before diversifying and now has a Formula One racing team along with several football teams such as RB Leipzig and the New York Red Bulls. How long before we see a team in the professional peloton with Zwift as a title sponsor? That would be some coupe having a team with riders that all came from the platform!
In the meantime, by partnering with events like the Global Bike Festival, Zwift are ensuring they are supporting the cycling community not just virtually, but also in real life. I am looking forward to meeting up with people from the cycling community and clocking up some kilometres in the mountains.
