Rouvy is also cheaper, especially if you have multiple riders in your family. $12/month for up to 3 riders.

I haven't tried Rouvy since the AR update, but I liked the ability to ride local rides and the ability to create rides from your own videos and GPS/Power details.

Zwift doesn't let me calibrate my hammer in the app and i think rouvy's control system is a little better too to be honest.

Ray over at DCRainmaker has a review of Rouvy. He has lots of nice things to say about it. My wife and I have been using it since before it was called Rouvy.

It is a middle ground between Trainer Road and some other programs. You can do the AR stuff, ride on real courses all over the world, or just do a planned workout with nothing but data graphs. Something for everyone, and it doesn't take the hardware Zwift needs, although the AR stuff upped the processing power requirements a lot.

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"...the street finds its own uses for things"

I've let my Zwift sub lax.... might be a good time to try something else. The multiple member stuff is a huge + Zwift will eventually have to offer something... maybe Rouvy will speed up the process.

I'm in the final days of my trial period with Rouvy. I will probably subscribe to it even though I'm not overly happy with the overall package. However, being able to do intervals on one my favourite climbs in Italy is simply a game changer for me. Zwift is plain boring to me, cartoon world, no variation. London at night while I sit in my dark basement? Not really. But this is just me, great to have some diversity in the market.

AR is really sort of cool, seems to be better then previous VR films. Especially when shot with a camera mounted to a car.

My main problem is that with only a 10 Mbit internet connection I can only use it with previously downloaded movies. This excludes all the HD Premium videos since these can't be downloaded. Actually, most HD videos (and many of them are really not that HD) can't be run as stream for me.

The download feature in the app turned out to be quite buggy. Often downloads would stop and not continue. Restarting the app gives me some more bytes but then the same problem. I started using an externel downloader, the links to the mp4s are stored in a xml file in the Rouvy directory. Super stable download at full speed, so my troubles are with the app and not the internet connection. Sunday evening had the entire system sort of slow responding, too many people vs server capacities?

Searching for routes via a browser is a nightmare. The implementation of the Google map awful. Those routes are one of the key values of Rouvy, I can't understand why they hide behind such an awful web front end. Or do all the folks use only the app? I have my dedicated basement PC where the app is installed but I don't use it for searching routes. Sort of enjoy to spend some time during the day browsing the routes and deciding what to ride after work. Perhaps this use case is to special.

And I want a different jersey for my avatar.

Looks cool. Although for me Zwift is all about the racing and group rides. I think the novelty of riding realistic routes would wear off after a while.

i’m undecided on it. i’m level 15 on zwift, and the “gamification” of it had had me hooked, but i’m starting to tire of the same courses.

rouvy... the first route i picked was a pot hole laden 20 mile stretch of farm roads in what looked like the midwest somewhere. not impressive.

the rouvy setup interface just plain sucks.

the few rides i did on it, the video files all were sd quality at best. i understand the technology requirement for streaming HD content, but really to me all that a rideable environment is is just a distraction while i’m working out with trainer road.

i may give rouvy another shot because it seems there may be more variation, but i don’t like the idea of having a 2 hour workout running on trainer road and having to swap videos in rouvy when the video is over.

we shall see.

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80/20 Endurance Ambassador

That my assessment as well. I have done ErgVideos for years and while real video is nice it's the group rides and races in zwift that allow me to do 3 hour rides in Zwift that I could never do othewise on the trainer. My local cycling clubs have even started to schedule group rides in Zwift. At the end of the day the best trainer workout is the one you do regularly. Whatever type (Trainerroad vs. Zwift vs. Rouvey, etc) works best for you and keeps you doing it regularly is the right one for you.

The social aspect of Rouvy is still not quite there, but half of that equation is reaching critical mass, and the other half is how good the platform is supporting it. I see some neat features in Rouvy that could be really interesting for group ride/race, e.g AR based stuff.

In terms of how realistic you feel, I think Rouvy is much better in terms of the synchronized resistance generation to simulate the gradient. I did a few rides on routes I've done hundreds of times locally here and the resulting speed/power/elevation were very close to my real life numbers. On Zwift, the same power number with similar elevation on the Watopia or London courses will typically yield a few miles faster in speed.

At this time Zwift is absolutely the best if you are in to racing, tons of people in each race and it will get your HR moving to the MAX for sure.

Rouvy or whatever they call this now (I use to use them few years back when they were called virtual raining) is super cool because you can ride some cool climbs via google streets (I always pre-ride my far away races this way) or use their high quality videos. You can design strava route anywhere in the world export GPX and ride in in ROUVY how cool is that, and I must say it is quite realistic.

If one day Rouvy will allow on realistic virtual races on regular google maps roads, it might take zwift out of business.

Been on Rouvy and Hammer for about 3 weeks now and I really enjoy. Did Zwift on trial for a week and -eh. Was ok but I like the ability to ride different courses- some of those Tour climbs- HOLY CRAP- us flatlanders in central WI- going to help with IM-MOO #4 in Sept. Also like being able to create own course using Google maps essentially. Have not tried to use Garmin files yet but Xmas break is coming so that is on the agenda. Plus the workouts option- nice. And it gives me a reason to ask for a good bike camera- tape my rides this summer for days like today

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"There are no problems in life, just many leadership and learning opportunities." SED

Perhaps someone here knows, is it possible combine a workout and riding a route (not necessarily an AR) in Rouvy?

I mean not just linking a video to a workout, I actually would like the app to control the slope and adjust video playback speed.

Example:

Doing threshold over/unders while riding up a pass in the Italian Alps. Workout mode would actually only be a timer. Currently I use an external timer but it would be neat to do this within Rouvy.

Same thoughts with my son who is used to watch me Zwifting .... "Hey Dad, this new virtual ride that your on ...its so lonely out there."

I was sold. Opened up my macbook to download this new app and... no mac support. They suggest running bootcamp?

Maybe when they offer support for mac I'll buy. Looks like a cool concept.

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@floathammerholdon | @partners_in_tri

I've had Rouvy for a couple of years since i got the Cycleops Magnus, and it works great for structured power-based training. However, there is no way i can do the virtual climbs without ending up in a power/speed death cycle. i don't know if zwift handles gradients differently or it is a problem common to all wheel-on trainers (the magnus has a small fly wheel and a larger one may help). Does anyone have experience riding zwift with a wheel-on, small flywheel smart trainer?

Just a quick note: There are a couple of Rouvy articles on the ST home page, with more coming over the next few weeks.

If you have any questions or things you would like to see covered, post them here and the author will try to answer them in the upcoming articles.

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Travis Rassat
Vector Cycle Works
Noblesville, IN
BikeFit Instructor | FMS | F.I.S.T. | IBFI
Toughman Triathlon Series Ambassador

Watched DC Rainmaker's video and the constant sign posts dropping with the grade percentage drove me nuts. Ray commented negatively about them too. Hopefully there will be a setting so you stop it from raining signs.

The biggest difference between Rouvy and Zwift is now financing. Zwift just secured 120 million in additional funding! Damn. Maybe Zwift acquires Rouvy and we can get the best of both platforms under one subscription?? That'd be very cool.

https://www.cnbc.com/...vest-in-esports.html

I would rather Zwift acquire trainerroad, or alternatively, put a lot more effort into the development of training plans.

I just bought the cyclops hammer and thinking about either zwift or rouvy, will those alone give me power output or will I need to add some type of additional power output i.e. pedals/crank etc..I haven't purchased a power meter yet and was hoping at this time I wouldn't have to...Thanks

The Hammer will measure / control your actual power. (as opposed to my cheapo speed sensor / dumb trainer setup which will estimate power from wheel speed based on a bunch of assumptions about trainer model, tire pressure, etc...

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

The hammer should measure your power, you shouldn't need anything more for that. If you want to use Zwift or Rouvy you need to make sure your computer/device can talk to the hammer. So for Zwift, if you are using an iPad or AppleTV you should be fine with the hammer's bluetooth. If you are using a PC for Zwift or Rouvy then you will need either an Ant+ or GigaBlue usb dongle. Most people recommend the Ant+ dongle if you are going that route.

The Hammer doesn't come with a dongle? I'd expect one to be included, given how cheap they are.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

Maybe depends on were you buy it? Their website says dongle sold separately.

Ive got a usb stick from some garmins Ive had over the years (910), that would work? Thanks for the quick responses...