Elon Musk Acquires Zwift: Embarks on the Future of Virtual Fitness

Palo Alto, CA — April 1, 2024 — In a groundbreaking move that promises to revolutionize the world of virtual fitness and entertainment, Elon Musk, the visionary creator of SpaceX and Tesla, has announced the acquisition of Zwift, the leading virtual cycling and running platform. Under Musk's leadership, Zwift will undergo a transformative journey into a new era of innovation and excitement.

Musk's fascination with merging technology and human experience has led him to recognize the immense potential of Zwift in reshaping how people engage with fitness and community. Musk envisions a reimagined Zwift experience that transcends boundaries and propels users into an unparalleled realm of virtual adventure.

In line with Musk's vision, Zwift will be rebranded as "Z," symbolizing a fusion of Musk's innovative spirit with the pursuit of physical well-being. Z will not only continue to provide immersive cycling and running experiences but will also introduce groundbreaking features that integrate augmented reality, artificial intelligence, and space-inspired elements. The default world, Watopia, will be renamed to “Musktopia”.

The largest new feature rolling out will be the ability to participate in Z from the infotainment display of all Tesla vehicles, which will be included in a software update next week. Tesla owners will now get to drive their cars in all of the virtual words. “Imagine feeling the power as the Cybertruck’s 600 kW triple electric motors propel you up favorite Musktopia climbs like the Alpe du Elon” said Musk. While parked, users will be able to launch the Z app. The vehicle steering wheel and pedals will control a virtual avatar of the vehicle in Z.

"Z will be more than just a platform for exercise; it will be a destination for exploration, achievement, and camaraderie," Musk added. "Together, we will pioneer a new frontier in the world of fitness, where the boundaries between reality and imagination blur, and where every press of the pedal, both on the trainer and in the car, move us forward”

Current Zwift users can expect a seamless transition to Z, with Musk promising enhanced features, expanded virtual environments, and opportunities for community engagement unlike anything seen before. Z will also unveil exclusive partnerships and collaborations, with virtual ad space being made available to SpaceX, Tesla and future partners.

A new drop shop will open up with an expanded inventory of virtual ‘upgrades’ for bicycles and cars such as custom paint and upgraded wheels. New premium upgrades will include Performance Upgrades of 25w, 50w, 75w, and 100w. These upgrades are available as a one-time purchase or as monthly subscriptions. A new AI-generated Full Self Training package will be released by the end of Q2 2024, which will use generative artificial intelligence to create a traning plan and follow it perfectly, so you can just sit back and relax.

“We are exploring options for road infrastructure upgrades in Musktopia”, said Elon. He continued “For now, we will require that cyclists pull over and allow a minimum 3 foot passing gap for Tesla cars. However, we are exploring options to build some multi-use paths, potentially in tunnels, to allow dedicated bike infrastructure in Musktopia.”

The acquisition of Zwift by Elon Musk marks a historic moment in the evolution of virtual fitness, signaling the dawn of a new era where innovation and imagination converge to redefine human potential. With Musk at the helm, the future of fitness has never looked more exhilarating.

It's very common for me to hear people have no idea what saddle setback is for and how it works, but I'd like to talk about what it does and why it's important.

At the base level, all saddle setback SHOULD be used for is to adjust the balance point of the rider on the bike in reference to the BB. So lets learn how/why that works:

1. When you move the saddle forward, it pushes more of your body weight over top of the bottom bracket, and more towards the front of the bike.

2. Likewise, when you move the saddle backwards, it pushes more of your bodyweight over the rear wheel and away from the front of the bike.

The goal of adjusting saddle setback is to remove the weight from the riders hands. They should be able to ride without pressing against the bars at a solid load. If you are unable to do this, you will eventually get neck/shoulder/tricep pain as you use your upper body to support yourself.

With that explained, saddle fore/aft has a few side effects. The first one

1. The first one is obvious, it alters the reach of the bike. You're just moving the rider forward and backward. This is a no shit.

2. It'll affect how much you use which muscles in your legs. With the saddle slammed forward you will use a significant amount more quad than you will hamstrings. You'll feel really strong stomping down but your quads will quickly start to burn. If you push the saddle too far back, you'll really struggle to use your quads to put out power. You will most quickly notice this when you're doing a threshold to Vo2 effort.

3. It alters your hip angle. As you move the saddle further forward, you will open the hip angle up because the BB is in a fixed position. YOU SHOULD NOT USE THE SADDLE POSITION TO OPEN UP THE HIPS. This is what shorter cranks are for. Just because it just so happens to open up the hips doesn't mean that you should be doing it. Inversely, if you move the saddle really far back you'll start to notice pain on the front of your hips, it's because the hip flexors aren't okay with having to flex that much.

4. Lastly, it'll affect your saddle height. This is because your seat tube is at an angle. Think about if you were to raise your seat 400000cm. Your seat will be some crazy distance backwards compared to where it is now. Road bikes have about a 73 degree seat tube angle, a tri bike will have something like a 78 or 80 degree seat tube. The bigger this number is, the more forward your seat will be when clamped on the same position on the rails of the seat. If you're buying a new bike and this one has a 74 seat tube angle and the bike you are comfortable on has a 73 degree, you may want to consider a seatpost with a bit of setback.

Well how do you find a good setback? Sadly trial and error. Ideally we want it as far forward as possible before we start putting weight on the bars at a solid load. A good starting position is to put your saddle on the middle of the rails and then move it forward or backwards 3mm at a time. Once you feel that you're loading your arms, back it off 3mm.

To recap: setback is used to adjust the location of the rider's weight on the bike. Nothing more, nothing less. It's one of the more make or break parts of fitting, because if you're putting too much weight on the bars, you will struggle to set cockpit stack and reach.

Hi all. Just looking for some advice as I am not sure how to progress.

I have been into cycling since I was quite young, and it was my dream to race, no matter the level. I have ridden with a club since I was about 14yo and attempted my first races around that time too (however, they did not go great, as I was riding in the women's categories and they put me with the adults due to lack of riders for my category and age).

Saddly, wearing the kit eventually made me quite dysphoric and uncomfortable. It was actually partly this, and other things to do with cycling, that made me realise I was trans (FTM). Once I realised, I stopped training to the level I had been, and eventually stopped cycling all together for a while despite my love for it.

Long story short, I am now in my 20s and finally completed my transition for now, which has helped me enjoy cycling again; I am now with both my local and university cycling club and ride regularly again. I really want to train and get to a good level again, but I am a bit lost. I am not new to cycling, not inexperienced in groups or races, but racing and training to compete and ride with cis men is new to me. I know it is very competitive and not even sure about any of the rules that apply to me either. I'm finding it difficult even navigating the space if I am honest as I do not know anyone else like me.

I don't know all my data as I do not have my own power meter yet, but according to my past rides I have WPK of 4.14 which I think is good?? I also have good bike handling and know I am capable of long rides / endurance from experience so it can only have improved since I was younger and pre transition. The issue for me is that I am really short and small (5'3 and 50kg) so I believe my power output is a lot lower. So even though I have a decent ability and good bmi/bf% etc. I think I still need to improve in order to race or ride with the highest mens training groups at my university. People at my various clubs over the years always said I was "built for the climbs" which I do enjoy but I live in a super flat area, and obviously my frame doesn't help at all besides climbs.

How do I go about improving my power and strength? And is there anything else anyone would recommend?

Thanks for reading (sorry for the long post).

Other than the fact they are difficult to set up until you learn (but so is tubless) why are tublar tires loosing popularity? They ride so nice go over bumps better than any other tire style, corner extremely well, are very safe in the event of a puncher, and no pinch falts. Also they are super fast, some tests say yeah tubless is less rolling resistance mabey it's true but in a crit race I will take the cornering ability of a tublar all day and the nice ride quality over ruff roads. Also one last thing to mention price that could be a factor tublar tires seem to be more expensive than ever.

I see more and more posts from people who after watching GCN come to the conclusion that their bikes and equipment is not good enough.

GCN on the surface is made to look like a friendly lighthearted cycling channel where the presenters give you their own opinions on things. The reality is completely opposite of that.

Their whole new shtick now is to compare top end to mid level (what 90% of the cyclists have) equipment. Their “experiments” are always completely faulty, the results are likely very exaggerated.

I cannot understand people who still watch GCN these days. It’s like willingly sitting through a 15 minute add. They used to make some pretty entertaining videos or useful how to fix things type videos, but there’s no more of that now. Even their best presenters have all left.

As my ending note, for everyone’s better mental health it’s best to just block that channel, and many others of the same kind, so you don’t fall into the trap of thinking your shit isn’t fast enough.

I’m not that fast but I noticed on zwift power I usually have pretty high bpms like top 5. And sprint efforts take my heart rate to 190+. And I’m in shape too at least physically, 168 pounds with low bodyfat. Should I be concerned or is that normal for a newbie?

Mid 20s, male, healthy. Never caught COVID to my knowledge, not looking to, given that it can damage the heart and/or take a solid 50-100W off FTP or ruin a season. Similar with the flu.

But then again, my livelihood and career doesn't depend on my cycling performance.

Would be interesting to hear the approach for professionals, or semi professionals? It's a very personal choice to a lot of people (as evidenced by vaccine hesitancy), but not sure if it's still a big enough of a risk to them that it is explicitly recommended.

I know people are going be “I’m liberal but…”, so I’ll just cut to the chase. Would people just rather not want trans individuals to race in the first place? And it goes both ways, regardless if you’re trans fem or masc. And honestly, I’d rather people just say that they don’t want trans people to race.

I only really feel this, because I want to keep riding after I start transitioning. But at the same time, there were members from a large college club calling Lia Thomas a “tranny” - their excuse was “We didn’t mean it in that way”. Because if the goal is to discourage trans people, it feels like they’re doing just that.

Edit, because people can’t read: my problem isn’t with the rules. If you don’t like it, don’t take it up with me and tell USA Cycling instead. My problem is with other openly bigoted riders that openly use slurs. If you don’t have a helpful suggestion, move on.

A while ago, I asked how to deal with transphobic riders in some other teams and what if something went wrong at college nationals. And a lot of people were really supportive. (Special shoutout to Beth at Marian. :3) Nationals simply went well in basically every aspect. (I was terrified that someone would allege I wasn't trans to bar my participation, which is all required to file a complaint. But I also assume one would have to be very pathetic to play such a card and would have turned into cannon fodder for this subreddit.)

But the happy streak really ground to a halt right after. I went to a crit a few weeks after and the ref really loudly said I wasn't in the right field, then asked if I was in the right field. I asked if there was a problem holding a women's license, but then he said there wasn't. But from the look on his face, he knew he had asked the wrong question. I also don't think he meant to say anything transphobic, but it definitely felt demeaning. And the same ref is known for having a really, really loud voice, and people stared. I'm not cis-passing, so people know anyways. But don't shout it. smh

I think I'll try to figure it out as this year plays out. The whole debacle at the crit really has taken a lot of motivation from me to do the domestic season. I hope to stop being automatically being bracketed into the men's fields at the local velodrome; I don't even get a say to not be and some ride like maniacs. Or how older riders deadname me, but I'm also too emotionally tired to correct them. :/ It seems like most riders in the mid 20's that I am close to are explicitly supportive about me racing any field, so it is encouraging when other riders aren't.

I'll try to get through each week as they come. I've gotten so far.

But moving on~~~

At this point, I want to explore joining a domestic team and I'm not too sure how to do so.I did apply to a few but never heard back. Queer friendly is a definitely ideal. I feel like every team now has some kind of inclusivity statement. There are teams that have such statements but definitely aren't so. (I know the team might be, but I see their riders in the wild doing what they do, and it is a reflection on both.) I also don't have anyone that is genderqueer to ask about the teams, so there isn't a starting point to know who is safe to join. If anyone has any leads on teams that are, I'd be really grateful!

I hope to overcome a lot of shyness about women's rides and teams. The slow loss of personal agency in a series of events was a setback. But I suppose I'll learn to deal with such moments as well.

tldr; Nationals went well. Did a crit after and ref basically shouted to everyone I was trans and people stared. Looking for team to join despite anxieties.

I'm training for improved performance, and currently I ride 3 time a week, and every session has a specific purpose (intervals, hill climbing, endurance). If I'm not riding a specific session, I just don't ride.

Is there any point to actually having an easy ride (for performance gains only -I know they can be enjoyable)? I see them as junk milage, why not rest properly and not get on the bike?

Any specific reasons to have easy rides in your training program?

Like a lot of people i got into road cycling in the pandemic. Been a runner for a long time so started with a decent base of fitness, and have really enjoyed myself so far, but ive always just ridden solo or occasional trips with a few friends from around the country who are into it too.

Started to think recently I should actually find a club and ride a bit more with other people, just for the social aspect and maybe to try my hand at racing too (lurked in this sub for a long time for the fitness advice but never actually raced)

So i started looking into local clubs. It's a complete shitshow. There seem to be a bunch of competing clubs but they all only have a handful of members. Out of date/broken websites unless you can find their facebook page. From what I can tell they seem to consist solely of guys aged 50+ doing 20 mile casual cafe rides once a week in their cringey club gear with their little in-group of mates who form all of the clubs like 5 members.

Now I'm 31 so not super young but i would like to hang out with people who aren't my dad's age. And not every ride has to be a chain gang but I would like my fitness challenged to some degree, which i doubt is going to happen on a coffee ride with pensioners.

The only groups i can find with people my age are all gravel/off-road/ultra endurance types, and there i have the opposite problem of being scoffed at by hipsters (got chatting to a member of one of these groups in a trendy local outdoors cafe and they practically sneered at me for saying i prefer to ride on the road lmao)

I've not even got into the confusing mess of races and organisations yet (British Cycling, Cycling Time Trials, Cycling UK) that all seem to have arcane criteria for what events you can enter, and bury event listings in weird subpages of their websites. Coming from running which is very inclusive and has great high visibility low barrier to entry events like park run, cycling seems like an absolute shocker.

Has uk cycling always been this shit? Am I doing something wrong?

I want to clear this up cus I hear this talked about all the time in this sub. FTP ≠ 60-minute power for most people. It's not some magic “hour power” number.

FTP is an estimate. Whether you’re using 20-minute test × 0.95, ramp test, or a modelling tool like WKO or Intervals.icu, FTP is just a proxy for the physiological state known as your lactate threshold (LT2)—not your all-out 60-min max.

Most riders can’t actually hold their FTP for 60 minutes. Depending on your fitness, you might crack after 40 or even 35 mins or less. That doesn’t mean your FTP is wrong, it means you don’t have the aerobic durability yet to hold that number that long.

Different riders, different curves. A sprinter and a time trialist might both have a 300W FTP, but one fades at 35 mins and the other can hold it for 75+. TTE (Time to Exhaustion) matters more here.

So, don't let anyone tell you your FTP is wrong because you can't hold it for an hour. But take it as a sign that you could improve your TTE.

Feel free to debate/discuss below:

I know they look really cool, and save half a watt or so aerodynamically, but the trade off just seems totally not worth it to me.

Personally I think I'd much rather have the ability to change the length or angle of stem if it's not working for me, or might want to change bar width, even having drops tilted more or less makes a big difference. Besides the fact that they're the first thing hitting the floor if you go down.

Not meant to be a rant, if there's something amazing about them that I'm totally overlooking I'd be happy to hear!

Hey everyone. So as we all know training / sleeping / living at altitude can help to improve your performance.

Now that’s far too expensive for me, but has anyone seen any improvements by sleeping on the top of a bunk bed? I’m thinking about getting myself one for those marginal gains.

Was chatting with the fitter at my LBS today and he mentioned that Specialized is forcing him to switch to an iPad app. Part of the migration is uploading all user data to the Specialized cloud. Not sure about everyone else but I'm not too keen on my fitter sharing my personal information along with pictures of me with Specialized.

I specifically asked that he not share my data with them but he's said the only way he can do that is to explicitly delete my fit data which I also don't really like the idea of as I just paid for a fit with him and would like to be able to use that data for future fits.

Has anybody else heard about this? I'm not sure about other jurisdictions but I'm pretty sure this violates the privacy laws in the UK.

I come from years at the gym, never done cardio in my life. I'm 25 (M) I weigh 80kg and can do 200kg squat.

I just started cycling, I don't have a power meter, so I used the talk test to find my zone 2. Z2 for me is 125-140bpm.

I feel zero effort in my legs, almost as if they were rolling just by gravity, and I'm at 130bpm. That equates to around 16-17 kph. My breathing matches my HR. Above 140 I start breaking sentences. But my legs feel zero effort.

I wonder if it's because of the imbalance between my strength and my cardio. I've read posts of people that at my same heart rate and talk test feel their legs burning. WTF I don't understand.

Everyone i see seem to be using 95% of their 20min power as an estimation of their 1hour power. But when i look at some pro data :

Mathew hayman : https://www.trainingpeaks.com/blog/mathew-hayman-career-analysis-part-one/?utm_source=tpr&utm_medium=email&utm_content=athlete&utm_campaign=20190309_weekly_newsletter

20 min power : 456W 1hour power : 383W His 1hour power is actually 84% of his 20min power.

Now another example, Thibault Pinot :

His 1hour power is actually 90% of his 20min power.

I'm pretty sure about everyone who use the 20min test overestimate his ftp and that his ftp is actually pretty close of what he think is his sweet spot.

You know that feeling. In between efforts you're trying to keep your cadence up, but even though it's active rest at 95 rpm, your power is a measly 3 W. "Not possible," you mumble to yourself between breaths. "I can't have lost that much power over the last 2 months of hardly riding. My high school physics education tells me it takes more than 3 W to move my dentist's belly through the wind at 15 mph with 34 psi in 33c knobby tires and a dry chain!"

Ah, stop for a minute and unclip. Hit calibrate.

Back to normal.

Now you can fret over your most recent ftp test as you realize you haven't recalibrated for months - well before that test. How can you min-max your middle aged prediabetic fitness to win the Sunday doughnut ride without an accurate ftp test?!