By Bradley Bleck
Cover photo courtesy of Bradley Bleck
My first foray into Zwift racing came courtesy of a friend’s invitation to ride with the ODZ Killer Whales of the Zwift Racing League (ZRL). The team, many of whom are from Spokane, races in C Category, considerably above where I began in E. Having taken plenty a beating in real-life racing, I figured it couldn’t be any worse online despite the discrepancy.
To race in ZRL and to chart my progress, I created a ZwiftPower account. Finishing races can improve one’s ZwiftPower score. Whatever one’s scores, outside of ZRL, Zwift will place riders in the most competitive racing category to minimize mismatches. To further balance the scales, given that about 20 percent of Zwift users are women, in-game performance is based on power-to-weight ratio, watts per kilogram, or w/kg. That makes Zwift racing fair for riders regardless of gender. W/kg is a great equalizer and the reason I have finished behind many a woman.
My first race as an ODZ Killer Whale was a team time trial of 16 miles. I didn’t do well, finishing five minutes off the back. Only the first four finishing times counted for the standings and I was our fifth. The second race was 27 miles. I finished 14 minutes behind. I missed the third race because our cat Chloe walked across my computer keyboard just before the start, crashing my computer. Race four was 25 miles and I was 10 minutes off the back, pack fodder yet again. In each of the three events, I was the penultimate finisher. (For those who don’t know “penultimate,” that’s “next to last.”) Despite my poor finishes, the team ranks nine of twelve in its category.
I finished so far behind because I am outclassed by the competition. No duh. My present FTP, the power I can presumably hold for an hour, is about 225 watts, roughly 2.5 w/kg. For the first race, I produced 2.0 w/kg. The winners averaged over 3.0 w/kg. Given the power differential, it was only a few minutes before I was blown off the back and slogging away on my own.
Finishing off the back means I don’t score points for the team or myself. Scoring points requires finishing ahead of those with higher scores, which is how one climbs from one level to the next. Being the penultimate finisher is little help with that.
Thankfully, there is more to Zwift racing than ZRL. Zwift offers at least one race every hour around the clock. These races have a category for totally new racers and there is no need to join a team. As I write this, I’m competing in the Zwift Unlocked series, five races over five weeks that began Oct. 6, three of which I have completed.
For the first two races, my ZwiftPower score placed me in the E group. Not long into the first race, I was with three racers, having gapped the others. We dropped one of the group, and then the other. I was excitedly riding for the win until the final kilometer, a climb. I lost by three seconds, but I was feeling confident about my prospects. While second among 10 finishers, I was first among those with ZwiftPower accounts, earning 10 points for my Zwift Racing Score.
In the second Unlocked race, there were 11 racers. Myself and one other rider dropped the others after a few miles. I lost by about 10 seconds as the winner pulled away near the finish. Because I had better racing scores than those I beat, I gained just four points, based, I assume, on my second place finish. Even though there was just 11 of us, the thrill of racing tactically, dropping riders and challenging for the win, made it fun.
For the third Unlocked race I decided to take a chance with the D group despite not having the requisite score, hoping to level up to D. The strategy paid off. I placed 40 out of 47 but picked up 42 points, putting me solidly in the D category. But it came at the cost of having to slog away off the back, having been dropped after a few minutes. Definitely not as much fun as contending.
I’ve been riding a second weekly race, Zwift’s Crit Racing Club. Two days after my third Unlocked race, I entered a crit race in the D category, again hoping to score some points and solidify my place in D Category. Finishing ninth out of nine cost me 30 points! Points wise, I was nearly back where I started but still, for the Unlocked series, three points above the D category threshold. Right near the bottom.
With my low score and ranking, Zwift racing cannot be about winning and losing, especially since I’m not winning. Being a contender is more fun than getting beat up by better riders, but the real benefits have come in raising my power from 1.9 watts per kilogram (w/kg) before the first race to 2.6 w/kg as I write this. My functional threshold power rose more than 50 watts and is now equal to my outdoor FTP of 225 watts. Middling for sure, but real progress. I’ve also had my best 15-second, 30-second and one-minute power numbers in three years on Zwift. Even for a dummy like me, what’s not to like?
Bradley continues to love teaching writing and literature courses at Spokane Falls Community College and hopes to both get stronger in Zwift races and enjoy as much time downhill skiing as possible this winter.
