The survey asked whether or not folks would be interested in the concept of “Zwift Premium”, which would include a slate of features that are more structured training focused. The next day after visiting, Zwift widely publishes a user survey that uses very TrainerRoad specific language. But there are countless nicer places from LGB to take an hour flight than RNO in January.
Sure, he was seemingly at Zwift HQ in Long Beach, CA prior to that. And I certainly didn’t see any epic outside ride photos posted. It’s stunning, and would easily be on my very short list of places I could consider moving to, from Amsterdam (within the Top 3, as long as I could avoid having ‘Reno’ on my street address).īut, for Eric, a guy who lives in London – it’s peculiar to fly to Reno. After all, I’ve gone on a number of rides with the TrainerRoad crew over the years into the surrounding mountains and landscape. Now, we won’t hold it against TrainerRoad that they list Reno as their address. After all, Interbike breathed its last breath there 4 years ago.Ībout this point, you’re probably wondering what else is in Reno, NV? Aside from the National Automobile Museum, there’s also TrainerRoad’s HQ. In fact, he then published a photo of it on his Facebook & Instagram feed:Ī post shared by Eric Min while Reno is a lovely slab of concrete with rundown casinos in the middle of the desert, there’s precisely zero reasons to go there in the middle of January. Let’s dive through all of them – in the order they occurred.įirst up, was the CEO of Zwift, Eric Min, going to Reno, NV on January 12th. There are three core signs that point towards either an outright acquisition or a significant partnership. Neither are the biggest platforms in the indoor cycling space, but they are titans in name for many outdoor cyclists. While neither company wants to give out paid subscriber numbers, the ballparks are likely in the 700-950K subscribers for Zwift, and probably in the 150-350K range for TrainerRoad. At first, TrainerRoad likely had a higher subscriber base (especially since it was there three years prior), but over time, Zwift would eclipse it. Meanwhile, Zwift started in 2014, where I met co-founders Eric Min and Jon Mayfield in a literal coat closet at Eurobike.įrom there, these two grew over the years.
Whereas Nate continues on as CEO of TrainerRoad. Reid eventually went on to join and revamp The SufferFest, which in turn is now owned by Wahoo Fitness. TrainerRoad started in 2011, where I met them at Interbike – with co-founders Nate Pearson and Reid Weber. Despite their differences, many users actually use both platforms (including myself), as a way of keeping themselves occupied indoors. But for the most part, Zwift has ignored TrainerRoad, instead, offering a relatively basic structured training platform.
And it’s only been in the last few years that we’ve seen more acknowledgment from TrainerRoad that Zwift exists, as the company has seen more and more of its users leverage TrainerRoad’s training, to ultimately compete on Zwift. In the beginning, they rarely, if ever acknowledged each other’s existence. One has been heavily funded by investors, while the other has been entirely self-funded. Except, just on different sides of the tracks. And, the wheels seem to be in motion already.įirst though, as a historical tidbit it’s worth noting that by and large, TrainerRoad and Zwift grew up together. Over the past three weeks, we’ve seen increasingly clear signs that something substantial is about to occur between the two major players of the endurance sports indoor training world: Zwift and TrainerRoad. If one were reading the tea leaves of the indoor trainer industry, they’d probably be seeing some pretty interesting things.