If you’ve been following this week’s Zwift Academy Final series from Eurosport, you know it’s been filled with highs and lows, thrills and spills, triumph and disappointment! Today, with the release of the final episode, the winners have been announced.
Congratulations to Maddie Le Roux (South Africa) and Louis Kitzki (Germany), winners of Zwift Academy 2023!
Full Press Release from Zwift
For the eighth year, the Zwift Academy talent identification and training program, in partnership with Alpecin-Deceuninck and CANYON//SRAM, has awarded professional contracts to two athletes who distinguished themselves above all others. South Africa’s Maddie Le Roux will join CANYON//SRAM Generation and Germany’s Louis Kitzki will join the Alpecin-Deceuninck Development Team. These two talented riders will add their names to a glittering list of Zwift Academy alumni, including Neve Bradbury and Jay Vine.
Maddie and Louis set themselves apart from more than 108,000 Zwifters who participated in the 2023 Zwift Academy. They were among the finalists – three women and three men – who were invited to their respective team camps for finals in Denia.
At the finals, all the finalists participated in challenges and races on the road as well as a Zwift race, met with coaches and team staff as well as joined the group rides with athletes from their potential future teams. Maddie distinguished herself by having strong power numbers and high-level race experience. Viewing this as her last opportunity to take her cycling career to the next level, Maddie approached each challenge with intense focus and a calm demeanor.
Adam Szabó, Team Director at CANYON//SRAM Generation says: “Maddie excelled in many of the challenges but where she stood out from all the finalists was supporting her designated leaders during the Zwift race. This moment was a turning point in the week, and we were sure this was what we were looking for in our team. We’re excited to welcome her to the team.”
“I’m excited to finally be able to share the news, it still feels unbelievable, to be honest, but I’m sure it’ll sink in soon,” said winner Maddie Le Roux. “It’s been a whirlwind since coming back from finals, but I am looking forward to joining the team in Europe and getting the season started.”
Louis impressed the coaching staff at finals with his raw talent, ambition and determination showcasing a huge amount of development potential. The youngest of the ZA Finalists, Louis took advantage of his exposure to the team’s coaches and the innovative talent identification opportunity Zwift Academy presents.
Kristof de Kegel, Performance Manager at Alpecin-Deceuninck says: “This edition, the finalists were the closest ever to compare on a physical level. Louis has the combination of a young age with the belief and awareness that his ‘weak points’ are only working points, which gave him the advantage over the other finalists. All three had massive physical capacities but Louis in our opinion the most workable profile in the long term.”
“The Zwift Academy Finals was such a unique experience riding with the team and getting to spend that time with the coaches, it is such a great way to really test if you can handle the professional cycling lifestyle,” said winner Louis Kitzki. “I am so excited to join the Alpecin-Deceuninck development team for the coming season, to learn from some of the world’s best cyclists, and hopefully follow in Luca’s footsteps!”
Maddie and Louis have been settling into their new teams since January. They’ve been enjoying riding on their specially designed Zwift Academy Canyon Aeroad and are looking forward to representing their new teams at the early season races.
Kitzki started this year’s ZA as a level 9 Zwifter. Shouldn’t Zwift require at least level 30 to qualify? Thankfully Maddie is a solid Zwifter (70).
No, it’s better as a competition to find the best candidate
“100.000 people started the Zwift Academy, and we’re down to just six. Three men and three women.”
This is the first thing that is said in each episode. I’m not sure if requiring a certain Zwift level is the right way to go, but as a bare minimum at least the riders should be selected based on their performances and numbers in the Zwift Academy.
There are several indications that at least some of the male contestants must have been pre-selected and then asked to do the ZA.
1) Kitzki – no Zwiftpower profile, no open Strava. How could they have verified his numbers, and know he’s not just another Zwiftpower ranger? Surely that would have meant that they’d have to check dousins of riders with similar numbers…
2) Gaffuri mentioning in episode 2 that he’d been stalking Kitzki/Schiffer prior to the selection. That seems very odd since they appeared completely out of the woodwork for everyone else.
3) Zero transparency or background given as to how the riders were selected.
Alpecin Deceuninck surely doesn’t want to waste their time and only wants to invite riders with a genuine shot at becoming pros. The clearly succeeded with that, having stated several times in the last episode that the contestants this year were way above previous years.
But I think Zwift would benefit from being able to show that there is a genuine, albeit extremely slim, pathway from Zwift to testing yourself with the pros. I don’t think they’ve been able to convince anyone this time around, maybe on the contrary in fact.
Yea, I have no problem with what level someone started at, whether they are an avid Zwifter or whatever. But if there are disingenuous things going on with preselection by the team then that’s just wrong.
Why is that?
I think OP is noting that the winner joined Zwift to do the academy (vs being a long standing paying member) – given the level he is at, those XP would have been accumulated simply doing the academy. I am not taking a view here, just explaining.
The filming and the storytelling of the episodes of this year ZA was horrible (my opinion). Big step back from last year.
Thought the exact same thing while watching. Almost like they did not want to film it at all.
Not horrible, but way less interesting to watch. Last year was more like a exciting story with getting to know the riders more in detail (families involved etc.). Furthermore the workouts and rideouts were shown and explained more in detail, whar I appreciated. Last year I watched the whole series while zwifting btw 🙂