Zwift Thu Road Race Series - 2023 Winter Week 4 (1/26/23, 6:00 PM)

[Jonathan O'Keeffe]

For the NCC's winter 2023 road race series, we are joining organized Zwift races, racing against each other as well as other riders.  Scoring is based on how you finish relative to other riders in your category.

The Week 4 race will be on Thursday January 26, 6:00 PM EST.  The race we are entering is the "Tour de Zwift 2023 | Stage 5 (A)" (https://www.zwift.com/events/view/3359472). The race is one lap of the Everything Bagel course in New York, for about 21.4 miles total.   Each category in this week's race will ride separately.  You can register for the race ahead of time in your browser at the link above, or you can join the race on the spot when you start Zwift by finding it in the event list on the home screen.  You may need to scroll the event list on the home screen to find the race.  

Note that start times for these races will vary from week to week, depending on the Zwift event schedule, but will generally start between 5:00 PM and 7:00 PM.  There is no late join option for organized races on Zwift, so make sure you're ready to go ahead of the scheduled start time.

Scoring will be based on the results published by ZwiftPower (https://zwiftpower.com/).  You must be registered for a free account on ZwiftPower in order for your results to be counted.  If you're not already registered on ZwiftPower, be sure to sign up in advance of the race, as it takes a little while to get your Zwift account linked to your ZwiftPower account.  You should also join the NCC team on ZwiftPower (https://zwiftpower.com/team.php?id=227) so that I can pick you out in the results.

The rides in the Zwift "Grand Tours" do not use regular race categories, but instead use A/B/C for Longer/Standard/Shorter rides.  This week, we are racing the A (Long) ride, so everyone should sign up for category A, regardless of your normal ZwiftPower category.  These events are structured as "rides" as opposed to "races", so you will probably not see a finish scoreboard at the end, but you should see your current position in-game as usual during the ride.  These events usually get many participants (several hundred), so be sure to get to the starting pen early if you don't want to be stuck in the back.  Many people will be riding this at a casual pace, but the front will be moving at race pace, and the start will be fast.

The scoring for mass-start single-category races is based on your finishing place relative to all finishers, with category and gender bonuses.  Your finishing points are computed by the formula (100 * (B + 1)) / N, where B is the number of riders you beat, and N is the total number of riders in the race.  Category bonuses for all riders (men and women) are based on your racer category in ZwiftPower on race day: Cat A riders get no bonus, Cat B riders get a 5% bonus, Cat C riders get a 30% bonus, and Cat D riders get a 50% bonus.  

Women have two options for this race: race in the open race (B) and receive an additional 30% bonus points, or race in the women's-only D race, receiving no additional bonus points.
Optional audio/video chat will be  available on NCC's Discord channel at https://is.gd/nccdiscord.

This race is part of our weekly lineup of  Zwift rides, as follows:
  -  Tue 6:00 PM - Time Trial / Hill Climb (TT bike required for Time Trials, not for Hill Climbs)
  -  Wed 8:00 PM - Social Ride
  -  Thu afternoon - Road Race (times will vary between 5 PM and 7 PM)
  -  Sat 9:00 AM - Social Ride (weather dependent)

Check the calendar page at www.nohobikeclub.org for full details on all events.