Thank you, great article. I have just tried TP Virtual with a 45min workout session and I liked it a lot. Given I have been meaning to give Trainingpeaks a try I feel like this offer is well the discounted price for a year. I always used to train as I feel like but given we are expecting our first child and I am no longer in a club, it might be a good idea to get more structure in my workouts as I will have to optimize for time. Also thanks for the suggestion of the TPV career mode in one of the posts, immediately registered. And thanks for the mention about virtual shifting, on the app and my touchscreen laptop it’s a bit clunky but I will get one of those little plus minus keyboards.
I do like the racing aspects of Zwift a lot, however, I do see myself to often going for casual group rides in Zwift instead of structured workouts, even if it is just an endurance session. In addition, it has really bothered me that Zwift has not managed to set up a family plan to this date. I thought about going for Rouvy however the real world isn’t that alluring to me, I prefer this graphic worlds, ugly as they may be.
I must also say that I found the TP Virtual hud and graphics not too much off from MyWahoo. The latter I have tried twice or so and it is absolutely awful in terms of user interface and immersiveness. TP Virtual does enough to pass the minimum bar I would say but of course does not come close to the smootheness of Zwift.
Lastly, I have been eyeing the Elite square frame for a long time thanks to its silent belt drive and I think using two systems such as Elite square and TP Virtual that are more open dev resonates well with me, including the option hopefully to virtually shift (have to do some research on that next).
EDIT Just saw I can use xbox controllers in theory for virtual shifting. Gonna give that a try.
TP Virtual seems a bit too fast for me in terms of watts to km/h. I felt like I had less kilometers on a flat workout for 60/90 minutes. Any way to get it closer to “true” metrics? Maybe adjusting the rolling resistance?
What’s great about rouvy is you can find a course near by and actually ride it to see if it’s similar. I did this with Mt Palomar and silver strand near me, pretty accurate
On a Triathlon site it feels like it should be mentioned that TPV has no run mode. That was something that almost kept me on Zwift, but finding mywhoosh provided a free virtual run app and I cut the Zwift cord. Still would love to be able to do everything within TPV.
If TP virtual had been around a few years ago then perhaps it would be different, but I use Zwift with structured sessions imported automatically from my coach via TP 3 times a week. And I honestly can’t remember a time it didn’t work.
I was using Tacx i-magic from 2006/7 and did 100% of my training for 1 March IMNZ from the UK on that, so virtual training isn’t new. And that exact (dedicated) PC and trainer survived until I went zwift and a Tacx OG Neo in 2015 (with that Neo OG still going strong).
I have used TP virtual once. Just to test it.
In the past I’ve done a lot of Zwift races, for various reasons less so recently but they were stunningly effective at improving / regaining my bike fitness. Just worked for me with the ‘human’ competitors.
I’ll be honest, I found the article did read to me as a touch advertorial for TP. But that’s possibly as I somehow seem to not be bothered by the things that annoy others in zwift, and perhaps just been on zwift so long that TP (and Rouvy and a couple of other 1 time test and then forget alternatives) just left me thinking ‘z, x and z are missing’ as opposed to seeing the things that TP has. Ultimately, in the scheme of costs, I honestly spend way more on gels/nutrition whilst sat on the trainer using zwift each week than I do on the monthly subscription. So in my personal ‘multi criteria assessment’ then the weighting on that is low. Ultimately it just works. If it doesn’t then I’ll change.
But for me as I’m struggling with TP being offline or glacially slow way more often than zwift at the moment then I’m unlikely to put all my eggs in that basket when the alternative is (fatal last words/tempting fate) so reliable.
And yes, I have the treadmill attached, but will fully admit that I don’t always use that, it’s very different and doesn’t add much. Odd how the cycling part in theory is so similar but psychologically is very different re Zwift.
Having coached athletes long enough, and having had Zwift break itself a few times over…it’s gotten better. But it does occasionally have a brain fart.
Also, being here Stateside, I’ve never experienced with the offline / slowness you describe with TP.
That all said – personally, I’m still choosing Zwift, just because I do enjoy the gamification / rewards and Zwift racing whoops me into shape like nothing else. But I also see a ton of value there for TPV, especially amongst the number of people I know who struggle with Zwift and/or already are locked into TP Premium.
Probably helps that after the horrendous flakiness of Tacx I-magic I have a dedicated Zwift PC. The offline of TP are of course timed for the US off peak - and so hit us harder. In theory the latency shouldn’t be too bad, but as per another thread this week, it literally takes 25secs to update the calendar to a previous month (please let me be able to say it’s because I have too many workouts stored in there over the last year ).
I think we’re aligned, both do stuff really well, good reason for some to have both. Also very viable for some people to only need one (or none?). Hey, I have full WKO+ too for when I’m injured and need to fill my time geeking out on past data. I also pay for strava, and honestly there really is no logic for that in terms of what I get for the money compared to what I can get for free, but for the amount I use it I can self justify the payment.
(don’t use this post to issue an invoice for Slowtwitch pro or whatever it was/is called )
Virtual shifting is a must when you swap bikes and share the trainer. I went hard on TPV, getting a two buttons keyboard etc…
The one thing that killed it was that charging virtual gears changed the gradient of my Kickr Climb. I really like the Climb and use it regularly. I posted a request for improvements on the TP forum and the answer was their approach is best and nobody can do it. Except that Zwift can shift gears virtually without impacting the gradient of the Kickr Climb.
Feel like at least ERG workouts are less strict on TP, the watts fluctuate a bit more around the target and are kinder to the legs. Also at least in ERG Mode my cadence is like 10rpm higher. Just some bias on my part probably.
Virtual shifting, I don‘t get it. We don’t use the smart features of the trainers, only pairing the powermeters to Zwift and the break controls of the trainers give the perfect virtual shiftings . Thereafter AI (Actual Intelligence) does the task of ERG control . The legs and the brains are trained simultaneously, I call it effectively.
I never noticed the lack of virtual shifting in TPV because I always use ERG mode but I use a Kickr Bike and as far as I know this allows virtual shifting with the built in buttons of the Kickr Bike, right?
I know cycling is their bread and butter and there is enough of a feature backlog there, but I’d love if they’d make some effort on the run side of things.
I think if they created different routes for running vs. cycling, the experience would be much more gamified and engaging. I love chasing down routes on the cycling side, but there’s so many routes that are inaccessible on the run side. I’ve basically done all of them under 10 miles already. If I’m doing a half marathon in training, it’s definitely in preparation for an event, which means I need to do it outside, race simulation style, with race nutrition, etc.
Challenges on the run side would also add to the experience. (IMO Challenges as a whole could use an overall - something other than “work out on Zwift for 6-9 months to earn your prize”).
).
. Thereafter AI (Actual Intelligence) does the task of ERG control 
. The legs and the brains are trained simultaneously, I call it effectively.