So You Want to Try Zwift

Riders who are "Zwift-curious" - this (very long) episode is for you! 

Kristin and Steve discuss the basics of Zwift, the popular virtual training app that gamifies indoor riding (and makes it slightly less miserable, or maybe even fun).

Transcript

Kristin 0:04

This is Kristin.

Steve 0:05

And I'm Steve, and you were listening to Cycling Together, a podcast about all things bikes, riding, and riding together.

Kristin 0:11

It's our first episode of the season.

Steve 0:13

First episode of 2026.

Kristin 0:15

First episode of 2026. And uh we mentioned on our last episode that 'tis the season, at least for us, for indoor riding. And we know that it's also time that people start contemplating New Year's resolutions with the indoor riding, but but we're here to talk to people who maybe have not started indoor riding or they're thinking about it and they've heard their friends or us talk about Zwift.

Steve 0:47

So yeah, or you can just listen to us make some mistakes and yell at the screen or your radio.

Kristin 0:53

We're gonna be doing what we're calling a beginner's guide to Zwift.

Steve 0:56

Is it a beginner's guide or is it more of a macro overview of all of the features of Zwift? That's what I'm gonna say. That is that title too long? Yes.

Kristin 1:05

Okay, yeah, there's nothing really zingy about say it again, a macro.

Steve 1:10

A macro overview of the features and slight nuances of Zwift. I don't know.

Kristin 1:20

Oh yeah, that is just woo. YouTube's gonna pick that up with all of its. But first, I am signed up for a ride already this year.

Steve 1:31

The PMC, right?

Kristin 1:32

I am signed up for the PMC winter cycle. So our son, the uh the least cycly of our family, will say you can't be non-cycly and live in our family, but uh is joining me. It is his first PMC event. It is the kickoff of my 11th PMC year, and it's an indoor riding event at Fenway. It benefits the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, as do all PMC rides. For us in particular, it benefits the uh Perry Levy Foundation for Gastrointestinal Cancers, and it is feeling particularly timely right now. And we have a lot of people in our family and our friendships who have been impacted by gastrointestinal cancers, which is anywhere from you know the top of the esophagus all the way down to your bum. Um, but we actually have a friend right now who's having who has colon cancer, and she just came through colon resection surgery. And one of the reasons I wanted to talk about it this is she shared this, you know, she shared an update about how she had eight inches of her colon removed. Um, and after 24 hours after surgery, she was pooping and moving around. And her doctor was like, that is astounding. I guess the doctor said your body is really showing up for you. And she is an athlete. And that's what she wanted to share this on her Instagram and social media because she was like, I'm always moving, I'm an athlete, I'm at moving at least 20 minutes a day. And the moral of her story was show up if you're for your body if you can. Move, breathe, get your heart pumping, stretch your muscles and your mind so that when you need it, your body will show up for you.

Steve 3:28

Okay.

Kristin 3:28

And the reason I show that too is a lot of people ask me, like, what are you training for? And I'm like, Life. Life. I'm not I'm not training for anything. I'm just training. Yeah, I'm training for more life, I'm training for better life, I'm training to be healthier in this life. And so reading her post about that really reinforced how important it is to move in some way, right? She didn't say if to cycle, she didn't say if to she's like 20 minutes a day, at least is what I get. Anyway, so those are a roundabout way of saying that um Andres and I are doing winter cycle at the end of the month, and it will be benefiting cancer research, in particular gastrointestinal cancers, including colon cancer.

Steve 4:10

That is fantastic.

Kristin 4:12

I'm excited. I'm I'm excited to do it with him. Bring him into the PMC family, and we are gonna have matching costumes, which is gonna be great. We're gonna be Power Rangers. Anyway, all right, so speaking of speaking of showing up for your body, yes, let's talk Zwift.

Steve 4:32

Let's talk Zwift. And why are we talking Zwift?

Kristin 4:35

And I and I think that maybe we start with that versus all the versus all of them, right?

Steve 4:40

And I think it's because Zwift really transformed indoor riding. It is the dominant player for I think good reason. And you know, I hated being on the trainer, hated it, and I cannot stand. I get people come in and say, Oh, I you know, I want a trainer because I just want to do some exercise in the winter. Not really cyclists, but people just think they want to get some exercise in the winter.

Kristin 5:05

Yeah.

Steve 5:06

And I'll just ride and I'll just watch TV.

Kristin 5:08

Yep, which is a way to go.

Steve 5:10

We are not shitting on anybody's choices before I don't know where you're going, but we are gotta say, to me, watching TV just makes me think more about what I'm doing on the trainer, and the time just you know, slows to a crawl.

Kristin 5:27

We have over the years tried various ways. You even have somewhere in the basement, like a VHS tape of Tortefront's routes that you were probably watching while you were riding your bike as ways. So there have been over the years many attempts to make the trainer more interesting less miserable. Yes. Um, we have tried the Suffer Fest, we have tried the Trainer Road. I'm with you. I'm with you. I could our daughter likes to watch like get on the trainer and watch New Girl. I find that completely unmotivational. I will be moving my legs. I can't say that I have the wherewithal to do it with any kind of like targets or thought. You still have to have like I don't know. It it doesn't feel like a workout to me.

Steve 6:21

No. Where's Zwift, which is it actually it actually is enjoyable.

Kristin 6:26

Yeah, it's an online interactive training and racing platform. It's a it's a video game.

Steve 6:30

It's a video game, it's a video game. It is it has uh gamified riding your trainer. Yeah, yeah, absolutely and all but only to the level of which you want, in a way.

Kristin 6:42

Yeah, absolutely.

Steve 6:43

You can add more and more game features to to your workouts if uh as you want.

Kristin 6:50

It's whatever you want to make of it, and there are some things like we're gonna talk about like music or not music. You know, some people love there are there are road sounds, there's sounds of it, and some people love that, some people don't. It it really is what you make of it, but it is the fact that you are seeing that uh you know, you start rolling your your pedals and your person starts moving, that in and of itself is very impactful, right? Like you're like, oh, okay, okay, I get it. But what we want to do is we want to take a step back. And if you're someone who is first of all, I know we're gonna have a lot of listeners who are on Zwift now, and as you alluded to, are gonna be yelling at the podcast machine about what we say that's wrong.

Steve 7:40

That's we're just saying that together. That is just keep you listening, uh keep you listening so you're you're you keep us on our toes.

Kristin 7:47

Right. The privilege of being a podcaster is saying things from an uninformed status. No. Um but we've tried our best to dig into some of the questions.

Steve 7:56

Um, I I have been on Zwift as a beta tester, so since its inception. And and I always say this every time we talk about Zwift, so I'll give it the 20-second thing. At the beginning, Zwift was a nightmare. It was an absolute nightmare for years and years and years because we had both Ant Plus and Bluetooth devices that you were trying to sync up. There was no there was no Apple iOS.

Kristin 8:20

Yes.

Steve 8:21

Um, and it was it was nightmare fuel. Sometimes you go down to do a workout and spend an hour trying to get things to work.

Kristin 8:29

Yeah, but see, why why say that? I have a question.

Steve 8:32

Okay.

Kristin 8:32

Who cares?

Steve 8:33

All right.

Kristin 8:33

If you're someone starting today, you don't know that or need to know that. Okay. What you're coming into is is a mature system that people like you have, thank you for your service, have helped grow.

Steve 8:47

You're right.

Kristin 8:48

Right? But someone coming in now, that's what we don't want them to be, is intimidated by the idea because now it just works. Because now it does seem to just work. I mean, it's like many technologies, right? Like somebody says to me, Oh, I'm, you know, doing a WordPress site. I certainly could be like, Well, back in the day, WordPress was quite the nightmare. But I'm not gonna say that because right now it's really good and stable and it's a great, it's a great system. Okay, so let's start with someone says to you, I want to do Zwift. What do I need equipment-wise? Okay, number one.

Steve 9:23

Number one. That's what we're going for with that.

Kristin 9:25

We need a bike.

Steve 9:26

All right, right? You do. You need a bike. You need a bike to ride. Yes. So whether that is your existing bicycle that you use outside that you want to now put on a trainer, all right.

Kristin 9:37

Okay, let's let's start with that.

Steve 9:39

Okay.

Kristin 9:40

I have a bike. I've heard I can use it inside.

Steve 9:43

Yes.

Kristin 9:44

What are some things you should? I know some of this will tie into the trainer, though the trainer itself that we're gonna talk about, but like fundamentally, is there a risk to using your bike, your outdoor bike for indoor activities?

Steve 9:57

And sh there's a slight risk. Okay. And and really the biggest risks are one sweating all over your current bike. So you want to take measures to protect your bike from the sweat. Okay. And the second is really just if you have a wheel-on trainer, then you're gonna wear out your rear tire. Okay. They do make trainer tires that you could put on just for that winter time or whatever you're gonna be using it. Yeah. So those are the really the only risks of right.

Kristin 10:27

But the cool thing is you could just use the the bike you have. You don't have to buy a Peloton.

Steve 10:32

Any bike type.

Kristin 10:33

Mountain bike.

Steve 10:34

Mountain bike, hybrid road bike. You know, in Zwift, everybody is on road bikes. There's actually an option to ride a mountain bike, and actually, even hand cycles.

Kristin 10:44

They have like a Pee-wee Herman style bike, too, if you've earned that.

Steve 10:48

Like if you know, you want to any bike you have.

Kristin 10:52

Yes, you could be on a mountain bike physically, but the avatar could have a road bike, yes. Doesn't matter, doesn't care. Um, and the sweat thing is because I mean, obviously you sweat outside, but when you are just dripping on your bicycle because you're not moving anywhere, it's just it's really corrosive.

Steve 11:12

It's very corrosive. Some people are much more corrosive than others. Yes, we've talked about it. And the biggest the biggest risks there are your headset bearings, because so that's right up front. You're dripping all over that. Okay. And then your handlebars. So if you're on a road bike and you're s and you your hands are all sweaty, what you're actually doing is that sweat is soaking through your bar tape down to the a bar. And if you have an aluminum bar, it actually corrodes the aluminum bar to the point where they can snap. So, and I and I see this, I see this not often, but enough where I'm saying redoing bar tape in the shop on a road bike, and I unwrap the bar tape, and you just have all of that white aluminum um oxidation around the shifter clamps. Yep. Right. And when I see that, sometimes if it's really just real surficial, I can clean that up. But most of the time it's quite substantial. And I and I tell a customer, you we have to change your panel bar. Okay. And because I have seen bars snap from that current.

Kristin 12:19

I mean, that can happen even outdoor. Obviously, you sweat and it can, but we're making it worse indoor because it's so it's not evaporating, right?

Steve 12:28

Right, and it's just so concentrated over and over and over. And you don't tend to sweat as much in your hands or drip down outside as you do inside.

Kristin 12:38

And you're even with a fan on less likely to wash your exercise bike correctly. Right. Like you might have a really sweaty ride, you come home, you you hose it down, that clears out that sweat. If you're down in the basement, that's not gonna happen.

Steve 12:53

And you know, if you have a dedicated bike and this happens, I mean, honestly, if you snap your handlebar, you're gonna be fine inside.

Kristin 13:03

You could fall off your bike, but you're not gonna be falling in the bike. I suppose you can fall forward. Yeah. Right. You're not gonna be falling in which brings us to dedicated bikes. So we've talked about this in the past. You and I use uh we have dedicated bikes.

Steve 13:19

They are that just live on the trainers, and they are a just hodgepodge of of parts and frames and that's what I was gonna ask.

Kristin 13:27

So what's the bare minimum? Because it doesn't have to be a full bike. What is like the bare minimum build for an exercise bike like you and I are running?

Steve 13:37

You know, it's interesting now that Zwift has this thing called the Zwift cog. Yes, which is basically a single cog that you replace on your trainer um so that you and then the the system virtually shifts your own. Right, instead of you shifting your gears. Yeah. So you know, you need a a frame, a stem and handlebars. If you are going to be shifting gears, then you need the shifters, right? But if you're using the cog, you but if you if you're using the cog, all you you actually you just need brake levers, which of course you're not gonna have brakes. So you don't need brakes, you need a crank and chain to turn the pedals. But it's it's a lot of stuff that oh, quite frankly, if you're a cyclist, you can probably come up with these parts from either your own parts bin, your friends cast off parts, old stuff lying around, the local transfer station freebie area.

Kristin 14:40

I mean, I know you say that I I could not. I that is not in my could I? Sure. I because I can do anything, but um, it's not initially in my comfort zone to be like if I didn't have you, to be like, okay, I'm gonna go find an old frame. I'm gonna go find so could someone like me come talk to someone like you and be like, this is what I'm trying to do, and could you help cobble together something? I could. Okay.

Steve 15:08

That can get hard, like a lot of yeah. So in a in terms of a bike shop doing this, it is possible, depending on the shop, on what kind of stuff they have around. Like if somebody came to me, I'd say, Well, oh, actually, I actually do have a couple old frames, right? So it'd be like, Oh, you know, I've got this and I've got a couple of these parts. If you can find these parts, right, right, um, then yeah, bring it to me and we'll just put together something for you.

Kristin 15:36

Um, I was thinking about this when I was riding yesterday. So I only ride outdoors one by the one downstairs. My bike is a two-by system. It's been kind of irritating me because I never ride two by, and so I'm having all this trouble figuring out that. Should you try to replicate as close as to possible your gearing that you actually ride on your exercise bike, or at least the fit or something? Like, what are you trying to Well the fit.

Steve 16:05

Okay, the fit is the most important thing. So you have three contact points on the bike: your saddle, your your beet to the pedals, and your hands on the bars. Right. That's funny.

Kristin 16:16

It would have been like the saddle and my left hand and my right hand.

Steve 16:19

Those all have certain distances, right? And setbacks and all that just so you are looking to take your existing bike that you were comfortable on, and if you are now creating a dedicated bike, you want to replicate the the those three contact points on your trainer bike.

Kristin 16:36

Okay.

Steve 16:36

Yeah.

Kristin 16:37

Okay.

Steve 16:37

And so because you're basically getting the same fit. Okay. So that the trainer bike feels just like your outside bike that you're happy with.

Kristin 16:47

Okay.

Steve 16:47

Okay. And it doesn't matter what type of bike it got.

Kristin 16:50

Right. Now, if you are someone who's just starting from scratch, right, you and you don't want to use your outdoor bike, there is a frame that you can get from the city.

Steve 17:02

Well, Zwift has a whole uh basically a bike kit. Yes. Yes, with the trainer, and it's just uh a ready-to-ride setup.

Kristin 17:10

Right. I uh honestly, when I was reading about it, so it's as of this recording, it's $1,300 for the frame and a Wahoo kicker core 2 with Zwift Cog. Yep. The kicker itself is $549. We're gonna talk about the those, and it's $7.99 for the frame. Honestly, if I didn't have you and I didn't want to put my fancy bike on a trainer, I could see myself doing something like this. I I could see myself making that investment and being like, well, this is just set. I can just put it in, I can set it up, and I don't have to I didn't think that was unreasonable.

Steve 17:47

It is hard to say how long existing things will stay similar enough, I guess it is. Yeah. But they haven't changed other than the the interactive electronics of the system, they haven't changed all that much in forever. So there's no reason to believe right now that that that Zwift bike couldn't last you 20 years.

Kristin 18:13

Well, and you can the frame is you can buy just the frame. So say you have a uh the trainer already. You have a trainer and your bike for whatever reason dissolves underneath you.

Steve 18:25

Yeah, or you're sick of bringing your outside bike in and out and then out. You can just get the frame. Yep.

Kristin 18:31

And the frame really, there's nothing special.

Steve 18:34

I and I know they call it the zip ride frame, but it's more than just the frame. It's it's everything you need to ride. You know, you don't you don't have to add your own handlebars. Yes. And you don't have to, yeah.

Kristin 18:45

It's a bike.

Steve 18:45

Yes, exactly.

Kristin 18:47

It as yeah, you're right. Yes. Even though they call it a frame. It's a bike, it's got handlebars, it's got cranks, cranks, and it's got everything. It's like sit it right. Yeah. Yes. So as I said, I didn't think that I haven't looked at what like a Garmin smart trainer bike costs, but but that didn't seem as unreasonable.

Steve 19:09

If you want a dedicated bike down here, it's not it is not unreasonable. It is certainly there is an argument there that the extra cost outside of the trainer can be done way cheaper with again putting together a mishmash of parts or even in some cases a a used uh road bike that you you know.

Kristin 19:35

Absolutely, but not all of us have the technical expertise or the interest. Right. Right. In like there's that it's the cost, what is my time worth? What is my what do I want to spend my time learning about? So absolutely. I I don't think there's any question that my old K two bike down to the basement is less expensive than a right, you know. $800 frame setup. But um again, if you weren't here in my house, and this is something I wanted to start, I as I read about it, I was like, Yeah, I could absolutely see myself starting that way. Okay, now let's talk about what's driving us in the back. The the trainer.

Steve 20:19

Okay. So this has been sort of turned on its head. There are many, many trainers out there by different brands that work fantastic with Zwift. Yes. And basically what Zwift needs is a trainer that um well, if you have a separate power system on your bike, right, Zwift needs power. Power meaning it what like the number of watts that you're outputting. Okay. All right. In the past, and I don't want to necessarily get into that too much, there would be Zwift virtual power. Yes. And it knew the it knew how much effort is a trainer needed to turn at a certain rate, and it would sort of estimate the power based on that. Okay. Forget that. Because power is just is so much cheaper and and ubiquitous now. So the trainer itself, now what what happened is that a company called Jet Black was making trainers. Okay. And Zwift then took that trainer, packaged it themselves in their under their own brand called the Zwift trainer. Yeah, priced it at like I think $4.99 or something like that, and absolutely just flipped the table, upset the Apple card on the whole trainer market. Because trainers, these are off-wheel trainers. I mean, you don't have a rear wheel on your bike.

Kristin 21:41

Okay.

Steve 21:42

The trainer mounts directly, the bike mounts directly into the trainer. Yes. Yes.

Kristin 21:46

Keep going.

Steve 21:47

I know I'm getting in the weeds here.

Kristin 21:48

No, it's not that you're in the weeds. I'm I'm after you're done with this, I want to reel you back.

Steve 21:53

Okay. So because trainers of that level and that quality, off-the-wheel trainers um with power, were at least 900 and up, typically over a thousand. So Wahoo, a big company that made a lot of popular trainers, was was realized this is gonna kill our company. Okay. So they bought a major stake into Zwift and basically took over that whole sish situation, right? So now the sort of the Zwift trainer, if you will, is the Wahoo.

Kristin 22:32

Which is five hundred and forty-nine dollars. And as you were saying, there's no rear wheel, it just has the cassette, which is in the trainer itself, yes, and spins.

Steve 22:44

Yep.

Kristin 22:44

All right, but I'm gonna say $549 is a lot of money.

Steve 22:48

Still a lot of money. Yep.

Kristin 22:51

There is a cheaper way to get into this, which is a wheel on trainer. In fact, Garmin has the tax boost trainer bundle that retails for $329, but again, as of this recording, is $170. What is it? What I I'm new, again, I'm new to this whole trainer idea, and I'm looking at a website that says I could spend $170 and get up to speed on Zwift. How's that? What is that doing? And what are the compromises I'm making if I get it?

Steve 23:24

So again, this is a wheel on trainer, so you have to your the your rear wheel and the tire is turning a small drum. Okay, so there's wear on your tire there. Yep. Okay, and there's a lot more noise. That's another big thing to consider is that wheel-on trainers have a significant amount more noise because of that friction between the roller and their tire.

Kristin 23:46

I don't remember mine making that much noise.

Steve 23:48

You yeah, you don't remember it, but it was much louder in. Right.

Kristin 23:53

I don't give a crap. So that's I mean, that's that and that's the big downside, right? It uses Bluetooth to send data to um.

Steve 24:03

Whatever device you're running Zwift on. We have to talk about the devices you're running Zwift on.

Kristin 24:07

Okay.

Steve 24:08

Yeah. So that is the that is a great inexpensive way to get into Zwift. And the only and this is where I guess what we could I want to say one thing. There's a big difference between 549 and 170. That's a huge difference.

Kristin 24:24

Yeah.

Steve 24:25

So the only thing to consider there when you're looking at this is this is uh something that you will have for a very long time. Right now, there's no reason to believe that things are gonna change that much.

Kristin 24:39

You can use it uh you can use a trainer wheel off, even if if Zwift closed tomorrow, yes, you could still use a smart trainer for to watch TV dozen other things, right? Exactly. They're not specific to Zwift. So it is an invest, it can be considered, you could think of it as an investment, spend a little more or double now.

Steve 25:04

If you think you're gonna stay on in using the trainer every, you know, then then really consider that price difference if it's worth it, because otherwise, for a lot of people, they might get the cheap one thinking they want to see if they like it or get into it. Reasonable, reasonable idea, but then I only have to spend the extra to get the much quieter, nicer.

Kristin 25:26

Yeah, I mean, I get it. Even as we were talking about this offline, you were like, I would never recommend a wheel-on trainer. Not anymore. I get that, but also if that's the barrier to entry, or if somebody found one, right? Maybe they had a friend who they upgraded from a wheel on because they decided they wanted a smart trainer, then yeah, I'd actually rather see it before I'd actually rather see wheel off trainer first.

Steve 25:54

Yeah. Yeah. Yep.

Kristin 25:55

Just to see, I just don't I I I worry that sometimes when we see all these costs, it it becomes exclusionary.

Steve 26:02

Yes.

Kristin 26:02

And I feel like of all the indoor riding options, this is pretty inclusionary, right? Like because again, you could you could just use your bike, right? Like you I so I wanted to make sure we're we're clear that there are ways to get into this a little more inexpensively. Yep. Um, okay, and then you mentioned also the smart cog, which is so the wheel on train, the wheel-off trainers right now use cassettes.

Steve 26:31

Yeah, and you have to match the number of of cog you have to match your your speeds on your cassette and put that correct cassette on your trainer.

Kristin 26:39

Right.

Steve 26:39

So if it's a dedicated bike, then whatever you have on there, and then obviously if you know, so and and and if you're gonna share a trainer with somebody, like a spouse, and they have 11 speed Shimano and you have 12 speed SRA, you then you can't share the trainer. But the Zwift cog makes it so you can.

Kristin 26:59

Does the Zwift cog also mean there's no chain?

Steve 27:03

No, it it just is basically just a single cog.

Kristin 27:06

Okay.

Steve 27:07

Yeah.

Kristin 27:08

Cool. So my chain can't fall off. Right. Because my chain has fallen off in the basement. Right. Like you're like, oh, I can't believe I just I just left. I gotta stop my ride now to put my chain back on. My bike that's not going anywhere. All right. I think that's pretty cool. All right, what else? We've got our bike, we've got our trainer. What else do I need?

Steve 27:31

Something to run the Zwift program. Yes. Okay. So you can use a you can use a computer. Number one. So a laptop or a desktop.

Kristin 27:43

Yep.

Steve 27:44

And I would say probably most people are running a laptop because you have that screen in front of you. Obviously, a screen because you have to be watching what you're doing.

Kristin 27:54

I read one article uh by Molly Harford. Um, and she was like, You can run it on your phone, you can run on your screen. She goes, but all I can say is the bigger the screen, the better. Oh, absolutely. Because there's also a lot, not only does it give you a more visceral experience, but there's a lot of data on the screen that, as I get older, is harder for me to do that.

Steve 28:15

And and part of it for my brain is all of that data is one thing that helps the time go by because there's a lot of stuff to look at and analyze and heart rate. Exactly. Yeah, it's it's so and then the other thing that Zwift has is Apple iOS app.

Kristin 28:34

Yes.

Steve 28:35

So you can run this on an iPad, an iPhone, or an Apple TV.

Kristin 28:40

Yes.

Steve 28:41

The Apple TV, and this is, I mean, my opinion, and every a lot of people's opinions, is the best, cheapest way in many cases to get into Zwift. Yeah, again, yeah, I mean 150 bucks is not inexpensive, but you are basically buying a computer that runs Zwift.

Kristin 29:01

Well, or you have Apple TV, which a lot of people do. And it's a lot of people.

Steve 29:06

Yeah, or you have an Apple TV, right? It's already on it. Well, it's an app that you get put on it. So now, I mean, I've seen people run Zwift and they're looking at their little phone, right? I mean, I don't know how you do that. That's not to me immersive or interactive or whatever.

Kristin 29:20

That's just makes my eyes hurt.

Steve 29:21

I can see that maybe you're, I don't know, on a business trip or something like that. And but anyway. Um and because I believe, oh, I I will make quick, quick side note. I believe that a lot of hotels have bicycles in their fitness rooms that have the capability to connect to Zwift.

Kristin 29:44

Get out of it.

Steve 29:44

So you could bring your phone or your iPad and then and then run. Yes, I believe that's the case. Okay, that's pretty cool. Somebody might comment on that.

Kristin 29:51

Right.

Steve 29:51

Okay.

Kristin 29:52

I'm sure someone will.

Steve 29:53

So then the next thing would be the next best thing, I suppose, would be the iPad if you're running iOS, right? Because it's bigger. Um, and then for us, we run an Apple TV connected to a TV. Right. And just it is really, really nice.

Kristin 30:08

And and as we've said before, but I will reinforce on this on this episode, screen position does matter. Where you want to be in a fairly natural, again, we talked about the three points that you're in. You want to replicate. So you also want to replicate how you would be looking down the road. So think about where you're putting this screen so that you can have a natural head position to see it. That was the thing we've been trying to work on. Um, but the same could be for your iPad or your or or anything. So I know there are some too that put it right in front of you. And I feel like that might work as long as you Yeah, I mean the smaller the screen, the closer you want it, right?

Steve 30:48

If you have an iPad, you're probably only gonna have it two, two to three feet away from your face. Right, right.

Kristin 30:54

Exactly. So, but sometimes it'll be on a like a table or, and this is one of the what we'll call essentials. You do want like something to put some stuff on, either whether it's your display or so.

Steve 31:06

You have somebody gave you yeah, actually, uh uh somebody was moving and gave me one of those. Um, well, what's a it's a Wahoo table. It's basically a U-shaped table that rolls up in front of your trainer bike. Yep. Um kind of surrounds the front wheel. Yeah, it's very cool.

Kristin 31:22

It's cool, it's a little pricey. I use an old music stand.

Steve 31:24

Oh, it's super pricey. I would never buy one for myself.

Kristin 31:26

I love my little music stand. It's just the right, you can get it nice and close. You can have it, I can put all the remotes that I need, my headphones, an extra rack. You know, it's just like it's perfect. And I think it was $15. So I will say it's a solid back one, not one of those old-fashioned wire ones. All right, and then in addition to the screen and the computer, then we have another app that Zwift give us, gives us called Zwift Companion.

Steve 31:55

Boy, I never realized how many, how much tech this thing does actually kind of need, right? So yes, so Zwift has this thing called the Zwift Companion app. And that you can run on an Android or an Apple phone. So if you're running Zwift on a computer or an Apple TV, like we are, you now on my handlebars, I have my phone mounted. And what that's doing is running the companion app. And and the great thing about that is it's basically crosstalking to your existing workout ride. Yep. So if you're if you're doing an actual structured workout, it has a uh bar which will show you in graphical format where you're supposed to be power-wise, which is really, really helpful when you're doing these workouts, other than trying to just keep the number in the upper corner at the right zone, right? Because it gives you a zone of the power. When it tells you to say do 200 watts, it can be really hard to yeah. We'll get to that.

Kristin 32:57

We're gonna get to that. All right, but it lets you. I mean, the Zwift app lets you can be any app lets you watch your workout or see where you are on the map. Yeah, it lets you chat with people like there's by text. I cannot do that. I am not functionally able to chat and ride my bike at the same time without losing cadence. I've heard I know you can do text-to-speech. I'm not that coordinated either. Um, sometimes when you're on a free ride, it'll say, Do you want to go straight or do you want to go right? And that's right. Yep, you're gonna choose your choose your direction before you come to an intersection. It lets you give ride-ons, which is basically how we encourage everybody. And there are benefits to that that we're gonna get to, but it's really cool. You just you just touch your where you are on the map, and it automatically gives what five, five or six people around you. Yes. If they're around you. The nearest people around you. And I'm always determined, I'm always I hit that ride-on like it's going out of style.

Steve 33:52

Well, it doesn't, it doesn't once you hit it once, you there's a it refreshes, it refreshes. There's a time period before you can do it again.

Kristin 33:58

Yeah, I work that ride-on. It unfortunately, I don't think you earn points for giving ride-ons, because if you did, I would have so many.

Steve 34:05

Back in the day, there was uh there was something for that.

Kristin 34:09

There should be for the cheerleaders. Okay, so that's the swift apt. And then I'm gonna call this the last piece of essential. There's a lot of we're gonna talk about other equipment we think you need, but a fan. Oh yeah. Oh my gosh.

Steve 34:22

Essential.

Kristin 34:23

I until this year was not thinking essential. I was like meh on a fan because I get cold when I'm down there, so the last thing I want is like air blowing on me when I'm first down there before I warm up. But I've been doing workouts, like trained workouts, and they are making me so wet. So I'm now on the body.

Steve 34:42

The last workout we just did a couple days ago, I was dripping. I forgot to turn the fan on. Yes. But we were in a group ride, and there was you know, I settled into this great with this great group, which in Zwift is called a blob, and and I didn't want to lose that. I couldn't hop off my bike for a second. And even my my avatar would sort of be coasting for a minute or for 10 seconds, but so I just suffered through it. And yes, I was it was so drippy, you know, you sweat in your eyes and so forth, but with the fan on, the sweat is just totally manageable, it's not that bad.

Kristin 35:22

Right. Apparently, there is a Zwift fan, like a that will turn on at a certain Well, Wahoo had a fan, so that doesn't surprise me.

Steve 35:32

Now it's the Zwift fan.

Kristin 35:34

One of my friends asked me about this, and I said to him, just get a smart outlet that and he goes, Oh, genius! That way I can just say, Hey Alexa, turn on my fan.

Steve 35:43

Yeah, a lot of times you don't want to start off with the fan on.

Kristin 35:46

That's my point. I'm usually too I'm already sad that I'm down there.

Steve 35:50

So we use um these just these little plug-in things from I think Google Home devices.

Kristin 35:55

Yep.

Steve 35:56

And so when I'm ready to turn on the fan on my phone, which I'm running the Zwift companion, I can just say, boop, turn on, and there it goes.

Kristin 36:03

Yep. All right. Other stuff we think you need. I like to have a tube of chamois cream down there just in case. Oh, down there. Okay. Yeah, I have it right on my stand just in case because sometimes it's fine, and sometimes I get on and you're like, ooh, this is not comfortable. And so I may have to refresh. Um, multi-tool to adjust something. You don't really want to.

Steve 36:23

Once it's set up, it's fine, but yeah.

Kristin 36:26

Except the other day I got on and one of my arrow bars was like a little loose, and I was like, oh, I need to go find a multi-tool. We have 4,000 multi-tools. We can't have one on the I'm just saying, like, make the idea is to make this as um frictionless as possible, right? So what can you have in place? Have your pump there, right? If you're not using your pump, get it out of the garage, put it by your phone.

Steve 36:50

So the funny thing about the pump. So, so your front wheel has the tire on. Yes. Unless you have the swift bike, you don't have a front wheel. Um, and and that's sitting, you know, that's sitting there. And of course, you never think about it until you suddenly realize, wow, it's been six months since I've pump put any air on that, and that's really squishy, right? To then, yeah, just to make sure you can quickly get your pump and because you don't want to have to delay your your workout because your front wheel is flat.

Kristin 37:20

Now I have arrow bars. You do, you do not. I joke, I call them texting bars, but I don't actually really use them much for texting. I have been using them quite a bit in workouts, they've been part of the workout has been get into arrow and sit in it for six minutes. So it's a different exercise. I don't know that I would have bought them. We had them laying around, but I do like having them because it allows you to shift your position.

Steve 37:47

And one of the cool things about indoor riding is you can work on your pedal stroke, you can work on strength exercises, you can think about the reason that like long distance disciplines in riding, which normally don't use arrow bars, yeah, uh, such as unbound and so forth, that they like having arrow bars. They're basically a place to just rest and change position, if you know, and especially if you're gonna be in it for the long haul, I suppose, on the trainer. But yeah, yeah.

Kristin 38:17

So I like something to think about.

Steve 38:19

Yep.

Kristin 38:20

Um, we talked about sweat. It's a sweat.

Steve 38:23

Oh, having I always have a towel draped over the top of my my bike. One that's sort of for sweat protection, two, that's just to wipe your brow.

Kristin 38:30

That's just for sweat. Mine is also for snot, and my friend Alex wants to know how come you don't get snotty? You don't get snotty?

Steve 38:37

Never, never never, never not once. I have never even thought about that on the trainer.

Kristin 38:41

Oh my god. Yeah. I often have to wash the, I mean you should wash it regularly, but I have to wash my more regularly. How could you have no idea? I get snotty outside too. How do you not get snotty?

Steve 38:52

Yeah, I don't get snotty outside too. Yeah, well, we've talked about that. It drives me nuts, everybody clearing their nose on rides, and I'm wondering, what's wrong with you?

Kristin 39:00

What is wrong with you, you mutant? All right. Um, let's talk about heart rate monitors. So you wear a heart rate monitor. I do. I don't I don't know why. Why should I wear a heart rate monitor?

Steve 39:17

A heart rate monitor is a great, great tool to know the level of work your body is personally doing.

Kristin 39:24

Okay.

Steve 39:25

Okay. And I'm sure there's gonna be physicians out there who are gonna just you know, go against what I'm saying.

Kristin 39:33

But not a doctor.

Steve 39:36

So so I wear a heart rate monitor mainly because it lets me keep track of my overall effort, and therefore I get an an overall better idea of my fitness level um and the amount of effort that I put into that particular workout. Okay. Okay, and that really actually. Let a lot of the tools and the apps and so forth let that those apps know what my level of work and then they can assign certain scores and and perceived uh efforts. Zwift. Well, and Zwift and Strava and Garmin Connect. Okay. And then that sort of lets those apps give me uh an idea of my of my fitness levels and and workouts and and where I where I'm situated at.

Kristin 40:28

Here's what I need to happen. Because I wear a heart rate monitor every day on my wrist.

Steve 40:33

Yes.

Kristin 40:34

So when my exercise, when I sink, I need my my Garmin Connect to be like, oh, she did this workout and this was her heart rate at the time. Squish them too.

Steve 40:48

I've always thought the same thing.

Kristin 40:50

Now you Swift is going straight to Strava, so it's not going to Garmin, so it wouldn't be. But like just the idea is like my heart rate is always being collected.

Steve 40:59

Yeah, but um, so you can use like we have Garmin watches, you can't actually say broadcast heart rate instead of using a chest strap.

Kristin 41:06

Wait, can I now do that with Zwift? Because I was never able to do it. No, I couldn't because it was Bluetooth and it was it couldn't, or we didn't have enough Bluetooth on my there was a reason you said I couldn't broadcast my heart rate into Zwift. Has that changed?

Steve 41:24

It might have been in the past. So so the big thing about Apple TV is they have I think a limit of four Bluetooth devices. Yes. And there are ways around that if your trainer has a single stream Bluetooth connection from multiple data points. So your trainer might have power, cadence, and speed type of situation all in one Bluetooth stream, and therefore it's not three different individuals.

Kristin 41:50

You and I are looking into this because, first of all, I hate the trainer strap that goes under my but whether you have a strap or the watch, it's gonna be this, it's gonna still be a Bluetooth channel.

Steve 42:00

So that might have been the restriction for you. But here's the here's the situation. We're checking that out is that I found, and this has changed apparently. So I have found that the watch is not great at sudden heart rate changes. So if I were doing, say, intervals and I was, you know, ramping it up for 30 seconds or a minute, that and then and then coming back down, resting, and then back up. It was just too fast for the for the watch to catch up to that and didn't know. And so I always was like, why is my heart rate so low? I am working so hard, and my heart rate is 94, right? Now, I mean, I have a fairly recent one, but I believe there is a next gen heart rate sensor, which I think you have, which apparently is much better.

Kristin 42:42

We are testing this because I'm going for convenience. I already have it on my wrist, and it's easier for me to remember to like have it. I have one for my arm that I keep forgetting to charge, and I forget to bring it down. I don't like the one that goes under because it just I already have enough stuff going on around the chest area. So we're gonna check that out. Okay. Because I would like to, I wouldn't mind. I just okay. Um music. I am pro-music. I need I need music to survive.

Steve 43:10

I don't need music.

Kristin 43:11

How is that possible that you do not need music?

Steve 43:14

I don't know.

Kristin 43:15

I really don't. I mean, I watch you, like I have got music just blasting through my brain, and I watch you, and it just it's like you barely have the Zwift sounds on. Like, well, because I'm trying not to disturb you. Oh, you can't disturb me. No, you could like recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

Steve 43:32

So now I could turn the volume up so I can hear the birds and the beast.

Kristin 43:36

Because I don't I don't yeah yeah, I don't understand. Okay. One other piece of technology that we use on occasion is Discord. Why why when do we use Discord?

Steve 43:48

When we're chatting with other people.

Kristin 43:50

So we're on like group rides where we know people.

Steve 43:52

I don't know if we mentioned this, and I become we maybe we just thought it was a given. Zwift is interactive with other riders all around the world. So every single rider you see in these virtual worlds is an actual person on their bike.

Kristin 44:08

Right.

Steve 44:09

And they're riding at the actual speed that they're riding at on their trainer and so forth.

Kristin 44:13

Right.

Steve 44:14

So it is supposed to, in theory, be an apples to apples comparison of rider to rider, no matter where they are in the world. We will I can talk about the cheaters on there, but I won't.

Kristin 44:25

It's dumped. It's a whole nother podcast. Yeah, it's a whole nother podcast. And these people will text chat on the you'll see text chats popping up on the screen. They're talking to friends, they're just making comments, they're whatever.

Steve 44:39

But if you want to ride with your friends, then then there's no way to actually talk to each other. So that's when you use Discord, and then everybody's on basically a um a chat session where you can just talk to each other while you're riding.

Kristin 44:55

Everybody suffer. Yep, absolutely. I know it's the only time I always think of Discord as like the video game app, but it's really it is great when you do like a group ride with say like the PMC group ride every month, it's really nice to hear these voices and chat. And even if you're just suffering in silence while they chat, it's it's nice. I like it.

Steve 45:18

Yeah, um, it surprises me that Zwift doesn't have that capability yet.

Kristin 45:22

You know, I was about to say that, but I think it's too much. Like, I think when you think about every group that might want to have a private voice thing, you can't have everybody just mouthing off. Like it's one thing for them to be doing text, yeah, dummy things because sometimes they get political, sometimes you know, but like then to have everyone be able to peel off for private, it's just probably too much.

Steve 45:43

Too much. And there's and there's easy things to get, yeah. I I get that. Yeah, yep. Absolutely.

Kristin 45:48

Yeah, um, okay, final piece of equipment is the click to it's like a Zwift remote control.

Steve 45:55

Like what is so the Zwift remote remote, they do they sell these little handlebar remote controls. Those are in some way uh a way to activate things in the in the ride if you don't have the Zwift companion app. Okay. Right? So you get little like there are power-ups. So anytime you go under an arched banner, no matter what that arched banner is, you'll you'll get a random power-up. And that could be um like a little climbing boost, so you go a little faster on climbs. It could just be uh uh an experience point um boost, um drafting boost, that kind of little things. And you but you can activate that when you want to. And on the companion app, you just push the button, you just push the little symbol. Right. But if you don't have that, then you can see it. Or you just don't want to deal with a screen.

Kristin 46:48

You might like the physicality of a button, yep. Right versus trying to like find the right thing.

Steve 46:54

You're coming to an intersection, you want to go left instead of you know yeah, okay. That kind of thing. That's what that's really for.

Kristin 46:58

Okay, yeah, cool. All right, that's all the equipment. Now we're into it. We've logged in. First thing you have to do is you have to set up your avatar. Yep. This is where you can pick your body, your gender, your hair. I'm still waiting for them to allow me to have purple hair.

Steve 47:17

I know you could you can be uh natural.

Kristin 47:18

It's only natural colored hair. But and they're not, I'll be the first to say the body shapes aren't necessarily super inclusive. There's like skinny and slightly might have added a little bit I saw the slightly less, slightly less skinny, is what I'm gonna call that.

Steve 47:36

Yeah, slightly less skinny.

Kristin 47:37

Um, but that's where you get to set up who you are. Um within that, you also pick your you're assigned a kit, right? Your jersey and your shorts, and there's some amount of gear. And this is where the gamification really starts because you will earn new gear and kits as you advance through. So there's a couple ways to earn, let's say, kits, right? Number one is achievements. Every time you level up, there's like a new jersey or kit for that.

Steve 48:06

Um not every time, but certain intervals, like five, ten, twenty, that kind of thing.

Kristin 48:11

A lot of the group rides that you do, if you do them once or a couple set number of times, you earn a jersey, you earn like the PMC. Yeah, like my PMC, you do that once, you get that kit, you get to keep it. I did some Betty rides. I had a Betty kit, which by the way, they redesigned one year, and suddenly I it was like they had gone into my wardrobe and changed my jersey. I was like, you shouldn't be able to do that. Um there are free codes out there. I have a Northampton cycling kit I got from a code.

Steve 48:43

R, but I'm glad you mentioned that because there are certain codes you can enter if you're running on a computer, but I don't know if you can do it if you're running an iOS, the iOS app.

Kristin 48:52

Oh no, you have to log into the computer to get your code. Okay, that's fine. But if you go to it's what is it, the Zwift, what's the Zwift insiders website?

Steve 49:00

I think they had a whole list of like codes for if you really wanted the you know, back in the early days there were probably six jerseys, you know, and now there must be hundreds, I guess. And so you it's rare to see somebody in the same kit you're riding. And especially when you when you like we earned years ago, um, it's like the tour of the McCurry Islands or something when they first introduced it. Oh, and I earned these bright purple shoes.

Kristin 49:27

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Steve 49:28

And I love them so much, I have never changed those shoes.

Kristin 49:30

Really? One of my favorites I have is from I did a uh winter grand fondo or fondo last year, and it's like a it's like a winter themed like gut snowflakes on it, and it's just a cute kit. But this is you remember when we would talk to the kids, they'd be like, Can't believe you're spending money on on virtual stuff, and here I'm going, they get my pretty closet of virtual jerks.

Steve 49:54

But unlike all of those games, we're not spending any money.

Kristin 49:57

But it does show that virtual rewards work.

Steve 50:00

Oh, they do, right?

Kristin 50:01

Like and then they're encouraging you to ride more. Yeah, yeah. And then your kit can actually also spontaneously change on you while you're in the middle of a ride, it can turn green or orange. That happened to me the other day.

Steve 50:13

There are sprints, uh sort of intercourse sprints, and they'll they'll sh give you warning because they'll sh start to show you a leaderboard on the left-hand side. Yeah. And then there's this big uh green start line and and uh markers on the side of the road. Yeah. And so then the sprint might be anywhere from 20 seconds to maybe a minute, and then there's a big banner you're gonna cross under. So whoever basically wins the has the fastest sprint time in a certain period, it keeps resetting itself. Yeah. They'll yeah, you'll win the sprint jersey or a King of the Mountain jersey or something.

Kristin 50:50

Yeah, you know it's funny, it happened to me the other day, but when you're in a workout, it doesn't tell you when the sprints start. Right. And so I didn't know I was in a sprint, and I didn't know that I led the sprint until suddenly I was in a I was like, what happened to my jersey? What what and then I was like, oh wait, I must have done something. How fun. All right, while you're also setting yourself up, you get equipment, right? So they give you a basic bike, but you are going to be earning points. We're gonna get to that in a second, that will allow you to buy better bikes, better equipment. And my question, I just bought myself an allied um Abel. Abel, very excited about that. Except here's my question Does this really make a difference?

Steve 51:33

So it does, it does. So I that that might be something people don't quite realize. It is so a more aerodynamic road bike, okay, right, is going to require less watts to go the same speed than a mountain bike. On on sort of let's say flat and rolling paved roads. Yep. A gravel bike is going to be faster or a mountain bike is going to be faster on the rough, unpaved roads. Okay. Because you have all sort of road surfaces in the different worlds of Zwift.

Kristin 52:11

And I swear.

Steve 52:12

A lightweight bike is going to be faster uphill than a heavier but more aero bike, let's say.

Kristin 52:19

And I swear when we did the first stage of the tour to Zwift, there was a sandy section. And I swear my I was I was with a group, I was doing great. We hit the sandy section, and I could not keep up with them. And then when I bought the Abel, you were like, oh, that'll help you on some of the sandy sections. This does seem to be. It's very minor.

Steve 52:40

It's very, very minor, but it is there.

Kristin 52:43

There are times where this does seem also very ridiculous because we are ultimately on here to exercise, right? So like there'll be times um where you'll be like, oh, get into the blob because that's gonna help you. You know, and you're like, yeah, but I'm also exercising. The whole point I'm out here is for a workout, not to like get this done fat, but I also understand because it's a game. Yeah, we're playing.

Steve 53:12

Just as you would in real life.

Kristin 53:13

Right.

Steve 53:14

Yeah. Because of the aerodynamic advantage.

Kristin 53:16

Oh, yes, we're gonna. I keep saying we're gonna get to that in a second, because we are, but let's talk about the the points. So those are we buy the equipment with drop points in the drop shops that we earn.

Steve 53:27

Drops just by riding. Yes. So you'll see the little drop counter up top. Yep. And just by riding along, that counter is just rolling, rolling, rolling up. You're earning drops. When now it's it's based on mileage, and you're like, well, if I'm going uphill, I'm not earning the same amount. Well, the little mountain symbol will come up if you're climbing, and so you earn drops faster going uphill.

Kristin 53:50

Yeah, it was interesting reading about this because like some of the things, first of all, you earn like 50,000 drop points when you level up, level one to level two, level two, right? Um, you earn them for every 10 miles or 10 kilometers.

Steve 54:06

Uh 20 kilometers. 20 kilometers. I'm sorry, sorry. No, I'm sorry. It's every mile or every kilometer you get you get right. But in but here's the thing while you're mentioned that my suggestion is to run Zwift in kilometers.

Kristin 54:20

That's what we do, yes.

Steve 54:22

Uh one, it kind of puts you in that mentality of kilometers, which is more used throughout the world for cycling. The other is you actually technically earn uh experience points a little bit faster because it is 10 points for every mile or 20 points for every kilomet or sorry, 20, what is it? It's 20 points for every mile, 10 points for every kilometer, I believe it is. Okay. So technically you're earning a little bit more.

Kristin 54:49

And what I didn't know is that when someone gives you a ride on, for 15 seconds afterwards, you are earning drops at a slightly faster rate, which I did not realize.

Steve 55:01

Those are all those little tiny changes they make constantly that you can never keep up with.

Kristin 55:05

All right. But then there's there's drops and then there's experience points. The experience points are what get you from level one to level two to level three to right. And so those are based on like your miles ridden.

Steve 55:19

The the experience points only from from my from my knowledge so far matter for one thing only. I mean, you do earn, again, you know, like a level 40 jersey, you know, so forth. But there are particular areas in some of the worlds which will have basically a force field in in front of them. And and if unless you are certain uh experience point level, you cannot get through into that area. So that is the real reason.

Kristin 55:51

This game is on.

Steve 55:52

I don't know of any area, uh you know, I don't know of any area that requires more than 20. So it might be 20 gets you everywhere. Um but again, this is one of those things they could constantly change. Yeah.

Kristin 56:07

So you earn, but you expi earn experience again, just like the drops, there are lots of ways to earn experience. Like um, if you maintain a streak of multiple weeks in a row, um, if you do a route you haven't done before, and then one of the articles I read was like, and you should combine it. Like if you're gonna do a workout for which you get experience points because you're also riding, do it on a route you haven't done before. And so then you can double up on your experience points. And again, that's just so that you get can get to areas that maybe you couldn't get to before. You want to level up. Okay, so now we set up our avatar, we have got our equipment. Let's ride. Okay. It took us 40 minutes, right? So there's various ways to ride. The most basic is a free ride.

Steve 56:56

You get on your bike, you find an area, yep, and you just ride. And then your little person's just riding along.

Kristin 57:02

Right. And there are so uh there are what is it, 12 different worlds?

Steve 57:08

I can't even keep track anymore.

Kristin 57:09

I think it's 12. Wow, could be wrong.

Steve 57:12

And that one I started, it was one.

Kristin 57:14

Yes, and it was a tiny little one. Yes, Watopia.

Steve 57:17

So Watopia is the cruise island of the main Watopia is the main island. It has expanded and expanded and expanded over time. Yes.

Kristin 57:27

Um and it's always it's it's always available, it's always available. But then we rotate through available worlds, New York City, London, Richmond, there is a way to ride anywhere you want, but they don't necessarily have those uh technically open.

Steve 57:44

So sometimes you could you could be the only person um well that's boring riding in a particular world if you physically go and change, but we're not gonna get into that.

Kristin 57:54

Yeah, so um, so yeah, with the rides, it's you you pick the only thing I would say is elevation can make a difference. So sometimes I'll pick a go, this little this one's just a 20-kilometer ride. Not noticing is straight up.

Steve 58:09

It's 3,000 meters of climbing.

Kristin 58:10

Yeah, I'm like, oh, this ride that was supposed to be 20 kilometers took me two hours.

Steve 58:14

Yeah, well, they have like they have a um they have a road that essentially mimics Alp Douez in France. So it mimics the actual climb. Yeah, right down to like every hairpin turn and so forth. So yeah, that will take you a long time. Yes, for a short period.

Kristin 58:34

So just think about that.

Steve 58:35

Or short distance.

Kristin 58:36

You can also be like, oh, screw it and just make your avatar turn around and always hit the U-turn button, by the way. I'm not doing this because it's not like you're starting a level, you're just starting a ride. You can be like, you know what, forget it. I'm gonna turn around, I'm gonna go the other direction. And then you'll just every intersection, Swift will say, which way do you want to go? Do you want to go up to the ruins or do you want to go down to the shore? Um, all right, so that's free riding. Then there's always group rides. You go onto the schedule, there is a ride going on every minute of the day pretty much by any group. There is no rules to who can join them. Right. If you want. Right. Right?

Steve 59:14

Yep. Yep. So you have lots and lots of different group rides.

Kristin 59:17

Yeah.

Steve 59:18

Um, right now, uh, we are in week one of what's called the Tour de Zwift.

Kristin 59:22

We're gonna get to that. Jump ahead. Okay, these are just vents. What's a pace partner?

Steve 59:27

Ooh, a pace partner. I love pace partners. This is that's a good question. Okay. So a pace partner is basically they have what's it's now it's called the um Robopacer. Okay. Right.

Kristin 59:41

And but they have a name too. Here comes Julie. Yeah, they have their names.

Steve 59:46

Yeah, uh Julie Miguel, I think, uh I can forget the names. I'm sorry. Um yeah, anyway. So they are essentially uh well When they started out, it was it was just a normal looking person, right? But now it's an actual robot on a bike. Yes. Right? They wanted to make it more obvious. Obvious. So, and this robo pacer rider is going to keep an average of let's say uh two watts per kilogram. Okay. All right. So, and and now it's average. Now it used to be they would ride at exactly two watts per kilogram, basically, and that was not natural. Okay. So Zwift changed it. So the output going uphill is going to be a little higher. Okay. And the output going downhill is going to be a little lower, but the average is going to be that two watts per kilogram. So you'll find lots and lots of people in this group all staying around this Robo Pacer. So if you want to do a um, it's almost like a free ride. Yeah. But it in a lot of cases with a with a plan, almost, you know, it's it can be very beneficial to choose a pace that maybe is a little bit, you know, outside your comfort zone. Yeah. Or it's going to make you work. Yep. And and then basically you just stay in that group. You can get 40, 50 meters ahead of the roba pacer, you can get 40, 50 meters behind. It will tell you to let the roba pacer catch up or to catch up to them. Okay. And if you get too far ahead or too far behind, you it just basically sort of drops you out of the group, releases you out of the group, and and which is nothing other than you're just no longer going to follow that course and you're not earning extra drops. Because you do earn quite a lot of extra drops the longer you stay with a foot robopacer.

Kristin 1:01:42

Um, the other thing we that reminds me of is what will it the system will also do is if you have done a um segment in the past, like a time segment in the past, there will be a little ghost of you waiting at the start of the segment that will be.

Steve 1:01:58

You can toggle that on and off.

Kristin 1:01:59

But yes, I love it. There she is. And she's like, okay, let's do this. And you and it will help you push your limit a little bit. Be like, okay, I can see where I was and I can see on track for that. I I actually really like that. Um, all right. You can host your own events.

Steve 1:02:16

Yes, you can.

Kristin 1:02:17

Um, you can host your own events and you can actually put a rubber band on them, meaning that everyone can stick together. It's just gonna make the group stick together, which is a little more friendly. Um, that's fun. And then they have special events, yeah.

Steve 1:02:32

Special events like Torto's Wift. Tortoise Weft is their biggest event, I'm gonna say. Yes, right? I love it. And they have these things all year round, but Torto's Whift takes place in January. It is a what are we six six weeks?

Kristin 1:02:45

I think it's six weeks.

Steve 1:02:46

Okay. Uh they and so six stages, and they allow you to do that stage at any time during the week.

Kristin 1:02:53

Yep.

Steve 1:02:54

And then it's in every hour on the hour. Yep. And then there's typically three different um distances you can choose. And it can be really smart when you look at which one you're gonna do to look at the elevation. Yes. I I believe actually uh so I think stage two next week. Yeah. Um, or was it even this week? But there is it was so usually it's sort of short distance, middle distance, long distance. Yeah. Right? I want to say that next week it is the longest distance, was actually shorter than the middle distance, but the elevation was significantly higher. So the time on the bike is gonna be way longer.

Kristin 1:03:37

So it's just a I mean, it's good motivation at the beginning of the year. Again, you earn like we just got the glasses, we'll get like the hat, you get the full kit, and you earn something to do it. Yep. But I mean, it's just a good motivational.

Steve 1:03:52

It's a motivational thing. Oh, I gotta, oh, oh, we're gonna do the seven o'clock, you know, Swift. Well, we gotta get on the trainer, be ready.

Kristin 1:03:58

It's only for this that week, they do have a makeup week at the end where you can make up stages any stage that you missed. You can do multiple stages, and there's actually contest where if you do all three options of each stage, you'll be entered to win a special edition Zwift bike. And you know, so there are, but it's it's more just the community of it, and it gets you on.

Steve 1:04:24

When you start out one of these events, everybody is sort of sitting in this holding pen on a virtual trainer, basically just spinning, right? So you can just be warming up, spinning, you're not going anywhere, everybody around just waiting for the start. This is where you drop all the rides on, and then it and then the it starts and they sort of release everybody, and immediately what happens is you're gonna have a lot of people instantly putting on a lot of power.

Kristin 1:04:47

Yeah.

Steve 1:04:48

And other people are not, you're kind of doing your own thing. Groups start to form. Blobs. And blobs, right? You know, you let off for a few seconds and you have to be careful. You're done. You could get dropped out of that group. And and so you then you have to either put in an effort to get back into the group, or you're sort of like, I'm done. I'm gonna wait for the next group to catch me and try to join them. You know, all that kind of dynamic things going on. It's almost like an outdoor ride in its dynamic, like that.

Kristin 1:05:17

Yeah, absolutely. Any of the but any of these groups rides are like that. I don't think that's unique to the Torres Whifter special events. Any of these events, any any group ride you join, that tends to be the dynamics.

Steve 1:05:30

Yeah, and but the more people a lot of times the better it is because I we must have had three, four hundred people who were on our particular time slot for our particular ride.

Kristin 1:05:40

Yep.

Steve 1:05:41

And because of that, I think my blob was I think we were the second blob on the road, and I was we were probably 25 people.

Kristin 1:05:51

Yeah. All right, and then there's workouts, and so for me, until most of the time I would get on the bike and I would say to friends, I was like, the funny thing about Zwift is like, you're gonna get on the bike, you're like, I'm just gonna do an easy ride, and then suddenly you're in a blob or you're being chased by people and you've torn your legs off. Yep. And there's nothing wrong with that. That is what like the tour to Zwift. It was definitely a pace. I kept with a pace with a group that I really worked hard, but there's no strategy to it. And so this year I have been working more on doing workouts, and the way that works is you can do an individual workout or you can do a plan. I'm doing a six-week FTP builder plan. And in that case, what I've enjoyed about it is I'm working hard. I'm probably sweating more than I have sweat in my regular rides, but it's a thoughtful, it's like okay, you're gonna keep at a 100 RPM for six minutes to go. You're like, I would never do this. This hurts me, or it's 85 for six minutes, or it's a strength one, or it's an endurance one. So it it's it's just different. It does take me a little bit of brain power when people are passing me and I'm like, nope, you're in your workout, stay in your workout, stay focused. And it does make the time go because you're like, okay, I'd next phase, next phase, next phase. Oh, get those really numbers right.

Steve 1:07:22

I would say workouts are one of the best things in Zwift because you can pick from just so many different predetermined workouts, and it's things you cannot do outside. I mean, we we are winter Zwift users, and as soon as we can, we're outside and we don't really touch the the trainer throughout the spring, summer, fall. Yeah. But if you are sort of um looking for an event and you're and you're trying, I mean, there nothing really beats getting on the trainer for structured workouts. You just simply cannot do the kind of structured workouts outside with stop signs and dogs and cars and and so forth that you can on the trainer.

Kristin 1:08:03

And it's coaching you. Like it was in this case, it was you know, reminding me to keep my form good. It was remind we were it was it was giving me pointers on like my pedal technique, so you could be thoughtful about that. I will say there were moments where I I would have a really hard time getting my what it wanted for me to do for power and what it wanted me to do for cadence to match, right? They they I couldn't get them both to be. So I finally said, okay, but what is it when I started this segment that it wanted me to do? What did it talk about? So, like for example, it said you need to keep up a hundred um RPM, right? So I worried about making sure that was right and ignored the fact that I wasn't making the power number match because this was the thing that it wanted me to do, right? So that's hard for me with my little type A personality that wants to get an A on everything, but it is it the idea is though, it it it's thoughtful. And now what I'm gonna be trying to do is I'm gonna do one tour to zwift a week, and then the rest will be workouts, which I think is a good mix, anyway. So all right. Um this is gonna be a really long show. Do we want to talk about erg mode? Because I know we got in trouble.

Steve 1:09:27

We did, we got in a little trouble.

Kristin 1:09:29

You know what Dana said we mangled.

Steve 1:09:32

Let's give erg mode a uh a pass or no, let's give it a one or two minute pass. I have tried erg mode on multiple different trainers. It is dumb, in my opinion. And I I don't never suggest anybody use it. And you know, there is if you look up Erg Mode and Zwift, you're gonna see this thing called the death spiral, where basically um it happens, it it deals with your cadence, and then you're not you're not spinning fast enough, so the trainer amps up the the resistance and you end up and it just keeps going. Every single time I've tried it, I've guessed I've ended up in the death spiral. And they're like, oh, you should do this and this and this to try to cease the death spiral. And you're like, if you have a if you have an operating mode that results in death spiral, you have a misengineered uh uh algorithm problem with your trainer. Uh like in how this works. There there is no need, in my opinion, to use erg mode. That is not realistic to how you ride outside. It is not a fan. I am not a fan.

Kristin 1:10:42

Okay, I'm gonna add, I'm gonna give a counterpoint. This is from our friend Dana, yeah, who I think we made apoplectic as she listened to the last show. So what she said was erg mode just forces you into a given power by adjusting resistance based on your cadence. So if you're pedaling quickly, the resistance will be low. If you're pedaling slowly, the resistance will be high, which is why people go into the spiral of death where they can't turn their crank anymore. Stop. I like it for when I don't want to have to think about maintaining a consistent power. For example, I did a workout this weekend where I stayed at the same power but changed up the cadence every two minutes. Erg mode is great for that. Or if I start to slack on longer intervals and my power drifts down.

Steve 1:11:27

So see, to me, if you want to maintain a certain power, you just maintain the certain power, right? You don't need to have the trainer think about that for me.

Kristin 1:11:36

If I start to slack on longer intervals, and she's saying it as a tool, she's using a tool, and I and I get that.

Steve 1:11:42

And we don't want to dismiss that. I tried what she's saying, and on multiple different trainers, it would go, it would clamp down so hard you couldn't even physically turn the pedals in the easiest gear on your bike. It was that clamped down. There you go. So uh, and again, so I I don't and I don't want to have to deal with that.

Kristin 1:12:02

And and and I guess that's the point is you can choose what you want to do, make your choice. All right. Um, anything else on Swift? There are a lot of how to get started with Swift articles. We'll put some in the show notes that we used when we were doing our research.

Steve 1:12:19

Um let's see. So I mean, uh, and a couple of the YouTubers were like DC Rainmaker as always, and then another guy called GP Lama. Okay. All right, I forget his name because he uses his name now. He has great videos on the changes and nuances and little little minor details that they constantly are uh you know playing with.

Kristin 1:12:39

Hopefully, this gives you uh enough information to be dangerous to give Zwift a go. Yeah. Right? If you are Zwift curious. Yep. I mean, look at how much we talked about.

Steve 1:12:51

I think we maybe made it sound super complicated, but it is fairly easy.

Kristin 1:12:55

I think so. Yeah. But it's and we just skimmed the surface.

Steve 1:12:59

We did. Skimmed the surface.

Kristin 1:13:01

That's why I'm saying wait, what did you want to call this again? A macro overview. Okay. Let's take a break and we'll come back and uh wrap this up. Okay. Well, as if the show wasn't long enough, what do you got?

Steve 1:13:18

I have a couple things this week.

Kristin 1:13:20

Oh my goodness.

Steve 1:13:21

So the first is the announcement uh of the retirement of Calvin Jones of Park Tool. He is a just iconic person in the bike industry. First met him in 2011 at the um US uh Olympic Center in Colorado Springs.

Kristin 1:13:39

When you were getting your race certification.

Steve 1:13:43

Mechanic certification, yes. So and then a bunch of times at all the trade shows.

Kristin 1:13:48

What does he do at Park Tool?

Steve 1:13:49

He is basically the uh the education guru, the training guru. The I'm sure there's there's tool design influence going on there. So all of the the conferences, trade shows, seminars, schools, he's he's been there.

Kristin 1:14:09

Wow. Yeah, the end of an era.

Steve 1:14:11

Yeah. So you'll see him pop up, I guess, from time to time on on videos, but but otherwise, his day-to-day uh job is over. Yeah, so congratulations on the retirement to Calvin.

Kristin 1:14:23

All right, what else you got?

Steve 1:14:25

I have one more thing I saw. This is a nice scene while scrolling. Yes. So the dork disc on a bike.

Kristin 1:14:33

The what?

Steve 1:14:33

The dork disc. The dork disc is that big plastic plate that goes behind your cassette on the rear wheel. Okay. It is intended so that if your derailleur is misadjusted or bent and the chain goes off the largest cog down basically into the spokes, okay, so that it doesn't get caught down there, doesn't chew up the spokes and so forth.

Kristin 1:14:57

Do the do those come standard on everybody's?

Steve 1:15:00

So yes, they do. Okay, and almost everybody, certainly who might call themselves a cyclist, takes them off immediately. Because they, all right.

Kristin 1:15:08

Um or doesn't put them on when they're being assembled.

Steve 1:15:12

No, no, they come they come on the bike. Oh yeah, out of the bike, out of the box.

Kristin 1:15:16

How do you get them off?

Steve 1:15:17

So do you have to let the cassette off? Yeah. Or very, very frustrating trying to cut it out through the spokes. Or you just plenty of people out there who've done that in their lives.

Kristin 1:15:29

I mean, I've definitely seen seen them break and then they're just spinning freely, and that's how they come off.

Steve 1:15:36

Because over time they get brittle, they crack, they start, they start plastic. Yeah, it's just clear plastic. It's particularly tough. Um, Seth of Seth Spike Hacks Um and Burn Peak, he I guess he did a video on this where he tested this and found, oh yeah, that it's doing what it's supposed to be doing. And then he tested it without, and he's like, Well, I didn't really find a much more of a problem without it. But anyway, so this was a requirement by an industrial standards organization um for bicycles. Oh, okay. And that's why they came on all bikes. Yes. And however, that requirement, that ISO requirement, was revised uh in 2023.

Kristin 1:16:16

Oh.

Steve 1:16:17

Is that they're not required anymore. Okay. But they are in the United States still. So, and because so much of the market is in the United States, a lot of companies just default to putting it on there in case their bikes end up in the United States. The thing is, is that when you look at these things, this is I gotta say, just tons and tons of plastic that is being manufactured and then thrown into the trash. Right. So the US has to change this and catch up so that we are not this useless dork disc.

Kristin 1:16:53

All right, there we go. You heard it here first. Could you guys who takes care of that? Who decides that?

Steve 1:16:58

So that's the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. They decide that it's it's still a requirement on by the process.

Kristin 1:17:08

I wonder if there's a way to start a petition with them. Like how does that process even start, right?

Steve 1:17:15

To submit to Do they still have employees who even work in that office anymore? Oh, who knows?

Kristin 1:17:21

That's a question for another day. All right. Well, I think we have tapped out this episode. Cycling Together with Kristin and Steve is a production of Steve the Bike Guy, an independent bicycle shop in eastern Massachusetts and Sundon Marketing.

Steve 1:17:36

If you like the show, please leave a review or share with a friend for show notes, links, or to leave a comment, question, or topic suggestion, please visit cycling together.bike.

Kristin 1:17:45

You can follow the shop on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok at Steve the Bike Guy.

Steve 1:17:51

All right, and next time I think we have an interview, right? That's the plan. Okay. Shh. Yeah. See you next time.