I wish RGT would

RGT
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If it were only so. Thomas please understand I am not questioning you, I am questioning the app.

There is a ride I do to spin out my legs. It is a downhill fixed decline spiral, 22 miles in length. I always ride it as a Race (so same weight as the organizer). There is no terrain difference so no place for one rider to be climbing while the other is descending. Based on that, the only logical explanation for one rider finishing ahead of another that was producing more watts would beif they were benefiting from a draft.

Not the case with RGT. I did this ride and a bot finished ahead of me while producing exactly HALF the watts I produced. Since the bot was out in front of me most of the time, by itself, NO DRAFTING.

So the quite logical assumption you offered as quoted above doesnā€™t hold for this app. :person_shrugging:

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Iā€™m not 100% sure that the tooltip is correct (as in, I start to doubt that all the bots have exactly the organizerā€™s weight)

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63

I think you have been on the right track with the drafting being the issue. I just did the same ride for the third straight day, each with a different setup, and each with wildly different results.

The ride is 35.3 miles, just a few short climbs totaling 128ā€™ and a fair amount of downhill but nothing that lets me get above 45 mph and even that is very brief. Each time I was joined by 24 bots. My time for all three rides were within 3 seconds of each other so even if i did different parts of the ride not exactly the same, over 35 miles each was almost an identical ride. As a matter of practice, I start out really strong for about the first half mile and then settle in and react as I deem appropriate. Here is a snapshot.

Ride 1: Race, Real Bots, drafting OK. I took the early lead but was caught by a group of 6 bots in just a few miles. Over the next 10 miles two of the bots dropped off the back. Somewhere around the half way mark, the 4 remaining bots just pulled away as normal. No power output could keep up with them and I could not draft off them. I finished at 2.0 W/Kg. The 1st place finisher was at 1.3. Non of the bots finished above 1.6.

Ride 2: Group Ride, Pace Bots, drafting OK. I took off but was quickly run down by a group of 5 bots. They were drafting but I could not draft on them. They slid off and out of site and another group of bots did the same thing. I finished 11th with a 1.9 W/Kg. Of the ten that finished ahead of me, it was an even distribution with 2 averaging the same W/Kg, four had a higher output of 2.0-2.2, and the other four had a lower number 1.6 - 1.8.

Ride 3: Race, Real Bots, NO drafting. I took off as usual and nobody ever caught me. With no drafting, I could see all the bots based solely on their distance behind me. Rather than the usual 5 or 6 all bunched the exact same distance from me, there was almost always a 0.02 mile gap between each. I averaged 2.1 W/Kg, finished first, with the second place finisher averaging 1.4 W/Kg (the best of all the bots) and it finished over a mile behind me.

While I will want to do a lot more testing, it appears that not allowing the bots to draft, since the app is programmed to not let me draft, had a big impact on the race. At least the results of the third ride made sense in the context of the individual performances.

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64

We are getting close results indeed (cf the screenshots of the 2 test-races I did on the 22nd of May, with racing bots and draft ON)

  • race 1 : 2.3Wkg and 6th, way behind bots averaging 1.1Wkg : this was when I was forcing myself out of draft, on purpose (since you said you were not managing to draft yourself)
  • race 2 : 1.4Wkg and 1st, on front of bots pushing 1.8Wkg : this was when trying to win while drafting as much as possible

We notice the same (huge) impact of the draft saved on the total average at the end, that you point out here :+1:

the quite logical assumption you offered as quoted above doesnā€™t hold for this app.

From what I can see (and what you showed too), Iā€™m quite happy actually with the physics of the app, and its ability to provide the correct speed for the given effort/terrain/weight. But indeed, the final ā€œaverageā€ numbers are highly depend on the draft :+1:

If you donā€™t manage to draft the bots, and you find it a ā€œfairerā€ challenge to cut the botsā€™ draft off, then by all means, go for it, these are bots, they wonā€™t complain :smiley:

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65

Side note : On way too many occasions do we see ā€œthe physics donā€™t make sense at all, byeā€ and never see the person again
I just wanted to say that Iā€™m very happy to see someone who would have the patience to keep testing/challenging observations (and even oneself first impression) :+1:

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66

Thomas I agree with almost everything you said.

My inability to draft off the bots is 100% in the app. No matter what I do, when I attempt to draft, the bots take any and every evasive action imaginable so I canā€™t stay on their wheel. The actions are often things that no rider would ever actually contemplate under any circumstances.

Just so we are clear, it is not that I manage ā€œto draft off the botsā€ because I lack the skill or knowledge on how to draft, it is only because the app absolutely will not let me.

Lastly, I think some aspects of the physics still donā€™t make sense, but I still plan to do more testing, at least I found one setup that makes sense.

Be well my friend.

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67

I agree with you ā€“ the bot lane motion should be toned down, for example, change lanes 5x less often unless there is a compelling advantage to changing, like taking the inside line on a sufficiently gradual not-too-steep turn, or the availability of a substantial draft advantage.

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68

The race bots on RGT now behave like a swarm of mosquitoes, all of which have become aware that you would like to swat them. Even if the steering was not problematic, which it is, you would need the reactions of a fighter pilot to obtain any draft from them at all.
I understand that RGT is working to make steering optional for all riders which is welcome. Perhaps the bots could also be toned down a bit to more like their pre-steering form.

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69

Awesome visual, and spot on. :+1:

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FYI from (fuzzy) memory there is a fairly high-effort way to check ridersā€™ weights (masses) which is to run a packet capture on one of your devices that is running RGT or the remote app. When I checked a few months ago, the protocol used contains each riders weight. From what I recall, the network traffic also included the ā€˜frontal areaā€™ plus loads of verbose info re the kit the rider was using.

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71

@Robin-RGT-FB-mod thanks for that. I would get right on that if I had the first idea what in the world you were talking about. :confused: Not a techie. Could you explain how to do that in plain English? If itā€™s too involved just say so. I will understand, because I donā€™t understand now, or, wait, where are my pants?

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72

Iā€™m looking at the API report from a recent event I organized and all of the pacer bots are listed at 75 kg, although they have different heights. I use ā€œrandomā€ so this isnā€™t randomizedā€¦ I think they changed how they allocate bot mass (I can look at some older events later).

the heights are irrelevant in RGT physics so far but that may change in the future.

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73

@Dan_Connelly where do you get the API report? Thanks,

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@Critmark Running a packet capture and then interpreting it is quite a faff* unless you are used to such things which you probably only would be if you were a software developer, network engineer, or something similarly ā€˜beepyā€™. Iā€™d be happy to talk you through it but it sounds like @Dan_Connelly has a far easier option to find out the relevant information in this case.

*technical term

So, Dan, is this some secret event organiser voodoo? Do tell!

That is interesting re the masses, @Dan_Connelly.

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I messaged you.

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