Occasionally, yes. Especially if they create a new world or extend an existing map. Also there are plenty of KOMs of various lengths that are fun for doing hill climb repeats. You can set it up to do the KOM, and then noodle back down, hang a u turn and go again, each time following a ghost of your previous effort. A good semi-structured workout.
100%…I did that a lot when trying to get all the routes completed. Go do the Uber Pretzel for a leg-breaking long endurance ride on the trainer.
I also will do it if I am looking to get some “climbing” in…a few years ago before a long weekend trip to NC, I would go up one one side of the Epic KOM, head down the other, flip a u-turn and then climb back up the other side.
They did have a Staff Product Manager role posted for Training specifically in Dec/early Jan. (I applied) so I think they are at least trying to focus on advancing training on the platform. Obviously a PdM is not writing training plans but looks at least like they’re trying to focus there.
Yes, I just rode my own workout, not programmed but riding intervals intentionally, not in ERG mode. One thing I would like to see is workouts matched to the terrain, so for instance a climb and flat that match your speed and interval length so that you could work out in simulation mode (not ERG) but hit the bottom of the steep climbs exactly at your prescribed interval start time and if you hit the prescribed pacing, hit the top of the climb and have the right distance eof flat terrain for your rest interval before looping around to hit the climb again.
Obviously would require a lot of computational power and maybe creating a course on tbe fly, so maybe not that likely.
I also ride endurance in group rides or with robopacers like a few others have said, and race frequently.
It’s not just a distraction. Zwift gives vain cyclists (like me and you) the ability to continue adding miles to their weeks and years as if they were outdoors instead of just a # of hours on the trainer. My Strava is littered with people doing just that. I notice folks in the summertime even doing it to take advantage of the high efficiency of indoor training and “get a few more miles in.” Not saying everyone does this, but it is certainly a factor
Signed my partner upto Zwift as they want to add some training around commuting for some big summer trips. No interest in the game side or following avatars, just wanted structured rides, an overall training structure, a little guidance and to not have to think about it too much or spend time learning about it all.
Lasted all of 2 weeks before Zwift was cancelled and a TR account created. We both found the UI infuriating. Then there is what appeared to be a lack of easy ways to pick out training rides, make a plan, etc. I tried to pick out rides on 3rd party websites but failed to see a text search in the library to easily find them. We perhaps didn’t give it enough time or watch enough youtube tutorials but meh, gave up.
So it was quite nice, as a long time TR user, watching them navigate the TR sign up, input the events and build a plan around their schedule. It just worked and think they’ll really benefit from the progression levels and ML adapations.
Doesn’t suprise me that they haven’t hooverd up any of the Peloton market, outide of my roadie bubble, I don’t know anyone who uses Zwift.
Wanted to start a seperate thread but if you are reading, big thumbs up TR 
and I think you can do that by setting that part of the interval as freeride. It’s not exactly what you said, but a doable workaround.
There’s gatta be something else. Nothing is free. It’s the ole Waze analogy… when the product is free, you’re not the customer, you’re the product
As a newly back on Zwift rider (I previously used Zwift back when it was a beta product) because I’m doing the BaseCamp winter group coaching, if it wasn’t for using it as part of BaseCamp, I wouldn’t. The UI on the computer is horrible and completely non-intuitive. And every different method (e.g., from within the Zwift app, the Zwift Companion app, web browser) of accessing “Zwift” has a different look and feel, and can see different things.
And don’t get me started on how horrible the “reconnecting” to ERG is if you drop out of ERG mode during a structured workout.
Open source software has entered the chat.
@jcolp Seems like that is the plan:
“Integrated is certainly something we’d like to get to, so you could do your workouts on Zwift.” Wahoo confirmed, before explaining that the current focus is consolidating its own apps into one.
I don’t do workouts in Zwift (either in-game or concurrent with TR). I always run sim mode.
I did a few workouts in zwift when the feature first came out, but not since then. I would often run a TR workout on my phone while riding in the zwift world on my big screen, but only if it was a hard workout where watching netflix, etc. wasn’t an option. If there was a way to “run” the TR workout from inside zwift (without manually creating the workout), I might use that feature, but it’s not something particularly important to me.
But I’m a fan of zwift and have been on it since beta. It’s my replacement for outside rides and racing when I can’t get that outside. Group rides and races are the main draw for me. I’m dealing with an injury right now and can’t ride outside, zwift has allowed me to maintain some fitness. Some of the group rides are very engaging and can be a much better workout vs, what I can achieve outside. The BMTR ride on saturday mornings is the best example, it’s about 4 hours of steady tempo work with no break. No way I can do that much quality work outside in only 4 hours and there is no way I can do that watching movies inside on the trainer without the motivation of a large pack and not wanting to get dropped.
THIS.
I’ve been thinking this a lot lately. I just set up IndieVelo to do a structured workout (which I had in .ZWO format), and when my son saw it, he said “Zwifting again?”. He literally couldn’t tell the difference between IndieVelo and Zwift. IndieVelo also did some “little things” like showed my HRM’s battery level when I connected it. Why does Zwift still not do that? They are certainly good enough at cramming Zwift ads down my throat all the darn time!
I don’t think Zwift has as much of a moat as they might imagine. IndieVelo was trivially easy to download and setup, and it… works. I’m not sure how much they will end up charging if/when they come out of their current “closed beta”, but for how I do my indoor riding, they are already on par with Zwift.
But for most people, the lure of Zwift is knowing there are literally thousands of others to ride with (or just near, as the case may be). It is the social and interaction that keeps people on Zwift, not the game itself.
You can have superior graphics, more realistic road feel, battery life indicators, etc but if no one is there to ride with, they simply won’t reach any kind of critical mass to challenge Zwift.
The central issue for any Zwift competitor is how to lure riders over to another platform in significant numbers.
Yeah, just having the best technology rarely results in a successful business. Speed to market often wins over superior products in spaces where a subscription base and eco-system are big differentiators. That’s why you often see these companies operating deep in the red during their formative years buying defensible market share (typically spending much more on sales and marketing compared to R&D).
I do that ride every once in a while too.
Zwift caters to a few different markets. I did qualify my statement with “…for how I do my indoor riding…”, because I really don’t care if anyone else is ever “there” with me or not. I only do structured workouts, and I don’t even really look at the screen much. I realize I’m not the typical audience, but the local folks I know who ride indoors are already about 50% on platforms other than Zwift.
Honestly, I want ALL the indoor riding/training apps to have viable business models, and compete with each other to make the best products. But what I’m seeing in the market now is more like gang-on-gang violence in the inner cities: It isn’t helping anyone. I’m afraid that, in the end, we’ll have a huge field of losers and one or two companies who aren’t being smart because they don’t have to be smart :-.