Dropping Zwift - trying Rouvy

Triathlon Forum
1

Hopped on a Zwift race yesterday, and got so pissed off (racing Cat D which is ostensibly for people up to 2.5w/kg. I’m slow…but I am right around that 2.5w/kg and got dropped by guys pushing 3.5 to 4. I don’t mind getting beat, but sandbaggers ruin it for everyone.) that I decided then and there that I wasn’t going to bother with Zwift racing (or online racing at all, for that matter) anymore.

Downloaded Rouvy today and signed up for the free 7 day trial, and I have to say that it’s head and shoulders ahead of Zwift… for me anyway. I rode the Norway Atlantic route, which looks so much like the coastline here in Nova Scotia it’s uncanny. I’ll give it a couple more days on trial, then if the honeymoon is good then I’ll kick Zwift to the curb.

3 Likes
2

You’ll want this then: https://www.groupon.com/deals/rouvy-4

1 Like
3

Check out TrainingPeaks Virtual (aka indieVelo). It has the best cycling simulation physics like wind, corner braking etc and group ride feel, built in anti-cheat features, time trials, team time trial races, point races, velodrome and so on. It’s a revolutional product compared to zwift and others.

3 Likes
4

so you are saying you havent used rouvy, training peaks is another cartoon system.

anyways, @JasoninHalifax use this link (check video only on search) to find some routes near you, Virtual routes around the world - GPS synchronized video, interesting places, laps, checkpoints

here is one nearby Virtual route - Nova Scotia To Lunenburg

you can let us know how close to the real thing it is

5

I tried it and while it looks fine, it’s not really what I think I want. It seems to be going for the hardcore online racer type, whereas that’s not really me.

The realism and virtual riding partners in rouvy are really nice and a welcome change from watopia….

4 Likes
6

Yeah no regrets here.

7

I’ve been on Rouvy for about 5 years. I like the real road view compared to the graphics of Zwift. While there may not be as many races you can always hop on a route and add virtual riders who have completed the route before. You can select a few faster and a few slower to motivate you along the way. There are tons of scenic routes to choose from and see what it would really be like to climb alp d’huez or other epic rides. I’ve found New Zealand and Colombia to have some great looking routes. I’d be curious to hear back in 7 days to see what you like/dislike as a new user compared to Zwift, which I have only tried twice.

8

I read this a lot about Zwift racing, but Cat D does NOT mean a rider “cannot push above X watts”, I have no idea where this perception comes from. You could put a total noob on a bike and they could sprint for a few seconds at hundreds of watts.

The goes in racing, even at cat D you’ll get people pushing high watts. That also happens in real life.

What the limits mean is the race average should be around that ( for a reasonable race time, say over 30min ) and if you look at race results, most of them are fine. I race a lot in C/B and when I see the results, they almost always reflect the standard.

Having said that, I did the same as you and gave Rouvy a go, a while ago.

I was really disappointed. They claim to be “accurate” but this is simply not true.

For example, I live near the IM Frankfurt course - the first stretch to Frankfurt, the gradients were all over place. You are riding up on Rouvy when it goes down in reality, and vice versa. Then I rode up the first climb and it’s about 1.5% average on Rouvy. I rode up at about 30kmh, this would have smashed anything Blummenfelt did this summer.

That climb is actually about 7% average.

Then the second climb, same story, and I gave up.

I then tried another course, in Switzerland, where I also know the roads well, and same story. Gradients had zero relation to real life.

Instead I have tried Fulgaz and found that to be much more accurate.

ymmv may vary, Rouvy is really nice - but the poor transfer of reality to the app ruined it for me.

If I know the routes where I ride in real life are badly done, I can’t trust anything else.

9

re: Zwift - I know what it means. I was looking at the results after the race, the top 14 (out of 32) riders all averaged 2.8 w/kg or higher. top 3 averaged 3.5 to 3.7 - that was for a 47 minute effort.

Just on Rouvy, I don’t really care all that much if the course is super accurate, I’m not using it for race recon or anything like that. I just want to ride, and look at scenery from different parts of the world… probably 50% of my riding is doing structured workouts in erg mode, so the terrain realism is irrelevant for those sessions.

Couple of little things, I can’t figure out how to change the camera angle, I don’t like the view where I’m off centre from my avatar. There’s supposed to be an icon in the top right of the screen, but I don’t have it.

I do like the workout view, it shows the full workout (graphically) plus a timer for the current interval plus the upcoming interval. I wish the upcoming interval displayed watts instead of %FTP, but that’s not a deal breaker. Overall it’s much better than the Zwift workout view, nearly as good as TrainerRoad.

Some of the corners really whip you around. I’m probably going to pick up a set of cheap rollers for variety, e.g, when I just want to do a long unstructured Z2 ride, but I’m not sure if the graphics would throw me off or not.

After 2 days, I’m still liking it.

10

If you go in to settings before going into a route you can choose the camera angle. On mine it’s on the left. Click on ‘Menu’ top left, go to ‘settings’,‘Camera Distance’ and choose ‘Me’.

1 Like
11

Rouvy user for 5+ years and enjoy it. Is it perfectly accurate for a ride/race- no but good enough for my needs. Tried Fulgaz and it kept crashing and felt even more unrealistic for rides I know so that lasted 3 days and no way. Have Zwifted- enjoy it when I need a race pace effort workout- can’t help but push with so many people around. But find the rollercoaster ride of some of the courses rather annoying. And not knowing the map inside and out no always sure where I am headed for the type of ride I want. I wish Rouvy would come back with a way for a rider to add their own course. Was able to do that for 3 of my local rides before they took that option off. That was cool as I could edit the file from my Garmin and get closer to riding the real course. But for my use the IM Moo course and the Chisago Lakes 70.3 course are close enough for my purposes.

12

Been years since my Rouvy try for a month but my gripe was that if it wasn’t one of the special Rouvy endorsement routes, very often the visual was off by up to a 1/4 mile from the elevation profile. Like you should clearly be descending but still were climbing.

That was annoying enough as despite cartoon graphics Zwift nails it for that part at least.

Maybe they fixed it. Don’t know. I loved the idea of Rouvy. I wanted it to work.

13

Started on Trainerroad in 2017, went to Swift in 2019 but didn’t like it, quickly moved to Rouvy which I loved especially for TP integration and brilliant routes plus virtual partners, went to Fullgaz because of IM specific courses to try before racing en just moved to IndieVelo which is now part of TP and for free if you have a premium TP account. For me structured training integration is most important, a low subscription fee is second most important. I don’t race online, I try to race in real outside races :wink:

14

actually TP Virtual is free even with a free TP account… I have tried it and that works in case anyone wants to know.

15

It’s free for now. That’s going to change in March when it will require TrainingPeaks premium to access it.

16

correct

17

I have been on Rouvy for 4.5 years now. I get to ride courses I am familiar with or get to try out courses in a part of the world I am interested in.

Also for competion I can add virtual partners with w/kg profiles similar to what I want to ride INCLUDING my own past rides and since I know how hard everyone is going I can curate a ride to the effort I want to put in and if I feel like getting thrashed I put stronger riders than me, and if I think I want to feel good about finishing mid to front of the pack in my personal race I put in riders of the target effort or a bit slower so in case I blow up there are others to ride with. It’s a winning platform for ME all around.

I am yet to do any Rouvy races. Also I can organize a group ride with friends and be on the same course at the same time…Hey lets ride xyz course in Mallorca at 10 am on Sunday. Sure enough, I show up at 10 am on Sunday and my real world live training partners are in the start corrall!!!

18

Why do you care that the gradient at a moment indoors and outdoors are identical and sync’d do the outroor reality. It’s just the indoor representation. If you consider that indoor version to just represent its indoor self and just have a loose semblance to what is out there in the real world many indoor rides on their own are interesting enough . I do a 42km route close to my house. In real like that loop with 680m of vertical takes me 1:21 to 1:30 depending on the day. It seems on Rouvy I am more like 1:15 to 1:24. I find I am faster on both uphills and downhills on Rouvy versus my real life self. I ride segments of Lake Placid on Rouvy and I go there often enough in real like that when I do ride on Rouvy I feel like I am in Lake Placid. Not identical, but close enough…same deal riding towards Hawi or riding up Alpe d’Huez or Stelvio. Close enough to be a good offering in my basement. Not the identical thing, but I am not trying to get the identical thing in my basement !!! Close enough is decent.

19

You’ll want this then: https://www.groupon.com/deals/rouvy-4<

Thanks for the code. That worked for me, but appears to expire today. My first experience on Rouvy was pretty meh, but I’ll give it a few more chances.

20

if its not an official rouvy route, there can be errors in how the elevation data was uploaded. When IM and rouvy broke up, users uploaded their version of courses. Most official courses I road were similar to real life.