Zwift Chat

[AlanW]

And by increasing the amount of XP you need per level, it means it takes you longer to get to the higher levels, which gives Zwift more time to stall adding additional levels - win/win!

Thats why I think its unfair, Zwift has taken the easy option by increasing the XP required instead of generating new levels.

A 1000 mile jump is sole destroying, assuming that you are childish enough to chase levels....

 

[steverob]

33

21

Ouch! You guys REALLY know how to pick them - those are not exactly ideal TT courses! But I will present them to the jury and see what they say...

 

[Legs]

Achterbahn? Road to Ruins? 5 laps of Glasgow?

 

[steverob]

Achterbahn? Road to Ruins? 5 laps of Glasgow?

That's a VERY good guess...

So Michael ended up picking Watopia (the list was deliberately NOT in alphabetical order) which has the most courses, although admittedly a number of the routes begin the same way, so as we knew we were only going to do a certain distance/time, some of them would be functionally the same as each other.

Similarly I ordered the list of routes in a non-standard way, just in case anyone tried to be a bit clever and work out what world we were in and therefore what course they'd most prefer.

Alex picked Jungle Circuit - can you do a TT on gravel bikes? One full lap plus the downhill lead-in from the pens would probably be about the right length.
Peter picked The Pretzel - which goes straight from the Pier to the Epic KOM, with the right distance probably meaning a finish roughly at the Castle, so 80% of the course (by time anyway) would be uphill.

Admittedly neither course particularly appeals to me, but if I had to choose the least worst, I'd go for Jungle. However I'd quite understand if the consensus was to abandon this plan and stay with the five stages we got originally!

 

[alex_cycles]

It is possible to get the Tron bike at Level 8 (!) which most people regard as the most versatile bike in the game (certainly compared with all the other road bikes and wheels, any benefits are absolutely marginal).

I can't really get my head round why people want to fill their garages with lots of different bikes, and their wardrobes with crappy socks and gimmicky gloves...

Socks and gloves you may keep, but I like to have the best available bike and wheels for the course I'm doing for the level I'm at. As you progress through the levels you can get the next best available bike. It's a video game. The XP progression motivates people to sit on a boring indoor trainer and even race against other boring sad-forks on boring indoor trainers.

I really enjoy the tactical side of bike choices for different courses and even bike swaps on certain routes. But right now the only ones I use are the Tron for rolling and mixed routes. Aethos + Rovals for climby routes. Grail + Enve for gravel or dirt. Cervelo + 808 Disc for flat routes. Could happily ditch the rest.

One thing I would do differently if I had to start all over again. I wouldn't bother doing the Italy or california challenge. I've never used either of those bikes coz they're crap (nor the Everest Emonda, which is a worse climber than the Cannondale Evo ). Would be nice if you could bin some.

 

[alex_cycles]

Alex picked Jungle Circuit - can you do a TT on gravel bikes? One full lap plus the downhill lead-in from the pens would probably be about the right length.
Peter picked The Pretzel - which goes straight from the Pier to the Epic KOM, with the right distance probably meaning a finish roughly at the Castle, so 80% of the course (by time anyway) would be uphill.

Haha. That's funny.
Actually I've done a Micro Mountain Massif TT on a gravel bike. It was "Sea to Tree" Temple KoM climb. Rude not to.

 

[Legs]

We could do Jungle Circuit on TT bikes to eliminate drafting? Will just be a bit slower, but watts is watts. Extract results from Strava as "Jungle Circuit Lead-in" + "Jungle Circuit 1 Lap"?

 

[alex_cycles]

We could do Jungle Circuit on TT bikes to eliminate drafting? Will just be a bit slower, but watts is watts. Extract results from Strava as "Jungle Circuit Lead-in" + "Jungle Circuit 1 Lap"?

If it was to be concurrent, that would work. Steve did float the idea of "do it when it works for you and submit your time" as well. So depends which end up being "the way". THe other thing that made the latter fun was he said you could do it multiple times. So on jungle circuit could try different bikes. Depends what the aim is really.

 

[Legs]

I meant unplanned drafting off other Joe / Jane Bloggses, rather than each other... I think Strava would be the only way of getting the times if we were just doing it at our leisure on free-rides?

 

[alex_cycles]

I meant unplanned drafting off other Joe / Jane Bloggses, rather than each other... I think Strava would be the only way of getting the times if we were just doing it at our leisure on free-rides?

I think you can have event times on meetups, but not sure they all start from exactly the same place?
For my recon vids I always use private club event, as that gives you a start from the pens (and therefore accurate distances).

 

[Peter Salt]

I think Jungle sounds like a better idea than the Pretzel - and it was the first choice. Agree with Tim that it should be TT bikes. How about we set it up as an event on Thursday, but then give people another week if they couldn't make it (to complete whenever they want).

 

[Whorty]

It is possible to get the Tron bike at Level 8 (!) which most people regard as the most versatile bike in the game (certainly compared with all the other road bikes and wheels, any benefits are absolutely marginal).

I can't really get my head round why people want to fill their garages with lots of different bikes, and their wardrobes with crappy socks and gimmicky gloves...

I love my fire socks ... although it does give me away when I'm sprinting

 

[steverob]

With meetups, if you are doing one that is only you attending, you will start from the same location as everyone else when they do theirs.

The problem with meetups was always to do with the riders starting on virtual trainers by the side of the road that had a gap between each one, so if you had a lot of people sign up, the start location could differ by as much as 200m between first and last riders, which meant the finish line was also in a different position for each person.

Plus when setting up a meetup there is an option to tick so that you won't see any riders who aren't in the meetup. That way there's no risk of drafting, meaning bike choice is fully open.

 

[steverob]

Tonight I'll do a quick test to check where the spawn point is for a Jungle Circuit meetup (just in case it isn't where I think it is - one or two courses are a bit weird like that) and I'll report back with what the "correct" distance would be if we go ahead with this.

If it is good, I'll then give out explicit instructions on how to set up your own Meetup (in case you've never done one before) or if you're unsure, I'm happy to set one up for you and invite you to it, as long as you let me know what date and time suits you of course. None of them will be before Monday morning though - that is when the 7 days officially begin.

 

[13 rider]

Meant to ask last night Andy , you mentioned I was on shallow wheels then you saw them change . Basically I equipped the bike with my DT Swiss bontragers before joining the ride but Steve mentioned he could see climbing wheels but I could see the bontrager logo . So I went and changed back and forth between the 2 sets . So all along I thought I was on deep sections but everyone else saw shallow just seems a bit weird