himespau 

People have asked about different alternatives to Zwift/RGT/MyWhoosh/etc.

A new one has opened in public beta (yesterday, I believe).

It's called indieVelo and can be found and https://indievelo.com
(one of my teammates noted that the name sounds a lot like "in development" and we wondered if that was just a temporary, pun-based name until they came up with something better, but, George, the guy making the game was like, "what? Oh, I never noticed that."

I've been using it (mainly for racing) for the last 2-3 months while it's been in private beta (so was under an NDA and couldn't comment when people asked about Zwift alternatives in the past).

It's got some pros and cons. As I said, I've mainly used it for racing, so my comments will mainly focus on that (I've used it a bit for pace partner group rides or free rides - mainly in race warm ups - and haven't tried the training plans at all).

Unlike in Zwift, you can't just blast around corners at full speed. You either have to slow down or it autobrakes you (and then shifts you to a further out line if you keep trying to put out power - which can still be an effective strategy if you are trying to do a long sprint through a corner 4-500 m before a finish line and everyone else slows for the corner). The braking around corners takes some getting used to, but it's an interesting concept - and one that Zwift seems to be considering adopting as well.

I like that you can set it up to feel the wind resistance in your trainer, so you have a feeling in your pedals as well as the draft gauge to know when you're out in the wind.

I really like the virtual gearing that allows me to either add resistance to my top gear or just leave the chain in my most efficient gear and use my keyboard to change the resistance I feel.

I love that dual recording is native to the game (and it displays all the balance stuff that comes with using pedals as your secondary power source).

The "smart" bots are interesting. They definitely make racing more fun than going against dumb bots that just put out X power.

I like how they give each race attributes (long, short, flat, hilly) and then give you a performance-based ranking based on who you beat on races with certain attributes. So your race ranking on long hilly races will be different than your race ranking on 4k sprints on the velodrome (oh, did I mention the velodrome yet?), but, in both cases, your ranking is based on RESULTS and not 20 minute power, which isn't relevant to most races.

I also like the way it automatically sorts you you into pens of people/bots that you're likely to be competitive against. Those last 2 features results-based race ranking (based on the type of race) and automatically sorting you into the appropriate pen makes racing so much better.

I joined Zwift back when there were 2 routes: hilly and flat. This definitely has more road variety than that, but lacks the current variety of roads and lacks the magic roads feature of RGT. On the other hand it does have enough variety to start.

As far as the graphics goes, I really like the sky. The rest of it might be falling on the wrong side of the uncanny valley compared to Zwift for me, but, as I said, I mainly have used it for racing where my focus is not on the graphics but on racing the bots/people around me, so I don't really notice the graphics.

Sy Reene

Interesting. Site doesn't have much in the way of ride videos and courses, or screenshots showing available functionality, menus, etc though?

himespau 

Yeah, that would be helpful. Since it was under an NDA until Friday, I never recorded/streamed any of my races or I'd post those that you could see. Pictures/videos would definitely be a big plus for the website if they want to draw people in. It's a program essentially run by one guy who is a big racer and a software coder, so that's more his area of expertise than making a good website, unfortunately. I think that he's gotten that feedback a lot in the last couple of days. None of us beta testers had seen the website prior to it going live, so we couldn't give that feedback.

himespau 

IF you have Twitch, here's someone's race that they streamed from yesterday: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1836788402?t=00h46m15s


https://www.instagram.com/reel/CtBZb2eN3zx/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet

tempocyclist

Watched the above Twitch video with the pacing group. Apart from that, information is VERY bare bones. Nothing on the website. Does it support workouts? Or is it simply just racing and pacing? What platforms?

EDIT: Just found the Wiki pages, reading through it now.

That said, for something coded by one person (or a very small team) it actually looks pretty impressive. I may give the free trial a hit to see what it's like.

unterhausen

Thanks for posting, looks pretty good.

Taicho_Cyclist

I did my first full route ride on indieVelo yesterday while on live stream. The experience is pretty similar to Zwift with many of the keyboard controls being nearly identical.

Search for Taicho Cyclist Channel on Youtube as I am relatively new here so links are still not permitted in my posts. Apologies.

tempocyclist

I've done a couple of rides now too, and yes, it is VERY similar to Zwift. Almost copyright infringing similar at times! Ride experience was good though. I loaded it up, registered, chose a "Pacer" ride, connected devices, and was riding in a matter of minutes. Very straightforward. If you've used Zwift then using indieVelo will be very natural.

I'll post some more thoughts later, and some screenshots once I figure out where indieVelo saved them on my laptop.

himespau 

I think all the folks involved used to be somehow involved in Zwift (the main 2 were involved in race performance verification), so they wanted to keep the feeling similar but design it with a key goal on fair racing and then add in all the other stuff people would like rather than slapping racing on as a module after building the system for social interactions and having people just race on their own for the first several years the way Zwift did it. Definitely an easy transition if you're used to Zwift at all. Some things seem to work more smoothly than Zwift, others seem less polished.

Sy Reene

Supposedly one interesting but nice difference is that you can evidently feel effects of going in and out of draft with resistance changes going to the trainer? Is this correct?

himespau 

That is one of the settings on the trainer that you can set the strength of (along with virtual gearing, how much you feel virtual braking, and how much you feel hill resistance). I have it turned down most of the way because it felt like the way it was doing it made the resistance too light when I was in the draft - essentially I was cruising in the pack in my sprinting gears and running out of gears when trying to sprint in races. Virtual gearing did help with that, but I ended up just turning the wind resistance feel all the way off. Of course, I'm a pretty heavy rider (~100 kg) and more of a grinder than a spinner (natural cadence in the low to mid 70's), so my cruising gear (54x14 or 15) is a bit lower than most other peoples who probably will not run out of gears as fast as I did.

Sy Reene

I'm giving it a try. One thing if anyone knows the answer. Is it possible to play this in windowed mode?
I run on a W10 convertible laptop/ touchscreen tablet. Once I launch the program, I can't figure out a way to access the virtual keyboard to hit the ESC key in order to quit? Am I missing something fundamental?

himespau 

Yeah, there's a setting to change it from full screen to windowed mode. Several people have suggested to George (the software writer) that it's better to start in windowed mode because it's hard to figure out how to quit without hitting escape and people feel locked in, but he prefers to play in full screen (and says your computer will give better performance in full screen because it's not trying to also power the graphics for other windows), so he doesn't feel it's an issue. As someone who likes to have a music player app open and streaming and discord, I like windowed to be able to run all that stuff. I can't remember where it is, one of the settings menus.

Sy Reene

Thanks. Yeah, I've got it figured out. I really just wanted access to the taskbar.

One thing I didn't figure out.. I paired my smart trainer, and separately paired my power meter pedals. However, I get I think power showing in the main display (Center top) coming fom the smart trainer, and separately a little below and to the left, a "powermeter" reading (displaying slightly different readings). I'm assuming my speed is based then on my trainer's power meter, not my powermeter pedals. I can't figure out how to switch this.

himespau 

Because these folks are coming from the world of eRace performance verification where it is felt that the trainer power is the hardest to mess with (can't change crank arm length or bias and get exaggerated power the way you can with a pedal-based powermeter), they have it set up to always get your speed and everything from your trainer power and just use your other meter for verification/additional data. Not a way to change this (without unpairing your trainer power altogether) as far as I know and they want to keep it that way.

Just for posterity's sake in case anyone else is interested, I have a youtube video below of me just messing around with the settings including wind feel and going from windowed to full screen and back again at the 30 minute mark (you can also get the taskbar by hitting just the windows button if you have a keyboard handy). My streams hide my taskbar and the top of the window while riding in windowed mode, so it might not be helpful to you.
A couple of weeks ago, I tweaked something in my knee while working around the house (I think one of my hamstring tendons). Stupidly did a couple of Zwift races the next morning because I had planned to and was doing them for points for the team. Took a minor tweak and made it a more serious strain. Took a week off the bike and then did a race because my knee only was a little tight and I wanted to get points in the series for my team. Knee was even worse after that. As a result this was my 2nd ride in like 2 weeks (and first time on indieVelo in almost a month), so I just wanted an easy ride with a pace bot while playing with the settings. Probably should have cut it short at 25-30 minutes instead of the 45 I did as my knee is a bit sore. Definitely not as sore as it was last week after a race that had me going up and down the Zwift Volcano 3 times at race power.

Sy Reene

Understood but unfortunate. I'd prefer to be able to use the same power meter for both my indoor and outdoor rides.

himespau 

The .fit file has data from both power sources in it; they have a website (https://dualrecording.com/ ) that you can upload your .fit file to, which allows you to compare the data from both power sources just from that fit file.

I just put in a feature request that they have a checkbox or something that allows you to choose which power source they use to send data to Strava so you can compare your results to outdoors. It probably won't work as there is probably some technical reason that the primary power used to determine your ride is written in a place in the .fit file which is the only place that Strava looks or something, but I tried suggesting it. Will see what happens.

tempocyclist

I've gotten a few rides under my belt now, mostly testing out the pacing bots and exploring some of the (limited) roads around the island, including the velodrome. Setup is easy, starting a ride or finding the right pacer is easy. The "drafting" is a little different to Zwift and the wind does effect trainer feel and virtual speed / difficulty. It's interesting. A few times I found myself stuck outside the draft and had to either back off a lot or stomp on the pedals to reposition my avatar. I haven't tried any of their race events yet, or the workout features.

Here's some screenshots I took during a ride:







NOTE: I used a Windows gaming laptop to a 4K TV. The software saves screenshots as PNG files (around 6MB each). I've reduced image size and re-saved each as a JPG so they'll upload here, but that has impacted the image quality.

himespau 

I don't know why it's something I notice so much, but I really like the sky on indieVelo. You should try some races (if that's your thing). It's so nice being in a pack that is automatically matched to your abilities (and filled out with bots that also match your abilities), so there's always a competitive race. Rarely are you alone off the front or off the back (except maybe the first couple races while it sets your ranking or if you're not racing full out). Sandbaggers aren't really a problem.

TennBent

Based on this thread, I downloaded this a few days ago. I used it yesterday for a recovery ride just to see how it was and I am impressed. I rode the Coastal Loop then turned around and rode it in reverse for a total of 20 miles. My initial impressions are that it "feels" better than Zwift. What I feel through the pedals seems more realistic. I have the Virtual Gearing turned off but I have the gradient and wind settings at maximum as I want to replicate the outdoor experience as much as I can. I like that when you get a tailwind or headwind, you can feel that slight change in your pedal resistance. At the 2-4 mph wind speeds I had, the resistance change was very nuanced and effective.

I also found my speeds in the game to be more realistic than in Zwift. I'm a recreational rider and not a racer. This was a recovery ride so I wasn't pushing it but I was carefully watching the wind speed and direction, the gradient, and my speed. When the road turned and the wind went from cross to head, I noticed that my speed dropped slightly unless I pushed out just a few more watts. It was so much like real life. I ended up cruising most of the time at about 17-18 on level ground, depending on wind speed and direction. I finished the ride with a 16.8 mph average. All of it was more in line with what I would do outside. In contrast, I did a recovery ride a couple of week ago on Zwift, using the Tempest Fugit route. I averaged 18.4 mph on that one; about 1.5 mph difference for a similar effort. That's one thing that has always kind of bothered me about Zwift. It assumes optimal riding conditions: perfect asphalt, no wind, perfect tires, etc., and I can easily manage 20 mph on many routes. IndieVelo seems to get the speeds more correct and without simply bogging the trainer down. As I stated at the beginning, the feel is more realistic, to me, than Zwift.

Toward the end of the ride, I was able to get in and draft with a couple of their fake riders. I do think that they are overestimating the drafting effect. As soon as I was behind one of them, my watts dropped by 20-30 to maintain the same speed. I don't get that feeling on the road. It just felt too easy. What I did like about drafting is that it was easier to stay in the draft compared to Zwift. In Zwift, I find it more difficult to control and, many times, Zwift will just slingshot me ahead of the person and I end up playing leapfrog. With IndieVelo, as in real life, I was able to ease up on my pedal stroke and stay nicely tucked in behind them.

The graphics are decent. I think I prefer them to Zwift. I have seen some folks say that IndieVelo really isn't that concerned with the graphics at this time and are instead focusing more on the riding experience. If it's true, then they will get even better later on which would be a win-win. My biggest gripe is that they don't have anyway to control the game other than keyboard or mouse. Zwift has had the companion app for quite some time and now have the Zwift Play controllers which makes controlling the game quite easy. For IndiVelo, I have to use a desk off to my side to hold the keyboard requiring a bit of a reach to use. A mouse would be even more problematic. Hopefully they will allow for something else in the future.

Overall, I like IndieVelo. I'm looking forward to trying their other routes and see how their steep gradients feel compared to Zwift. They certainly show a lot of promise and I hope that they are successful.