Season 2 of the 2021/22 Zwift Premier League runs from January 10th to February 14th. As a quasi-contributor to Zwift Insider and a rider/director of a newly promoted Premier League team, I wanted to give an unfiltered behind-the-scenes look at the action. Look for a recap each week here on Zwift Insider.
Can Only Improve
In week 1 of the Premier League, the Velocio team got a very early wake-up call. The team finished in last place and the 3 points we scored were from a guy, me, who got dropped.
The good news is, going forward, we could only do better! Last week I attacked before we completed the first kilometer and this week I told myself I would make a plan and be more patient. Week 1 made it very clear these races don’t leave much room for wasted watts.
Premier League Points
I have been racing in the Community League since the start of the ZRL and have watched nearly every Premier League race. Most races in the Premier League go like this:
1. Starts fast.
2. The peloton, in the form of a Pacman with sonic shoes, eats all the breaks.
3. We get a ludicrously fast finish sprint.
4. Team that stacks the finish wins.
Minimal teamwork, no exciting breaks, races are just a game of maximizing finish points. Really, you could just watch the finish (to be fair, that is a lot of bike racing).
In the Community League, the points on offer outside of the finish are substantial. There are significant points available for fastest segment (FTS) and first across the line (FAL). It made all the races dynamic and hard to predict, because if you didn’t play for the bonus points, you couldn’t win.
This season, the Premier League has moved in this direction and now it is worth it to animate the race. Just two races in and we are seeing the rewards of this improved point system. A friend of mine in the race thanked me afterward for being aggressive, saying it is helping set an example of more exciting and compelling racing. I would like to think his praise is warranted, but really it is the point structure that is making this great style of racing happen. I am just already familiar with it from all of my time in the Community League.
That all said, the smartest thing for my Velocio team to still do is to sit in and try to maximize finish points. Just getting to the finish has proved incredibly hard.
Before the race I had talked with a friend on another team and he was advocating for a break a couple of laps in. My heart said yes but my brain knew sitting in for the finish was really the only play I had. The sprint points are worth it, but you have to be top 4 to score. So I told myself I would try to conserve energy, be smart, and try not to get dropped.
Bad Start
Before the race, our Canadian Greek God had to run to the store to buy a scale because he was traveling on an ice climbing trip. He spent the morning on the edge of a cliff in 85 mph winds for “fun”. He managed to get his scale and bike set up in time for the race but as soon as the race started his Internet died. Despite my earlier proclamation that we could only improve, we actually started worse than last week.
The London lead-in is a well-known start. It’s fast and slightly downhill, goes into a highway tunnel that opens into a long flat next to the river. From there it does a short climb up to the city proper. It is short, but it is always awful.
One kilometer into the race the pack speed lulled and I wanted to attack, but I promised myself I wouldn’t do that. So I waited patiently. Tuegels attacked and it strung out. Predictably the climb to the city was hard and everything came back together but now we were game-on and strung out. The first time through the finish arch there were no points available. I wondered if someone would forget this and go for them, like in the women’s race, so I watched the front for any pointless attacks. We got to the line and no one had attacked or sprinted. Then the pack hesitated. It was well past the 1km mark so I dropped my ghost powerup and attacked.
First Attack
Each lap is about 7 minutes long, and I guessed you would need to build a 10+ sec gap to hold off the field if they sprinted. I made my jump and Jimmy Kershaw (Movistar) came across and dropped an aero powerup as he got to me. He blew past.
Last week I tried to bridge to an attack by Jamrozik (Restart) and I couldn’t make it. It looked like the same thing was about to happen. I gave everything I had to make it back up to his wheel. I got there and he kept smashing and I hung on for dear life. When he eased up I pulled through with whatever I had to offer. The gap went out quickly and with a kilometer to go till the sprint we still had 20sec. Which is insane actually.
My powerup available was another ghost. Not ideal. I figured the best way to use it was to mask my sprint, since the ghost doesn’t just make you invisible for 10 seconds – it also drops you off the rider list that the racers can see. It means if you go into the orange attacking they can’t see it coming. I pulled till about 500m to go and forced him to lead it out. Just as he started to accelerate I dropped my ghost and started my sprint. Not sure it helped but I would like to think I tricked him into thinking he had it won and by the time I came by it was too late to react. Let’s pretend I was clever. 10 points! I tried to send an email to Zwift to stop the race as I was winning after the first available points, but they didn’t respond.
Although Jimmy and I still had a good gap on the field, we were both fully gassed and came back to the pack quickly.
When To Attack
The race was fast and feisty but it stayed together for a group sprint for the second set of sprint points. The hard part of this is that when everyone sprints the pack speed goes bananas. I had to sprint at the back of the pack to not get dropped, and still I very nearly was. My sprint watts were abysmal and I knew I was going to be in trouble.
Some advice I often give to new racers is to go hard when no one else wants to go hard, or go hard when everyone has to go hard. The point being either take advantage of the pack not wanting to work or go hard when everyone is already tired and doesn’t want to go hard anymore. When I started my attack I picked a time that seemed too dumb to chase and was given a leash to get some time. Coming through lap 2 the whole pack had just sprinted, so everyone was tired and wanted to ease up. Another good time to attack.
Sure enough, an exceptionally strong group of riders countered the sprint and got a good gap. They had Vujasin (Canyon), Tuegels (BZR-SPSD), Nehr (NeXT-Enshored), Fumagalli (Italy), Talbott (Saris-NoPinz), Van Diemen (Movistar), Tenselhoff (Wahoo-Le Col), and Schwebe (Restart). These are some of the best there are. If you could handpick a breakaway from the field you might pick exactly that group. It formed in trickles and at one point I saw an opening to go with a bridge but its success seemed precarious at the time. Before I had the will to go the elastic snapped and they were gone.
They built a large lead and it looked as if they would be gone for good. Which has NEVER happened in a Premier League race. Then what helped trigger this break – the valuable mid race points (double points) – also started to kill it.
It’s a double-edged sword with this wonderful new point system. As soon as the break got to 1km to go everyone started to play games. Instead of pulling people were playing chicken with position. What was a hefty lead was dropping despite the fact the pack wasn’t that motivated, since all the points were gone up the road and most teams were represented. They stayed away for the big points but the relationship was spoiled. Honeymoon over, that annoying thing Talbott (Saris-NoPinz) does with his heel as he pedals, it just can’t be ignored anymore. I wish he would put the dirty glasses in the dishwasher and not just in the sink. Everyone is looking to leave each other.
The break split a bit and the pack gained motivation. They were pulled back but not till after they took another lap of points. Attacks and counter attacks went and at this point it felt like the race was an accordion being played by the riders, stretched and mashed together again, making painful music. In the carnage I found myself in a small group off the front with 1km to go on the penultimate lap. The field was closing in, but there was still enough of a gap to make it worth it to light some matches.
I went early, following someone else’s attack. I bridged and went by and was leading till 200m to go when 2 guys came by me from the break. Third on the line and I was just 9 sec away from another first across the line. That was my last match and I thought my race was done. But the attacks and sprint were so hard we were back out in front of the pack again. I went from pulling the pin to full speed ahead to reform the break.
The Finish
By this point everyone was hurting and the pulls were getting shorter and slower. Our group of seven had about a 12-second gap with 2km to go. At this point McGlinchey (Wahoo-Le Col) ripped a vicious attack that none of us could follow. Behind NeXT-Enshored had put guys on the front to drive the pace. So with 1km to go we had a lone rider chased by a break, chased by a pack with the gaps coming down quickly. It was here I saw Thrall (NeXT-Enshored) and Jones (Canyon) come across from the pack and they went right through the break.
I tried to jump on as I knew that could be the path to placing, but I couldn’t hold them. I was left stranded, giving everything I had left with 500m still to go. I was still in the top 5 but the pack was closing. With 250m to go my 5th turned into being caught by the pack, and by the time I crossed the line 10 seconds later, I was 54th!
Our sprinter Jason Frank, now recovered from COVID, popped a good one to finish 8th. He stuck to the plan and scored 23 points. As a team we ended up 9th and moved up to 12th overall, right above the line of relegation (thanks Ted Lasso for educating me on this process).
Next week is in New York and another short lap that is mostly flat but has some rollers that will be tough. I think aggressive racing is here to stay. The pack speed on Zwift is still too fast in my opinion (the KOM on London sprint was set at 52 mph) but it is a testament to how good the racers are in the Premier League that groups of riders can temporarily starve the insatiable appetite of the Pack-man.
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