Cowboy launches ebike game that lets you race other riders — in the real world

Cowboy has made the ebike industry’s first foray into gaming. 

The Belgian ebike maker has launched three games — Race, Burn, and Push — that allow you to battle it out with other riders on a range of real-life challenges.   

In Race, you compete against another rider in a 500-metre sprint. Your first dual will be against a stranger with similar stats. But with every win, your opponent gets a little bit tougher. 

Burn is an intense one minute calorie-burner, while Push tests your ability to keep pedalpower above a certain threshold for 15 seconds straight.  

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Races are not live for safety reasons, but your opponent most likely finished their race a few minutes before you. In Burn and Push, you can even compete against yourself, but that doesn’t sound quite as fun. 

“It can become pretty addictive,” Tanguy Goretti, Cowboy’s founder and CTO, told TNW. “During the testing phase, we saw some riders playing four games or more per trip.” 

All three games get increasingly difficult as you progress through the levels. If you have the stamina, you can climb to the top of the leaderboard — to the envy of anyone who also owns a Cowboy ebike, and has spare time, and cares about this sort of thing.  

Sarcasm aside, the games actually sound like they could be a lot of fun. And they get you outside and active and social which is undoubtably a good thing. The fact that you can even play a game with your ebike these days shows just how far bicycle technology has come in just a few short years. 

If ebike gaming sounds like your vibe, you’ll be glad to know that the games are now available through Cowboy’s app. You simply need to cycle to a “safe environment,” like a park, select your game, and get pedalling. Cowboy says it has designed the games with safety in mind. The gameplay is intuitive, with minimal distraction, allowing you to focus on the road.  

According to Goretti, Cowboy riders already compete with each other on stats such as who can cover the most distance in a week. “So it just made sense to take things up a notch and offer proper in-app games,” he said.  

Cowboy’s software-connected, minimalist ebike designs have earned them a dedicated following among young city-dwellers in pursuit of cycling perfection — and with some cash to spare. 

The games are the latest offering from the ebike brand, which has seen significant growth since it was founded in 2017. The company even managed to reach profitability last September. 

Equipped with features like a built-in phone charger, automatic theft-detection, predictive alerts, and so-called adaptive power technology, Goretti says the company prides itself on having the “ultimate connect ebike” — so the addition of some in-app gaming seems pretty on-brand.  

This latest announcement follows Cowboy’s recent launch of Cowboy Cross, the brand’s first all-road bike which we got a sneak preview of back in March.