# TTT - Planning

## Solo simulation

It is essential to know the speed at which a rider would complete the course solo. For this I use a bot and run the simulation for the riders Weight, Height and Bike choice on the Course that is to be raced. I choose a power that is close to the anticipated front rider target.

Afterwards I can analyse the speeds over different parts of the course and see how these vary for different riders.

Having done hundreds of these simulations I now have algorithms in a spreadsheet that enable me to select any rider profile, for any course and calculate these speeds.  I do still run spot checks using a bot every so often, especially after a Zwift update, to make sure nothing has changed with the physics engine.

## Drafting Simulation

Similarly, I have run multi-bot tests to establish the draft benefit you can get behind different numbers of riders, at different speeds and gradients. Again, I now have established algorithms to calculate this pretty accurately without the need for bots.

## Energy Expenditure

Armed with this knowledge of the powers required on the front and in the draft it is now possible to set different times that each rider has on the front and in what order they are in the team to generate the expected overall energy expenditure of each rider. This is weighed up against their FTP to give an overall % effort, which I can then tailor according to the form the rider is currently in compared to their last known FTP.

## Customization

Just using the above energy expenditure calculations would be to assume perfect changes and perfect drafting on a flat course, which is never going to happen. So,

- I add weightings for additional energy lost according to the efficiency of the team and can also apply further adjustments for specific riders if they are particularly bad at riding efficiently!

- The drafting benefit calculations are also tailored to the particular course profile with its different speeds and gradient.

- For the weaker riders that have to hit much higher powers compared to their FTP, I can set their overall % effort to be slightly lower.

- By changing the rider order I can alter the timings on the front to better suit the team

## Strategy

With only 4 riders needing to finish out of a possible 6 I can now look at the effect of a rider putting in longer efforts on the front and dropping out early versus shorter efforts but staying to the end in order to improve the draft benefit for others.

There may be other non-energy related strategic decisions to be made e.g. safety of having a back-up 5th rider in case someone else has issues (e.g. connection dropout).

## Results

I’ve developed this system over the last couple of years and have found that given the correct FTPs and current form the planned efforts very closely match what a rider can put out on that day to give the optimum team performance.