Zwift Chat

[bridgy]

Don't really know yet.

Only skim read the website last night, so I don't know if it has to be committed names or a squad. All I saw last night was between 3 and 8 riders. If it was a squad, then as long as we had 3 riders on the night I'm guessing we'd be ok.

They do allocate you to a start pen based on the make up of your team (based on the Cats of the riders) although they do say they'll adjust your finishing place if you start in the wrong pen.

Need to read up on it a bit more. Also to understand how the team name thing works.

Any advice @bridgy @<Tommy> @berty bassett @bobinski ?

I just thought it looked good. Always enjoy watching the team time trials on the pro tour and thought it could be fun to have a go at a virtual one

I think you're looking in the right place - the WTRL website. Like Bob said, some of the admins at ZSUN sorted it all out so I don't know the finer details but I would suggest perhaps you make contact via WTRL if anything isn't completely clear from the website rules.

What I do know is firstly changing your name on Zwiftpower to an exactly correct format was important for picking up team results (i.e our team within ZSUN was Red Giants so I was "Paul Bridgman (ZSUNR - Red Giants)" on ZP and everyone was the same format. Secondly, the starting Pen (or cat A-D) you join is not logical based on the w/kg valuesthat show on ZP or the companion app - your screenshot above shows how its done based on the make up of your team. So for example we had one Cat A in our team and the rest were B's and we had to join the D-Cat or D pen when sigining up for the race. (There is actually some logic to this - it's to keep lone riders who sign up to the event away from the proper teams, so faster teams enter a lower category and slower teams a faster category).

Once you enter a team formally via WTRL they give you a start time, so we had to join the event as normal and for us it was a matter of sitting on the line for 11 minutes before starting - this is the bt you'll need to get sorted with WTRL I guess. Results are then posted on the WTRL website - I think you need to be signed up for an account in the site to get these and I couldn't manage to do that but hopefully you can?

Apart from all that, there's some rules on their website regarding what to do if you catch or get caught by another team etc.

I hope you can manage to get your head round all the admin and get a team entered - it's hard, but good fun!

 

[Milzy]

I'm thinking of giving the VEveresting Alpe de Zwift a go. I've heard only about 250 people in the world have done it. Maybe a few more now with lock down. I'd try and go for sub 12 hours but just to complete it would be good enough.
I'd start at 7am with an aim for 7 pm finish. I could do with a bit of practice first but I can't seem me going back into work for another month at least so there's time.

 

[Aleman]

8 and a half ascents ... plenty of changes of shorts and socks

 

[Whorty]

I'm thinking of giving the VEveresting Alpe de Zwift a go. I've heard only about 250 people in the world have done it. Maybe a few more now with lock down. I'd try and go for sub 12 hours but just to complete it would be good enough.
I'd start at 7am with an aim for 7 pm finish. I could do with a bit of practice first but I can't seem me going back into work for another month at least so there's time.

I've been up and down twice, but gave up on the 3rd ascent 8 1/2 times is going to hurt

 

[Milzy]

8 and a half ascents ... plenty of changes of shorts and socks

One thing I've found is bibs push into my thighs as I don't like them baggy. I think the compression helps but hurts on long days. Varying the make of shorts will not just be cleaner but stop any mild post brusing. Also my feet sweat so much more indoors and I can easily get athletes foot.

 

[JuhaL]

One thing I've found is bibs push into my thighs as I don't like them baggy. I think the compression helps but hurts on long days. Varying the make of shorts will not just be cleaner but stop any mild post brusing. Also my feet sweat so much more indoors and I can easily get athletes foot.

If you gonna do that challenge then you should give yourself a liberty to stop when needed and change wet clothes to dry one and make you feel comfortable as possible.

 

[CXRAndy]

One thing I've found is bibs push into my thighs as I don't like them baggy. I think the compression helps but hurts on long days. Varying the make of shorts will not just be cleaner but stop any mild post brusing. Also my feet sweat so much more indoors and I can easily get athletes foot.

Some carefully placed desk fans to keep parts of your body cool and dry

 

[Del C]

So, I've been doing some reading of the WTRL website and I think this is what we'd have to do if we want to enter a Team Time Trial team in their weekly event.

First of all, we could try it as a one-off to see how it goes, in case anyone isn't sure they can or want to commit to riding the event regularly. We can then review and decide if we want to ride it again, regularly or occasionally.

The event takes place every Thursday, at 18.00, 18.30, 19.00 and 19.40.

We can enter a team of 3-4, or 5-8. Or I suppose 2 teams of 3-4 if we have enough people? Finishing time is taken from the 3rd or 4th person across the line depending on the size of team entered.

Entry is slightly complex, but this is what I think it says. One of us (at least) has to sign up to the WTRL website. From 7pm on Thursday, the WTRL site is open to enter teams for the following Thursday. We can enter teams according to the chart below:

For example, if we were entering a 4 man team, we could nominate 1 B Cat, 2 C Cats and 1 D Cat. We don't provide any names to WTRL, just the rider Cats that we are entering into the team, so we would need to know ourselves who our riders are.

WTRL encourage mixed ability teams, which they map to their 'Coffee Classification' (ie Latte in my example). Because of this, the standard Cat classification used by Zwiftpower is meaningless, so WTRL just map their TTT classification to the standard A, B, C, D cat sign ups and use their own classification system to separate the Teams on the road by staggering start times using an offset time per team.

Once a team entry is accepted by WTRL, they allocate you a start time. This is based on the nominal event start time, eg 18.30, with an offset (say 5 minutes) meaning in this example the start time for our team would be 18.35. All the times for each team entered are then published on the WTRL website, alongside a link to the event on the Zwift website. This is the point each individual rider in our team signs up, by following the link to Zwift website and signing up, in our example as an A cat.

We also have to ensure that each rider in the team has the same team name tag. This is how WTRL work out the team results. For example, we could decide our name tag would be Cyclechat 1, for Cyclechat team 1. The format required for entry would then be Derek Cobb (Cyclechat 1). You have to use rounded brackets and Cyclechat + space + 1. This is how WTRL filter the results and ensure all riders results are allotted to the correct team.

On the day, we are recommended to be in the pen 5 - 10 minutes before the event starts at 18.30. There is a time counter on the pen. In our example, the event start time was 18.30 and the team start time was 18.35. So when the countdown timer on the pen reaches 0, it is 18.30 (the nominal start time of the event) and we then have to wait a further 5 minutes before we start. This is exactly what we did when @bridgy organised the handicap race we did a few months ago.

WTRL recommend you can keep warming up by pressing A and going to the pairing screen (for a laptop user) or going to the garage screen (if you're on Apple TV, iPad, iPhone, etc), but make sure you return to the main screen before our 18.35 start time. You don't pedal when you're back on the main screen as this is a standing start event, so make sure you leave at least 15 seconds before returning to the main screen to ensure your turbo wheel or direct drive cassette isn't still turning as you'll be making a false start . Again, this is exactly what we did in our handicap race.

WTRL also recommend the team captain has a stop watch to count down the time to the team's allocated start time and then 'shout' go at 18.35 - you can 'shout' preferably by Discord, or by screen message. They recommend using Discord to help the team keep together or agree tactics once we are racing.

Results are published on the WTRL website.

It sounds a bit complex, but I think when you read it through, it's one of those things that once you've done it, it actually makes sense and is a straightforward process. And when you think that what they've set out to do is allow mixed ability teams to ride together, then its actually a good scheme. It just needs a bit of reading first time round.

If you want to read the full description of how the event works, you can find it here:

https://wtrl.racing/ttt/TTT-Rules-and-Info.php

So, what do people think? I'd like to have a go at this. I think it will be hard but fun. If enough people are interested I'll volunteer to sign up with WTRL and enter a team. Probably a team of 4, but if enough are interested we could swap to 8 or 2 teams of 4.

 

[<Tommy>]

So, I've been doing some reading of the WTRL website and I think this is what we'd have to do if we want to enter a Team Time Trial team in their weekly event.

First of all, we could try it as a one-off to see how it goes, in case anyone isn't sure they can or want to commit to riding the event regularly. We can then review and decide if we want to ride it again, regularly or occasionally.

The event takes place every Thursday, at 18.00, 18.30, 19.00 and 19.40.

We can enter a team of 3-4, or 5-8. Or I suppose 2 teams of 3-4 if we have enough people? Finishing time is taken from the 3rd or 4th person across the line depending on the size of team entered.

Entry is slightly complex, but this is what I think it says. One of us (at least) has to sign up to the WTRL website. From 7pm on Thursday, the WTRL site is open to enter teams for the following Thursday. We can enter teams according to the chart below:

View attachment 517809
For example, if we were entering a 4 man team, we could nominate 1 B Cat, 2 C Cats and 1 D Cat. We don't provide any names to WTRL, just the rider Cats that we are entering into the team, so we would need to know ourselves who our riders are.

WTRL encourage mixed ability teams, which they map to their 'Coffee Classification' (ie Latte in my example). Because of this, the standard Cat classification used by Zwiftpower is meaningless, so WTRL just map their TTT classification to the standard A, B, C, D cat sign ups and use their own classification system to separate the Teams on the road by staggering start times using an offset time per team.

Once a team entry is accepted by WTRL, they allocate you a start time. This is based on the nominal event start time, eg 18.30, with an offset (say 5 minutes) meaning in this example the start time for our team would be 18.35. All the times for each team entered are then published on the WTRL website, alongside a link to the event on the Zwift website. This is the point each individual rider in our team signs up, by following the link to Zwift website and signing up, in our example as an A cat.

We also have to ensure that each rider in the team has the same team name tag. This is how WTRL work out the team results. For example, we could decide our name tag would be Cyclechat 1, for Cyclechat team 1. The format required for entry would then be Derek Cobb (Cyclechat 1). You have to use rounded brackets and Cyclechat + space + 1. This is how WTRL filter the results and ensure all riders results are allotted to the correct team.

On the day, we are recommended to be in the pen 5 - 10 minutes before the event starts at 18.30. There is a time counter on the pen. In our example, the event start time was 18.30 and the team start time was 18.35. So when the countdown timer on the pen reaches 0, it is 18.30 (the nominal start time of the event) and we then have to wait a further 5 minutes before we start. This is exactly what we did when @bridgy organised the handicap race we did a few months ago.

WTRL recommend you can keep warming up by pressing A and going to the pairing screen (for a laptop user) or going to the garage screen (if you're on Apple TV, iPad, iPhone, etc), but make sure you return to the main screen before our 18.35 start time. You don't pedal when you're back on the main screen as this is a standing start event, so make sure you leave at least 15 seconds before returning to the main screen to ensure your turbo wheel or direct drive cassette isn't still turning as you'll be making a false start . Again, this is exactly what we did in our handicap race.

WTRL also recommend the team captain has a stop watch to count down the time to the team's allocated start time and then 'shout' go at 18.35 - you can 'shout' preferably by Discord, or by screen message. They recommend using Discord to help the team keep together or agree tactics once we are racing.

Results are published on the WTRL website.

It sounds a bit complex, but I think when you read it through, it's one of those things that once you've done it, it actually makes sense and is a straightforward process. And when you think that what they've set out to do is allow mixed ability teams to ride together, then its actually a good scheme. It just needs a bit of reading first time round.

If you want to read the full description of how the event works, you can find it here:

https://wtrl.racing/ttt/TTT-Rules-and-Info.php

So, what do people think? I'd like to have a go at this. I think it will be hard but fun. If enough people are interested I'll volunteer to sign up with WTRL and enter a team. Probably a team of 4, but if enough are interested we could swap to 8 or 2 teams of 4.

What a well thought out post Del 👍

I agree with lots of what you said. It’s definitely worth having a go, and there’s definitely a large element of trial and error involved! But it seems incredibly well organised.

Something I like about it is that they seem to really be encouraging people to enter with teams of mixed ability. So for you guys it should be a good fit. The next course is pretty flat, the last one was 1,400ft climbing. So you might find each week is someone else’s chance to ‘step up’ for the team.

In our pen at least one team had riders who jumped the start by mistake. But generally like you say it works the same as our handicap races did.

 

[Del C]

What a well thought out post Del 👍

Haha!

Once an engineer, always an engineer!

 

[mjd1988]

So, I've been doing some reading of the WTRL website and I think this is what we'd have to do if we want to enter a Team Time Trial team in their weekly event.

First of all, we could try it as a one-off to see how it goes, in case anyone isn't sure they can or want to commit to riding the event regularly. We can then review and decide if we want to ride it again, regularly or occasionally.

The event takes place every Thursday, at 18.00, 18.30, 19.00 and 19.40.

We can enter a team of 3-4, or 5-8. Or I suppose 2 teams of 3-4 if we have enough people? Finishing time is taken from the 3rd or 4th person across the line depending on the size of team entered.

Entry is slightly complex, but this is what I think it says. One of us (at least) has to sign up to the WTRL website. From 7pm on Thursday, the WTRL site is open to enter teams for the following Thursday. We can enter teams according to the chart below:

View attachment 517809
For example, if we were entering a 4 man team, we could nominate 1 B Cat, 2 C Cats and 1 D Cat. We don't provide any names to WTRL, just the rider Cats that we are entering into the team, so we would need to know ourselves who our riders are.

WTRL encourage mixed ability teams, which they map to their 'Coffee Classification' (ie Latte in my example). Because of this, the standard Cat classification used by Zwiftpower is meaningless, so WTRL just map their TTT classification to the standard A, B, C, D cat sign ups and use their own classification system to separate the Teams on the road by staggering start times using an offset time per team.

Once a team entry is accepted by WTRL, they allocate you a start time. This is based on the nominal event start time, eg 18.30, with an offset (say 5 minutes) meaning in this example the start time for our team would be 18.35. All the times for each team entered are then published on the WTRL website, alongside a link to the event on the Zwift website. This is the point each individual rider in our team signs up, by following the link to Zwift website and signing up, in our example as an A cat.

We also have to ensure that each rider in the team has the same team name tag. This is how WTRL work out the team results. For example, we could decide our name tag would be Cyclechat 1, for Cyclechat team 1. The format required for entry would then be Derek Cobb (Cyclechat 1). You have to use rounded brackets and Cyclechat + space + 1. This is how WTRL filter the results and ensure all riders results are allotted to the correct team.

On the day, we are recommended to be in the pen 5 - 10 minutes before the event starts at 18.30. There is a time counter on the pen. In our example, the event start time was 18.30 and the team start time was 18.35. So when the countdown timer on the pen reaches 0, it is 18.30 (the nominal start time of the event) and we then have to wait a further 5 minutes before we start. This is exactly what we did when @bridgy organised the handicap race we did a few months ago.

WTRL recommend you can keep warming up by pressing A and going to the pairing screen (for a laptop user) or going to the garage screen (if you're on Apple TV, iPad, iPhone, etc), but make sure you return to the main screen before our 18.35 start time. You don't pedal when you're back on the main screen as this is a standing start event, so make sure you leave at least 15 seconds before returning to the main screen to ensure your turbo wheel or direct drive cassette isn't still turning as you'll be making a false start . Again, this is exactly what we did in our handicap race.

WTRL also recommend the team captain has a stop watch to count down the time to the team's allocated start time and then 'shout' go at 18.35 - you can 'shout' preferably by Discord, or by screen message. They recommend using Discord to help the team keep together or agree tactics once we are racing.

Results are published on the WTRL website.

It sounds a bit complex, but I think when you read it through, it's one of those things that once you've done it, it actually makes sense and is a straightforward process. And when you think that what they've set out to do is allow mixed ability teams to ride together, then its actually a good scheme. It just needs a bit of reading first time round.

If you want to read the full description of how the event works, you can find it here:

https://wtrl.racing/ttt/TTT-Rules-and-Info.php

So, what do people think? I'd like to have a go at this. I think it will be hard but fun. If enough people are interested I'll volunteer to sign up with WTRL and enter a team. Probably a team of 4, but if enough are interested we could swap to 8 or 2 teams of 4.

Heck of a write up

I like the mix of courses. Don't want to put myself down as definite as hard to fully commit but very interested

 

[Joffey]

So, anyone fancy putting together a team for the WTRL Team Time Trial Event?

Races are on Thursday at 18.00.18.30, 19.00 and 19.40

Between 3 and 8 members in a team. I've screen shot the rules on team composition from the WTRL website at https://wtrl.racing :

View attachment 517661
The website explains the wider rules, how the event starts and how we may have to modify our team name tag to take part.

We've probably got enough B, C and D riders to make up a team, as well as @peterob in A now. Anyone interested?

Maybe it will just be a one-off, but if it goes well it could become a more regular or an occasional thing?

I'm up for it

 

[IrishAl]

So, I've been doing some reading of the WTRL website and I think this is what we'd have to do if we want to enter a Team Time Trial team in their weekly event.

First of all, we could try it as a one-off to see how it goes, in case anyone isn't sure they can or want to commit to riding the event regularly. We can then review and decide if we want to ride it again, regularly or occasionally.

The event takes place every Thursday, at 18.00, 18.30, 19.00 and 19.40.

We can enter a team of 3-4, or 5-8. Or I suppose 2 teams of 3-4 if we have enough people? Finishing time is taken from the 3rd or 4th person across the line depending on the size of team entered.

Entry is slightly complex, but this is what I think it says. One of us (at least) has to sign up to the WTRL website. From 7pm on Thursday, the WTRL site is open to enter teams for the following Thursday. We can enter teams according to the chart below:

View attachment 517809
For example, if we were entering a 4 man team, we could nominate 1 B Cat, 2 C Cats and 1 D Cat. We don't provide any names to WTRL, just the rider Cats that we are entering into the team, so we would need to know ourselves who our riders are.

WTRL encourage mixed ability teams, which they map to their 'Coffee Classification' (ie Latte in my example). Because of this, the standard Cat classification used by Zwiftpower is meaningless, so WTRL just map their TTT classification to the standard A, B, C, D cat sign ups and use their own classification system to separate the Teams on the road by staggering start times using an offset time per team.

Once a team entry is accepted by WTRL, they allocate you a start time. This is based on the nominal event start time, eg 18.30, with an offset (say 5 minutes) meaning in this example the start time for our team would be 18.35. All the times for each team entered are then published on the WTRL website, alongside a link to the event on the Zwift website. This is the point each individual rider in our team signs up, by following the link to Zwift website and signing up, in our example as an A cat.

We also have to ensure that each rider in the team has the same team name tag. This is how WTRL work out the team results. For example, we could decide our name tag would be Cyclechat 1, for Cyclechat team 1. The format required for entry would then be Derek Cobb (Cyclechat 1). You have to use rounded brackets and Cyclechat + space + 1. This is how WTRL filter the results and ensure all riders results are allotted to the correct team.

On the day, we are recommended to be in the pen 5 - 10 minutes before the event starts at 18.30. There is a time counter on the pen. In our example, the event start time was 18.30 and the team start time was 18.35. So when the countdown timer on the pen reaches 0, it is 18.30 (the nominal start time of the event) and we then have to wait a further 5 minutes before we start. This is exactly what we did when @bridgy organised the handicap race we did a few months ago.

WTRL recommend you can keep warming up by pressing A and going to the pairing screen (for a laptop user) or going to the garage screen (if you're on Apple TV, iPad, iPhone, etc), but make sure you return to the main screen before our 18.35 start time. You don't pedal when you're back on the main screen as this is a standing start event, so make sure you leave at least 15 seconds before returning to the main screen to ensure your turbo wheel or direct drive cassette isn't still turning as you'll be making a false start . Again, this is exactly what we did in our handicap race.

WTRL also recommend the team captain has a stop watch to count down the time to the team's allocated start time and then 'shout' go at 18.35 - you can 'shout' preferably by Discord, or by screen message. They recommend using Discord to help the team keep together or agree tactics once we are racing.

Results are published on the WTRL website.

It sounds a bit complex, but I think when you read it through, it's one of those things that once you've done it, it actually makes sense and is a straightforward process. And when you think that what they've set out to do is allow mixed ability teams to ride together, then its actually a good scheme. It just needs a bit of reading first time round.

If you want to read the full description of how the event works, you can find it here:

https://wtrl.racing/ttt/TTT-Rules-and-Info.php

So, what do people think? I'd like to have a go at this. I think it will be hard but fun. If enough people are interested I'll volunteer to sign up with WTRL and enter a team. Probably a team of 4, but if enough are interested we could swap to 8 or 2 teams of 4.

I’m registered on WTRL website and entered 8 teams a couple of weeks ago, although phyicallly (or should that be virtually) I was only on 1. It’s best if the team captain registers the team as they get an email that day of the event.

getting registered is easy - no bank details required 😀

it does sound complex but once you’ve done one it all clear Becomes clear.

mixed ability teams are fine and the category (or classification system) means you are competing against teams of roughly same ability in terms of teams made up of same category per ZP

the event is run in 7 different time zones thru the day and The top 10 teams globally in each classification qualify for the Premier League held the following Thursday- this is broadcast live on ZCL YouTube channel commentated on by Nathan Guerra.

I’m happy if you want me to register a team for the first week if youse want to give it a go but atm I couldn’t commit to racing as I’m tied up racing it for my Team Ireland team for the foreseeable

 

[Marino.g]

I’m happy to be a part of the team but can’t fully commit depending on work commitments so I’m happy to be sat on the subs bench if needed on the day but I’m a very poor C cat but might be back in D after Monday’s race .

 

[Whorty]

@Del C spoke to wife and she reminded me (!) that I shouldn't commit to racing a specific time twice a week whilst the lockdown is ongoing as we have no carer available and I'm needed to do 'stuff'. I'm going to have to be really annoying and say assume I can't do it and if you need a C on the day let me know and I'll see if I can join. Hopefully if we can get the carer back onboard at some stage I'll be able to commit more.

For now I'll stick with Monday's DBR race as missing one of those won't break the ride for others.