Zwift raises $450 Million; Specialized joins KKR in the investment round

n=1 example I know but this is why I’ve just cancelled my zwift subscription and kept TR.

If TR keeps their focus on their current offering they’ll have me as a subscriber for a long time.

Disclaimer : Zwift user for 5 months, TR user for enough years that Im not actually sure when I joined

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Amazon Alexa fund was one of the investors so not too far a stretch to see who will power their voice integration

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I’d like to see what Apple could do if they bought TR and someone like RGT. potential to use Apple mapping to intergrate into RGT magicroads and TR powering the training side of it.

The end goal for all these platforms is not the same in each case: It’s not a case of TR being at risk because they don’t have as many volcanos on the screen as Zwift. That’s not what it’s about.
Zwift probably wants mass market penetration like Peloton. TR is about proper training for people that want to take their cycling seriously enough to enjoy getting faster with some effort.

I have a friend who has a Peloton - not in a million years would i see him as a serious cyclist. I also know a lot of people (myself included) that ride around on Zwift when we don’t want to go outdoors. But for the whole package of training “properly” and getting fast TR is by far the best option.

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Zwift’s world is very restrictive. I was watching my kids playing GTA on the PS4 yesterday and idly dreamed of being able to cycle around that world all day in HD instead of their currently slightly basic offering…

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Have you seen the GTA Bike mod?

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You can. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9gdNtZQ47Q

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Apologies to those who’ve seen my thoughts on this before. As someone who uses both platforms, zwift provides a decent (not great) visual distraction. But it could honestly be anything on a screen, on weekends it’s usually an english premier league game.

When I got my Hammer, I quickly decided that if I had something with ERG mode that the best use of my time would be with structured training that. I personally can’t see myself trying to do structured training on Sim mode in zwift, for example, for the same reasons I don’t do most of my structured training outside (although with a variety of courses like time trial for flats and mountains for long intervals, I can see how zwift is better now in that regard).

But if I’m inside, I value training and I value the programs TR designs as the best use of my limited time. Zwift has had plenty of time (and have hired people) to work on the training side of things and it’s nowhere near where it needs to be, at least not without shelling out more money for trainingpeaks plans/coaching.

Again, I like and use zwift, and I keep it around in the event that I get into racing or something on it, but my OCD/personal preferences keep me with TR as my main driver.

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I’ve done the Zwift workouts before, and quite frankly I can’t do them. Because the app is part of the cartoony video game world, i just doesn’t feel the same and it’s hard to focus on the workout. Call me crazy but if I’m doing some VO2Max intervals, I just want to see the damn blue line and nothing else. That’s the genius of TR, it allows you to focus on what you’re doing and get the most out of your legs.

Now, as a full distance triathlete, those 3+ hr trainer workouts are mind-numbing with just the blue line, so that’s where I’ll switch over to Zwift though letting TR control my trainer.

Zwift will NEVER become as simple and thus beautiful as TR because they are going to be constantly pressured to add more features, and fail at that. TR is going to keep getting my money every year until the blue line goes away.

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I think this is likely bigger than Zwift, Specialized, Peleton etc etc…

There’s a recognition from the UCI of eCycling as a distinct discipline with it’s own defined ruleset. There’s been a lot of positive support for indoor racing/different training strategies from the UCI World Tour riders. We’ve got the first official UCI eCycling championships this winter, with Zwift being used as the platform to host the races. However the UCI are not locking themselves into a commitment to use Zwift for future eCycling championships.

Zwift have had a hardware division for some time now. Zwift bikes/trainers are only a matter of time. The racing community is crying out for hardwired trainers as it’s crazy that the only part of the race set-up to rely on wireless protocols is the most important. Akin to why serious eSports competitors use a wired keyboard and mouse. My guess is that we’ll see wired trainers, with the ability to be calibrated remotely from Zwift’s end as the norm in the future.

Zwift need the clout within the cycling industry to ensure they have the neccessary hardware and legislative ability to be seen as the only credible option for UCI sanctioned eCycling events.

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haha. Awesome!

How accurate, repeatable and consistent across bikes/trainers do you think the power measurement would need to be to enable high-level e-sports?

I read it all (that I see) and appreciate it.

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And this is why I like TR more than Z.

The creators are still heavily involved in their product.
They use it themselves, they listen to their users, they post on their forums.

Hell, they even post about heavy blankets and how to clean them!
I bet the Z creators are not involved with Z as much as @Nate_Pearson and the rest of the TR people!

So thanks Nate.

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I think everyone one the same trainer would be the gold standard. The wired part is to avoid “mechanicals” such as Ant+ dropouts ruining a race.

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Sounds like the new UI that was planned has now been scrapped and they’re going to do it over again… :man_facepalming:

the new UI we’d planned on releasing in March is on hold. We’d been knitting that sweater for a really long time prior to COVID, but the operational changes we made to scale up to the huge spike in usage means we outgrew that sweater. Growing the core product team will help us knit a new one sooner.

Indeed, as shared above.

The whole thread is a good (bad) read and still shows some of the poor attitude and general clueless take of Z reps.

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Hopefully they know throwing move developers to create a new UI will not necessary make for a faster development period… :man_shrugging:

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Sorry, I skipped back through this thread to see if it had been brought up already, but missed that.

Yeah, that Zwift thread has quite a few face-palm moments scattered throughout.

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For high-level esports, I don’t think that would be sufficient. I think you’d need a step change improvement in power meter accuracy/consistency vs. where we are today.

Imagine if you’re in a simulated climb during a esports race and your power meter is reading 1% lower vs the guy next to you?

The table below shows measured power meter accuracy. Look at the column “mean deviation”. All brands have an absolute average deviation greater than zero. And within each brand, there is a reasonably wide range (the +/- is one Standard deviation). This simply wouldn’t cut it for competitive esports.

image

So I guess a long way of saying that what’s driving the Zwift valuation I don’t think is the potential of UCI-level esports on a Zwift platform, I think it’s the potential mass market appeal similar to Peloton.

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