Through Zwift Academy, a talent identification program held on the cycling simulator app Zwift, cyclists Maud Oudeman and Alex Bogna have received one-year contracts with professional cycling teams Canyon-SRAM and Alpecin-Fenix. The women’s winner, Ouderman of the Netherlands, will join Canyon-SRAM of the UCI World Tour, while the men’s champion, Bogna of Australia, will join Alpecin-Fenix of the UCI Continental Circuit.
This year’s Zwift Academy, held on Zwift’s indoor cycling platform, attracted over 150,000 riders. Finalists also raced on the streets of Mallorca, a Spanish Mediterranean island.
The Zwift Academy dates back to 2018 with previous participants Ella Harris, Jay Vine and Neve Bradbury also turning pro through the global online tournament.
Zwift previously held a digital race around the Collins Cup in partnership with the Professional Triathletes Organisation—which announced Tuesday that Peter Hutton, director of sports partnership at Facebook’s parent company Meta, will join the PTO’s board of directors.
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When Mark Zuckerberg broke his arm in 2016, he wrote on Facebook that he started to bike indoors using Zwift. Zuckerberg’s tech giant is now forging its own fitness journey into the metaverse after recently buying virtual reality fitness app Supernatural to pair with its Oculus VR headset.
Zwift also held an event during this summer’s Olympic Virtual Series hosted by the IOC that generated 250,000 participants from around the world. Earlier this week, USA Cycling selected 19 men and women to race in the 2022 UCI Cycling Esports World Championships held Feb. 26 on Zwift’s New York Knickerbocker map, a 34-mile online course with 3,000 feet of incline.
