That's a great review, exactly the information I wanted. Thank you.

Good review. I joined a meetup ride for the first time and didn't know how this feature worked. I was killing myself trying to stay in the group or move myself around and couldn't figure out how a 2.5watt/kg rider was breaking away when I was cranking out 3.6watt/kg! I was so frustrated that despite my effort, a 1.5watt/kg rider was in front. I thought my zwift was mis-calibrated somehow. lol. I hold the same view, these rides are pretty much pointless as it disconnects the rider from the work effort. The problem with my ride, it wasn't social either so it was a bunch of people just riding together with your effort all muted.

Very informative thanks

Lots of completely reasonable opinions and experiences below, and a great video.. thanks you very much. What I would like to emphasise is all my mates push 275 to 350 watts when cruising and their FTP near double me easily... For a night in, with me being partially towed and my parameters being stretched this mode is simply brilliant. Yes, my mates are having an easy time... just like the same sort of ride in reality... and for that this works brilliantly. Do my stronger mates get the same workout? NO, but they are here for some fun times with less able friends that they know they can't drop. For that, it is flawless. It's a lower stress mixed ability function. It's a fun aspect. It's just great for that.

I agree with you @HonestTree. It ruins the realism of the application and of the ride. At the end if it social you just need a good video-chat app open, and then everybody trying to stay together managing their pace...

Been doing a lot of these rides and while not quite as interesting, you can chat or be more social due to the no drop. I would love to know how they calculate when the tractor beam kicks in. I think it is about 2m per rider in the group. Def need to throw out some of the data and just enjoy the ride and social chatting.

We did a group ride with keep together mode up Alp de Zwift. One person fell back. We waited over 10mins at the bottom to finish our ride together. I was surprised they never did sling shot. Maybe the algorithms don’t behave the same on the climb🧐

I wonder if the fence would be a better way to keep the group together. As you found when the game controls your avatar you can zone out which asks the question why Zwift. I haven't done a group ride but so it was helpful to watch yours. My Zwift is paused for the warm weather so maybe by fall it will change.

So what's up with sprinting and KOMs during a ride with this setting on? The screen shows "winners" amongst the group but are they really? I have "outsprinted" many times a friend when clearly he is doing significantly more power per KG than me.

At the end of the race, everybody averages the same W/kw, everyone ends at the same time. So as I'm wondering how is Zwift calculating the the overall speed?

So I assume at the end of the ride your distance is essentially irrelevant, but what about your power data? That should still be correct right?

At the end of the ride does Zwift calculate your individual average speed according to the w/kg you put out or does everyone end up with the same average speed?

I’m trying to find out what happened, I was in a meet-up ride ‘keep everyone together’ and at some point joined a different route or got dropped back. The group was miles away and couldn’t join anymore. Not sure why?

I think it should be the speed of the slowest person so no one is boosted or gets take prs. Also I did a3 person ride with this enabled sans we kept losing our new beginner friend

Does it really matter what average speed you actually do. First of all, you are doing a “ride where everyone sticks together” -so you will probably end up going at the speed of the slowest rider, after all the point of this ride is you all stick together. And one of the big advantages of this type of ride which you touched on - anyone can do a ride they want to do. So if you want do a FTP test, your watts will still be what effort you put in.