I have been complaining for months about the bots in RGT doing things completely contrary to what I am doing, or anybody should be able to do. Things like riding next to me for 10 or 15 miles while producing half the W/Kg, but I won’t rehash these. Support has never been able to provide any reasonable explanation. But today, something new happened. It seemed odd but in another post, WahooCoach_Corey provided some clarity, unintended as it may have been.
In this post Difference between AC and MAP - #6 by WahooCoach_Corey this explanation was given for the 4DP numbers.
NM is like your max vertical jump or your max 1 rep weight lift - all the power you have concentrated in one explosive effort
AC is like your maximum sprint effort - I come from a running background, so I like to think of it like anything from a 100 - 400m all out sprint
MAP is very similar to VO2max effort - again with the running analogy this would be like your 800m to 1 mile all out effort
FTP is your 1 hour maximal effort - for me the intensity sensation is something like a maximum 10k effort (or longer depending on how fast you are)
I highlighted the AC definition for context. I was doing a RGT ride and twice during the 37 mile ride 2-3 bots took off at a pace of 4 W/Kg. For me that is 150% of my AC. Assuming the bots are anywhere similar to me, it had to be at or above their AC as well. The issue is in both cases, they held that pace for 15 - 20 minutes.
So please tell me who can ride at the equivalent of their all out 100 yard dash pace for longer than a 5000 meter race? The whole bots participation in my rides is beyond ridiculous. When I schedule a group ride I usually limit the bots to 10. Is there a way to limit or exclude the bots in a quick ride?
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You can’t really map your AC level to their W/kg, and 4 W/kg is around the FTP of upper Cat 3 / lower Cat 2 racers on Coggan’s chart (between Good and Very Good} - in other words, not very special at all, which is always kinda humbling, at least for me 
For some real world comparisons, there might be some interesting bits and bobs in this Cycling Analytics piece
https://www.cyclinganalytics.com/blog/2018/06/how-does-your-cycling-power-output-compare
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@fukawitribe I would agree but that is why I said “Assuming the bots are anywhere similar to me”. If they are much better cyclists than I am, why are they in my ride? What’s the point. It would be like me doing a major climb with Sir Mike Cotty. We may be on the same hill at the same time, but all similarities end there.
I did see your assumption, I was just trying to point out that it probably wasn’t really a valid one.
A far as I understand it, there are a variety of bots at different levels of ability - including the two mid-ish pack racer ones you were talking about. That seems reasonable to me, in fact desirable as there will a whole bunch of folk using the courses, of vastly different capabilities. I’m not really fussed that I might be blasted into the weeds every so often by a bot that’s going at someone else’s tempo, or even active recovery place - they’re for someone else… I can use the ones that are suitable for me.
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I haven’t ridden RGT much, to be honest I find the interface unintuitive and confusing and I’d rather watch a sufferfest video with real scenery rather than fake trees, however the one time I did use it I found the bots to be the strangest thing ever. I was pushing 2 w/kg and there were some pushing 0.5 w/kg and I never caught them. Then there were the ones doing 7 w/kg the entire time. I got passed by several of them doing anywhere from 1.5-6 w/kg and couldn’t figure it out. When I did finally catch one of them, riding at 1 w/kg if I remember correctly, they maintained the same pace, passed me and I never saw them again, all while never upping their pace. Strange behavior indeed.
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@Sir_Alan this has always been my experience. I’ve tried working with support for months on this but it is what it is…bad programming.
Not sure if you knew this already or if you’ve tried it but there is a way to change how bots react. There are “real bots” and “pacing bots”. You can set up their wattage range and limit them to wattever (pun intended) wattage you want. You can do this for both the pacing and the real ones. For pacing bots, you can also have them set to random (ie random power and weight) or distributed (bots with uniform power and weight the same as yourself). For real bots you’d choose “custom” to set their power range.
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Thanks Sir Glen. an you do this just for events you set up or for quick rides as well? And where in RGT do you do this?
I dont think you can do it for quick rides. You do it for events you set up. For group rides they are more predictable according what I’ve read.
You do it on rgtcycling.com when you set up your event.
- pick the road (real or magic).
- then pick the Bots tab
3.then pick real and custom for real bots and set the range you like
- for pacing bots, choose random or distributed and also set the range and number
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I did this for a group event where I was doing a workout and the pack stayed with me almost the entire time. I eventually got well ahead of them, then I stopped pedalling so they could catch up, which they did, then I slid in mid-pack. There is no drafting during group events so it was just intended to fill the screen so I wasnt so “lonely”.
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Thanks @Glen.Coutts I will play with these settings. As for:
With all the voices in your head, are you ever really lonely Sir? 
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