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I was lucky enough to squeeze in an afternoon ride today, it was a beautiful winters day in northern Sydney, full summer kit is all that was needed. Do you worry about all black kit for visibility?

I still can’t justify spending money on a winter kit, to be honest. Instead, I am wearing my Uniqlo thermal shirt under my loose-fit Pearl Izumi Quest summer jersey and its matching tights over my summer bib. It does the job by keeping me warm through the ride at a fraction of the cost.

Congratulations on the PR. That chamois pad does look cheap. That said, it does look nice. I did like the black on black look that you chose. I'll just be wearing my work clothes when I commute to work.

Criminally underated video

Did it 3 times, all pre covid. Never cracked the 10 (family commitments = poor training) Similar lead in every time, 3 month prior 20'ish hours training per week, mix of Beach Road, trainer programme and adding hills and 10 hour rides in the month before. The best result (10.18) was getting into the early gate and cracking the descent. Newspaper down the front of the jersey to stay warm, dump it at Tawonga before the climb. (Fattys go down fast). Holding the wheel of every one who came past from then on. I also learnt how to add / remove layers on the bike. Year 1 I lost at least 20 minutes pulling over and adding / removing layers for descents / climbs. You can never have to many gear inches, ever, like ever. Spinning 80 rpm on the meg on a 50/34 - 11-36 while passing folks standing up grinding their semis with 25’s was the (very brief) highlight. Tins of creamed rice in the lunch pack (other option was the provided curry bread roll 🤢) Tear tops means you can chug 600 calories in < 30 seconds. Put more mars bars and cans of coke in your valets than u think you can consume, then double it. If you don’t drink it, you can sell the coke can for 100 gazzilion dollars to the struggling dentist on the Pinarello (no offence to either … but I made $400) Don’t get cocky on Hotham. You’ll think you’ve finished, you start pushing it and then Hotham V2 waves her little “oh hi” middle finger at you and drains your will to live. Trust your Garmin … when it says there’s more to come, there really is more to come. Never stop moving, even if it means walking, just don’t be stationary. If you have to walk, fold your socks down over your ankles in your shoes so you don’t blister (year one lesson) or just ride SPD’s Pack a foil blanket … I gave mine to some pour soul on back of Falls who looked like he was being given last rights ... by himself, I hope he made it. Cry when you see the dam (mandatory) and don’t drop your chain 30 metres before the finish line (those photos never go away). Best and worst day hours(s)of my life

Sounds like they need to add another category: like a+,A,BC ? The other trouble with 5 minute power and or ftp test, is people can easily compromise the test, by not exceeding the numbers they want to stay in B?

How do you take any racing on zwift seriously, with all the silly things allowed to reduce time that have nothing to do with real racing.

It’s interesting you mentioned Whoop. I had one and it didn’t even see my subscription out before realising it was junk. The reason I say this is I raced the Long Dirty Warrny a 250 km gravel race (have done twice now), although I’m sure you’ve heard of it. The following day after the race, I was feeling a little worse for wear and yet my Whoop recovery score was at 96%, tbh I felt like I’d been hit by a truck. So for Whoop to be telling me I’m ready to perform at my maximum was an absolute joke. My TSS just for the race was in excess of 550. It also did this to me on a couple of 200 km plus gravel training rides. When I asked it’s AI chat how this was possible it advised me to call emergency services if I was feeling suicidal. Wtf!! After that it went straight into the bin. Cheers and keep up the great content, love the new editing.

I'm in Melbourne. It's been so cold. The gravel bike interests me. What end of the gravel spectrum are you aiming for? Light gravel or something more gnarly? I also need more kilometres on the bike. Not feeling the motivation for that at the moment.

This video is all whining from somebody that wants to win a race and do not want to compete with people way better than him. The issue you mention is exactly the same for a D that just got promoted to C, or a C that just got in into B. Sure as you go up, going higher is always harder. The real issue with Zwift is what you are doing, A riders that want to stick to B and ruin it to all the real B riders. Maybe Zwift should have an A+ category for the pros. But at the end of the day there can only be a finite number of categories and each category there are people at the top that have a good shot at winning, and there are people at the bottom of that category that have no chance of winning. That's the way it is in Zwift and in the real world too. In the pro pelotons most riders have no chance of winning any race.

made me a little more motivated :D cheers

And you discovered this Zwift problem in 2024? Bro, it's the same from the beginning. 😊 If you want to do some credible indoor cycling races, go to Indievelo.

This is essentially how bike racing works on the road, you move up and suffer.

Whatever it is, B just sucked a lot more this year compared to the year prior even after my fitness and race craft had improved. Races also suffer because everyone is gun shy to do a strong 20 minute effort too. It's just dump the tank racing which absolutely sucks when you are mid grade. Sub 20 way over power efforts get you a lot of climbs and sprints that blow the doors off the mid grade competition. Not to get too salty, I do also like being pushed and don't really care about race results. But the cat system needs work and everyone knows it.

They should go base in HR at said threshold power. If a 30 year old rider is winning a B race averaging 3.8 wpk but his average HR is 130 beats then hes obviously sandbagging the B race.

Can't believe you "only" have 874 subscriber... such a good content, and high quality video... keep on!!!

The fact that there are literally people riding a bicycle shaped game controller in their living room and huffing and grunting at their TV is hilarious. Just when you thought roadies were max cringe they go even harder.

Cool video. Consider decreasing the music volume a bit to make it easier to hear you.

Isn’t it normal you find it more difficult when you upgrade from cat

I have half a dozen mates who ride competitively in A in club races (in real life), but can easily sandbag in B on Zwift. If you sit in and just sprint, it's not difficult to stay out of the grading system's algorithm. Perhaps more factors need to be included in the grading equation - a certain number of podiums in a given time pushes you up a grade, etc?

Its called Sandbagging and 8 out 10 of the top 10 finishers in A,B and C races are Sandbaggers.

Add weight to the problem with cat B and fixed w/KG limits. Try a 4.2w/kg 65 kg rider vs a 4.2w/kg 95kg rider - who will win? Flat - the heavy rider by a large margin. Climb - still the heavy rider, but only by a small margin. Most of the best B riders have big numbers, and alot of kilos.

Its like I'm watching an episode from 5-6 years ago. Has been a problem ever since, Zwift never cared about improving this. Have a look at IndieVelo, you won't get mismatched racers given they have done a few races so IndieVelo knows your power. Its super easy to implement shows the one-man army behind IndieVel. With Zwifts workforce of more than 1.000 employees, you can only conclude that racing in general is not a priority for Zwift. Their number one priority is marketing and getting as many subscribers as possible who don't use the platform. Avid racers are not withing the scope of this marketed group. It has been like this for years and it will continue like this for years as Zwift is controlled by external stakeholders who have a vision that doesn't go further than the yearly (short term) result.

I kinda like being on the stronger end of the Cat B races and being able to make significant attacks or work to pull back breaks and not just hanging on for dear life

I picked up cycling, I did a cat D race as a noob and boom upgraded to cat C! I was like, what!? 😮 Never raced again! 😂

Good stuff. Zwift Racing Score (and hence, results-based racing categories) can't launch soon enough. Looking forward to it.

If your goal is to up your FTP to 4.5 you should just stop crying and race A CAT. It’s hard for everyone. More categories = less populated race. LAME.

Ramp overestimated my FTP by about 60-70W, I wouldn’t touch it with a 10m pole.

Zwift math is a wild place. A friend and I have done a lot of work trying to understand it. We both are B+ and have bounced around the top end of B for a long time, yet neither of us have gotten into A for more than a few days I once did a breakaway where I averaged 350 for 22 minutes or so. I got the A upgrade with a 4.2 wkg average. zFTP of 340. The next day I did a 6 minute Petite KOM effort at roughly 400 watts/4.9 wkg and went back to B with a zFTP of 325.

It's not a problem of cat B, it's a problem of cat A. I felt pretty good in cat B and the field was pretty fair and equal. But once you get into A it's like the wild west. All from 4.1 to 6 wkg in the same bag. Cheaters are way worse than the sandbaggers in B. In A, you have to grow up to at least to 4.5wkg to have any chance surviving.

The flaw isn’t the categorisation. It’s the lack of tough courses. Too short climbs. If there was races with high 8 min plus steep gradient climbs you’d have much harder racing. Instead it’s just sit on and sprint with the odd couple of 2 min punchy climbs. When was the last time you did a 20 min climb full gas in a Zwift race?

An alternative approach might be to have races where risers are split up into 4 or 5 or 6 groups based on FTP etc. The top group might contain the top 25% of riders, the second group the next 25% etc. In this way as a rider you would get a mix of races, sometimes you'd be at the top of the group you end up in and competing for the win, other times you'd be at the bottom and just trying to hold onto the front group. This would also remove the incentive for people to 'hide' and make it harder to game the system.

Zwift categories are deeply flawed, for many reasons. Also the ZRaces are short (usually on flat) efforts that rarely push people to the limits for more for a few seconds (maybe up to a 2min max effort at best). If you want to see more competitive races try one using the Zwift racing app categories. The difference is noticeable and much more fun races. DIRT and FRR use them. Hopefully Zwift will roll out racing score sooner than later and will help a bit.

Idealy you have 20 categories, so slimmer is the gap between them. But then the races will be different. I only see a ranking system with a set number of riders as possibility for this. Example: Each race starts with 50 people. The ranking devides everyone into sets of 50. The amount of riders that are left make up for the last "cat". In this way you have the more riders starting the race, the better it will fit your ability. You get ranked on your performance after that race.

When I do ramp tests it pushes up my 5 min power but not 20m. It actually reduces my zftp because it steepens my power curve. My ramp test outcome will calculate an ftp of 340w meanwhile my zftp is under 310.

Yeah I have been B for a long time but get dropped from the top B riders easily. But no wonder if I watch your race how you are able to hunt down breakaways that should not be possible for a normal b rider it’s all out all the time and we can’t easily go back and forth like you did it. So zwift really needs to have more categories as the fun goes down because people also like you prefer to stay b and not go to a as it’s not so cool to be dropped all the time. Welcome to the world of mid and low end of the category riders who always get dropped by a bunch of people who should be A

Sand bagging is happening through all the levels, just like a lot of masters riders are on testosterone, where you have competition you will always have cheats.

Sounds like there is space for another category but also Worth remembering that even at the professional level most the riders starting the race don’t stand a chance of winning. A lot of interesting things Zwift could try to solve. Such as handicapping by certain number of seconds based on your power curve and/or play with the aerodynamics to handicap (stronger riders get less draft) They could also try to factor in % of your best power curve, as in maybe the elastic band is harder to snap if you’re both doing similar percentages of your max for a given time frame. Difficult to optimise as you wouldn’t want to lose a sprint doing 1500 to someone doing 600 because both are 100% but that way stronger riders who begin to reveal their true signature as they get dropped or the finish approaches wouldn’t benefit as they’d still just be at 100%

Bro, if you have a 4.3 watt kg FTP you're an A. Stop being whiny bitch and ride A. You make the race for real Bs blow.

I think dynamic, performance based categories, the way IndieVelo does it make the most sense. Basing it on “fitness” numbers that people can easily manipulate doesn’t really make sense. How you perform in races should be what decides the category you are in.

I think you just described every cat up from D

It’s not hard for B’s to draft A’s and win, which is why I always go up in a mix race. I don’t think there are any A’s over 80kg

TFC Mad Monday races split thr categories. Theres Mad A which is for 4.85+wkg, mid a 4.37-4.84, mad b 3.96-4.36, mid b 3.58-3.95, etc. It's fun to race against others much closer in fitness.

As a low A myself it’s tough and what’s worse is since Autocat there are almost no riders in A races so can’t even get a race in (in Sydney Timezone) and I’ve almost given up bothering racing on Zwift. I can win the odd race as I have very good short term and sprint power and that is what’s keeping me in A unfortunately. Ultimately it’s a video game and a workout platform.

Thanks for this. I’m between C and B cat most of the time. I’m 67kg with no top end power (1 min is 5w/kg / never broken 600 watts in a sprint). I usually get upgraded to B off the back of TT results where I can ride at 3.4W/kg. I’m 56 and have approx 6 hours a week to train so significant improvement is difficult. I’m dropped very quickly in most B races - I just can’t sustain the requisite power on the climbs. I normally race very flat B races or TTs until I get downgraded back into C. I think a system of progression based on wins/ podiums/ placings could work or split categories for B and C with distinct A and A plus categories too. There is definitely a lot of deliberate sandbagging going on at the top of B and probably C too. I’m sure that Zwift love the prime time mayhem and large fields so don’t have an incentive to change. I’m happy to ride in B but would prefer a system that better used rider data to establish category. Thanks for the video, really good to see someone having an honest conversation about where they think they should be and the shortcomings of the current system.

Can you share your mobile image for using your camera? Nice.

Having spent a few years in Cat A, winning regularly, I would often not be surprised to see Cat B riders mixing in the sprints at the end of mixed races. Or, sometimes even checking ZwiftPower and seeing that the Cat B's finished the race faster than us Cat A's. Atter a lengthy illness I'm now working to regain my fitness and have dropped to CAT B. I'm finding the issues with the categories are not power related, but rather ego or race craft related. I say all.the time that it's not always the strongest rider that wins the race. As highlighted at the end of your Cat B racee here. If have stayed with the pack, made the most of the Aero gains from the pack and saved those efforts for the end. I find that folksnin A tend to race far smarter than those in B.

I do feel for B riders who don't have good VO2 max. I am currently sitting on 4.36 for 20 mins and am still classified B. I had a couple of months off and finding competitive races at the times I like to ride is difficult. I did a KISS race last friday with the As that was intense but the climbs were only 3.5 minutes @ 5.3W/kg so didn't improve my recent 5min power. I personaly enjoy the challenge of riding in A cat but have been disappointed that there have been so few A riders for most events and given the option of riding with 4 A Cats vs 30 B Cats I go with the later

Zwift needs to make an elite category for the 5kg plus, Then A riders can fall between be 4kg to 4.9kg.

Definitely not an easy thing to do. With any handicap system, the winners of one category would nearly always be fine racing in the next one up, you just have to accept that. In the case of cycling you have a problem of different rider profiles and different race types, and vastly different race participant amounts, making it almost impossible to settle on anything fair. As someone who races in off hours, I think it would make the most sense to combine a and b and just have the results split, but that would probably really annoy the prime time racers with large fields. But that way getting the a promotion would be see as an upgrade not a downgrade, because it makes it clear winning b is a really just someone losing to the A’s.