hanging with the front group is very though for me because i am exactly at the bridge between A and B. With racer categories? Additionally, well be moving forward on hiding height and weight from Zwift Companion and Web. More of an issue than thisRead more . If thats the norm, then I really dont see theRead more . I just we had a better system than category limits, racing license anybody? (Example: if your FTP is 300 watts and you weigh 75kg, your FTP w/kg would be 300/75, or 4 w/kg.). Some people, I think, just have a lower HR. Think of ZwiftPower, then, as something similar to Strava, only entirely Zwift-focused, and free! Im a heavy rider at 102kgs and 193cm tall I once reverse doped my weight at the top of the radio tower to try and achieve the 100km/HR badge It had the opposite effect in that I was actually slower than when descending at my actual weight lol I dont race other than against myself so Ive never weight doped as such My observations recently however have created an awareness of how many stick insects ride bikes on zwift . Same reason there are categories and age group races outdoors! The only place where being heavy helps is on the decent, which are almost all short (except Ventoux and Alpe de Zwift), and as a heavy guy (85kgs) I need to recover on the decent. IRL cycling pros are not exactly heavy weights and lean-ness is highly encouraged. Hopefully when it comes time to hide height and weight from public view on ZwiftPower, Zwift will have some really useful tools in place which help race organizers do their jobs more quickly and effectively, while promoting wellness in the racing community. And atRead more . Ive lost 2.2kg over a 6 hour ride due to carb loading before, and burning that and hence losing a lot of water weight during the ride. The only trouble is the downhill doesnt take as long of course, so the light advantage is obviously better. The COVID-19 lockdown period, now in its third month around the world, has seen an unprecedented boom in virtual cycling. You have lowered your weight and skewed your power graph so it is inaccurate. For example, if a rider has an FTP of 210 watts and weighs 75 kilograms, that means the rider's FTP is 2.8 w/kg. nothing less. I use Zwift to get in shape and prepare for outside riding. Some of the reasons Ive never pushed as hard on a real ride include: Stopping / slowing for junctions Traffic / pedestrians / other hazards Appreciating the view No watt meter on my real bike I dont race in real life I dont do workouts in real life Changing wind Threat of a headwind on my home journey And the biggest: WantingRead more , Agree with the above. Mike, Great article as ever Eric. And besides, my main goal on Zwift is to not get dropped in the hills during Team Cryo-Gens more hardcore Saturday rides! Youve got people putting out 5+ watts/kilo atRead more . Yes us heavier riders have the downhill advantage definitely. Its funny, I was talking to one of my work colleagues who also Zwifts about AdZ and how because Im heavier (125kg / 276lbs) I would never be a sub 60m AdZ rider (I reckon Im looking at sub 2 hours, if lucky), Ive never once considered weight doping, sure I know I could but why would I? Hide the weight who cares let them upgrade all the way to As where you have strict reporting requirements. My performance IRL then probably looks pale compared to when Im racing in Zwift, I use the same power meter on Zwift as I do outdoors and I only push it outdoors during FTP tests and during closed road events (i.e. I wont do and will rather try my very best to compete with the As. For me its the most fun to see the progress I make on strava, new PR on climbs or on flats (hanging in on the back of a group) If I would lie about my weight I throw off my goals to Improve atleast make them near impossible for the coming time in the End I dont see the funRead more , I reversed dopped by mistake when I first started Zwift putting my height as my weight and weight as my height. His favourite races are Strade Bianche and the Volta a Portugal, and he rides a Colnago C40. Hes not looking for a trophy every race. As we said in the first post, "Assuming race organizers can access the data via ZwiftPower, and the site includes simple tools for spotting potential weight or height dopers (perhaps flagging those who made dramatic changes recently), then hiding weight and height data from the public should work swimmingly." Secondly, Zwifts statement says they agree there is a need for tools that deliver greater transparency to Zwift racing. Thats good to see, and we completely agree! Just from riding regularly I went from 166 FTP to 187 in 800 miles over a 2 1/2 months. was the lowest of top 15 riders. https://zwiftpower.com/profile.php?z=697996. If its a big hill, well then w/kg has us equalised. yes, but you are missing my point. Why not only require weight and height for entry to A and B races? As Zwift racer James Eastwood so aptly put it, The community dont want to see peoples weight they want fair racing.. The categories are the cycling equivalent to weight classes in boxing. Theyre only cheating themselves and it all comes out in the wash eventually. Racing on the Zwift virtual platform has only increased, with the professionals getting in on the act, too, via the Zwift Tour for All, the Virtual Tour of the Gila, and e-races organised by Team Ineos. This is why for a while I was ranked as a C even though my w/kg was higher than 3.2 since my watts werent over 200. There is no reason I should be gettingRead more , Sounds like its time to start racing the Bs, @guest_35522! 240W 50kg riders (4.8W/kg) beat 380W 95kg riders in B category Tempus Fugit time trials. 11 things you only know if you race on Zwift | Cycling Weekly I averaged between 300 and 310 watts for all segments and my heart sat pretty consistently between 140 and 144.Read more , saying x number of watts per kg at xxx hr is flawed anyways max and resting hr can vary alot. Not sure why its hard for you to believe that there are a lot of riders under 70kgs. My power to weight is decent at about 4w/kg. If I feel happy in my body thats the most important thing for me, and why I rarely weigh myself. But what exactly is ZwiftPower and how does it work? Id never do this as my Zwift Power is an accurate log of weight and power but it does make me wonder how much easier itd be to be bigger. I dont mind the low HRs but the low power and high w/kg really irk me! Just the fact that you need a third party (ZP) to validate race results really says it all. Everyone races at the same weight/height. Maybe with a KICKR Climb it might be possible. It points to the need for a results-based categorization system, which I discussed a month ago in the final post of my race category series. Daniel Ostanek is production editor at Cyclingnews, having joined in 2017 as a freelance contributor and later being hired as staff writer. Do you believe weight doping (reverse or otherwise) is a big problem in Zwift racing, and if so, what can be done about it? Bob, what on earth is that all about? I have climbed well and I have suffered on climbs but also sprinted well. Privacy Policy, How to Race on Zwift (Setup, Strategy, and More). Last week we announced Zwifts plans to remove rider height and weight from ZwiftPower, among other changes (read the full post here). I am racing in the Cs finishing in the 40-50s but there are 30 + racers ahead of me posting watt/kilo of A, and strong B racers. Look at ZP results. I put my real weight 95% of the time. But for most riders watts per kilo rules the day, determining which category you race in Zwift. But many people (including myself) prefer categorized races because we want to have a chance to actually battle it out for a win. As others have said, your higher weight helps on flat courses. for example,Read more . Well Eric, my weight is plummeting, and Ill probably be taking a break from Zwift over the summer, so Im sure the upgrade is coming very soon!!! No one is going to lose or gain 5kg overnight or shrink a 1cm. You enter a real race,out in the world, you are ready to finish in the top 20 for your best result of your life,then out of the blue a dirt bike rides past you goes tabletop and crossesRead more . Zwift is great just to ride around and it has lots of good training sessions which you can do. We would like to thank the community for your passion and feedback. ), So what is reverse weight doping? Hi, very impressive w/kg at 65. Great drafting skills!, Heres the thing: I probably am a fairly efficient racer, when I want to be. Thats not what I recall at all, everything is a race, even if you werent aware . Tough to recover after attacks in a race when youre always near maxing out. Taking weight out of the equation you could just make everyones avatar moving forward by holding down the up arrow on their keyboard. One question I have struggled to answer though which maybe is not a consideration is that on the flat watts is what is required and I also have to push high wkg to stay with groups. Updating Your Privacy Settings in Zwift Companion To update your default privacy settings, sign in to the Zwift Companion (ZC) app on your iOS or Andro. If there are problems, Zwift already has a reporting function and everything is recorded police that properly andRead more . It is obviously a stupid thing ( weight doping) and why a rider would do this is beyond me but pride and quasi Strava bragging or Zwift Power bragging is a thing. I havent even used my road bike outdoors since 2012. The categories currently used in most Zwift events are based on your FTP watts per kilothat is, your FTP in watts, divided by your weight in kilograms. what does help identify and stop cheats is formalizing race series and having them use an organization like Zada (whether effective now or not, this is the correct path). The Tour de Zwift events this year were much moreRead more , Wait. (Its not the only part, of course! Gain a few (virtual) pounds. This site contains affiliate links to Amazon, Wahoo, and other brands. I know its just virtual but my godi hope they enjoy their lies. either a) ur starting ur sprint way too late or b) ur leading him out. Category systems are complex beasts, of course, I agree, people can have fun with weight doping and such aslong they dont enter competitive races. First up, you'll have to head to Zwift.com and log in, then click on Settings > Profile > Connections and choose 'opt-in' under the ZwiftPower logo. But without any hard and fast rules, we cant say anything is illegalat least for certain races. How Do I Change My FTP On Zwift? Or are you looking for a participation trophy on every race as well? Heres an idea: Take weigh out of the equation. My weight is showing orange everytime. Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. As a 96kg, 51 year old with an FTP of 317 and a resting HR of about 48 (and a theoretical maximum HR of 174) Im not sure why my lower HR during an event should seen as suspicious. The other race, events, and activities are needed to display that data. would that be cheating then ? Noob question though, whats the etiquette around weighing with kit on or off. Work over time is work over time. I am 42 years-old with a HRmax of ~169 bpm. His 150 or 160 is not comparable at all to what mine would be, I have been Zwifting for a couple of years now I can honestly say I am completely addicted to Zwift. Zwift Insider is independent of Zwift corporate (www.zwift.com), although Zwift does provide funding to help defray site costs. How doRead more . I am not in the least bit interested in competition cycling, so no point in doping in either direction as i would only be cheating myself. If its not done during a competitive Zwift event, I dont see it as a problem. In fact, the only riders at or below my w/kg were minutes off the back. BA1 1UA. My IRL time and my Zwift time are almost the same. Conserving energy is a key part of successful bike racing. Goodness. Change weight in Zwift Power - General Discussion - Zwift Forums We like this move from Zwift. I would suggest a free (for now) virtual race license that would outline racer behavior with consequences. light guys categorically do NOT have an advantage on the flats vs heavier guys, assuming both riding at same w/kg, heavy guy WILL be going faster on Zwift. Youd think theyd be the same but when Zwift and Strava dont even agree on stats for the same ride, Ill take any other comparisons with a big pinch of salt. Is a very strong rider for his age and trains hard. , Myself being a lighter rider who fluctuates some 2kg during a week I tend to always use my upper weight giving me a lower Wkg. We remain committed to protecting the health and well being of the broader Zwift Community, and we look forward to enacting additional measures in the future. Generally weigh myself once a month. We are both lighter riders and find the w/kg categorisation system frustrating (unfair even) but its what we have at the moment I think most people feel like they have a right to be competitive but this simply is not the case and ifRead more . As long as people are using reasonable weight/height and arent cheating or changing it drastically all the time (my scales autoupdate my weight, so mine changes once a day, but by small increments), Im much more interested in being able to see the weight of my teammates so I can properly plan my TTT lineup than I am the weight of my competitors. All lists are full of 190cm lads weighting 65kgs. Why no monitoring on this? Either these racers need to calibrate the trainer or they are sandbagging big time. It must be very hard to do with many, many lines of code to implement otherwise it wouldve been done by now, In reality these changes would not (will not) impact cheating. I still have no sprint kick so Im never winning anything anyway. How do you actually update your weight on ZP?? When you're in the game, click "Menu". Zwift is full of cheaters and thats not going to change now. are clay hart and sally flynn still married; composite chart 12th house; tupperware party points; st francis of assisi school jobs I think a once-weekly weigh-in is acceptable. As an ambitioned A Racer with no smart scale, I stick to the higher end of the spectrum when setting my Zwift weight once a week. Visit our corporate site (opens in new tab). Exactly. Zwift posted a follow-up message on the forum, Zwift x UCI To Host Cycling Events for the Olympic Esports Series 2023, Race London ZRacing March Series Details, Notable Zwift Events for the Weekend of March 4-5. On a tablet or smartphone, you can download the. I dont think it can all be attributed to weight; it appears that some hardware tweaks can scale up the reported power output. Food for thought. Then everyone would know who is legit or at least somewhat legit. In IRL there is a double draft. Current category system simply allows very fast but heavy riders to race in categories lower than their actual abilities. This would cover submission and review of a private video showing height and weight which would result in a check mark on ZP showing this rider was height/weight verified. On Zwift I look suspicous. I disagree with you on this point. People still rode at B level pace in a C group. Even if Id ridden at threshold a little over 4 W/kg, I wouldnt have been able to hang onto the front in a D race, it seems. Currently trying to convince a friend who is new to Zwift not to reverse weight dope. 5 year age categories and incredibly competitive a in most age groups, Thanks so much for your helpful comment. There's a forum, too, so that users can discuss ongoing race series, find out about upcoming events and have any queries answered and problems solved. If you've already created an accountcheck out the s. There could be Zwift level weight bonuses instead of another pair of socks. I do ZHR Masters on a Tuesday night. I used to live next to the Alpe and later, next to the Ventoux. But theres one problem: this puts you into the B category, and you dont want to race the Bs. If you were to meet meRead more . (Image credit: George Marshall / Zwift) The first thing you notice when the flag drops, is Zwift racing is so much harder than your run of the mill bike race . If you are on the lighter side, try picking some climbing races. The latest race content, interviews, features, reviews and expert buying guides, direct to your inbox! Zwift doesnt like this and disqualifies him on Zwift power. If thats not something that needs fixing then why run any races? Skinny guys get DQd if they match heavies on the flat for power so they can NEVER win, even in the mountains. As a relatively light 69kg rider, I often feel at a disadvantage in the flatter races, of which there are many more than hilly ones. This can be seen by comparing Zwift physics with real life physics (calculated by websites likeRead more . Even some of the regulated weight rides will give 2kg leeway. Also a really frustrating thing is why doesnt Zwift autoRead more , is he riding in the right category? Especially for the C and D groups but even for the Bs albeit to a lesser degree. In order to ride with him I have to drop my weight to allow me to keep up. But maybe Im just thinking like a lady its hard for me to imagine a lady voluntarily gaining weight, even virtual weight. Heres how it works. I have to say I weigh myself most mornings in the buff (just my glasses on so I can see the numbers)! Adjusting Difficulty Before Your Workout. In spectacular and shocking fashion. It's a bit more complicated than most website sign-ups, but now you'll be all ready to get started. This is especially true if you are trying to ride with riders you possibly know locally or otherwise. In fact, you can change a workout on Zwift about as fast as you can U-turn a bicycle on a real hill. I am a long time racer in NorCal and cheating is cheating. While most Zwifters seemed to understand and even appreciate the intent behind the change, there was concern that removing this information would result in increased height/weight doping. Zwift Insider is independent of Zwift corporate (www.zwift.com), although Zwift does provide funding to help defray site costs. also interesting about this equation are the: wattage data points and the zwift computations of W/Kg. Though our intent is to protect potentially vulnerable users by removing labels that can trigger unhealthy behaviours, we also hear the concerns of the racing community. IRead more , Aaron, do you know what is the wattage requirement for Cat A? How does it work? w/kg is partially based on real world physics. You can record your weight n height n have it verified by experts etc up to five minutes before an event. Well, imagine youre a strong C racer. The categories currently used in most Zwift events are based on your FTP watts per kilo- that is, your FTP in watts, divided by your weight in kilograms. It all has to do with the way Zwifts racing categories work. (Same effect in a sprint, just harder to isolate). When a rider can change categories by modifying their virtual body weight, thats an issue. Just short of my 68th birthday I still dont see any point in cheating. I would say 1kg or more is more normal. I argue that he is intentionally misrepresenting his weight so he can place higher in B instead of getting shelled in A (like I do). They do however have a disadvantage on any flat or downhill. Theres also fitnesssyncer.com that is free up to 4 sync services. The license would be needed to participate in ranked races, however if you dont have a license, other races would be available to participate in. (Example: if your FTP is 300 watts and you weigh 75kg, your FTP w/kg would be 300/75, or 4 w/kg.) 1 second per 1 km on the AdZ dowhill (after losing minutes going up it) is literally the only place in the game its beneficial and the IRL advantages on the flats over light riders is excessivelyRead more . Then weigh yourself, and open Zwift, and see if it reflects the change. Though our intent is to protect potentially vulnerable users by removing labels that can trigger unhealthy behaviour What are they trying to protect? This is done by separating riders based on their FTP (functional threshold power) a wattage test you can take part in on Zwift over a 20-minute, 45-minute or 1-hour period. Daniel has reported from the world's top races, including the Tour de France and the spring Classics, and has interviewed many of the sport's biggest stars, including Wout van Aert, Remco Evenepoel, Mark Cavendish, Demi Vollering, and Anna van der Breggen. Its going to take a certain amount of calories for a certain person to perform a given amount of work in a given time. Some races (many, in fact) on Zwift work exactly like that. I started zwifting about 2 1/2 months ago.I did the ftp test and put in the correct weight.Ive no idea how precise my trainer is tho.what i do know is,Ive managed to go from cat c to a. As a Triathlete, I have a different perspective when racing and riding on Zwift because the vast majority of Zwifters (according to Zwift and Strava) are only cycling; whereas Im also training by Running and Swimming. As far as my weight goes the only thing I care about is being as accurate as I can to get accurate results. But youre not affecting anyone elses experience. ZwiftPower: Your ultimate guide | Cyclingnews (I dont recommend this approach, but it proves the point that weight doping is an issue that concerns many Zwift racers. There are two ways to do this. Introducing a horrible measure that addresses a problem that doesnt exist, and subsequently retracting it following mass protest is not exactly what I would call revolutionary change.