I think I’m addicted to it….

it rocked for about a week

then i got bored

Starting to get bored – just use it for a record of my rides, share them with my mates and training but TBH I don’t go out for KOM’s – if I get one great but if I loose one – who cares – there are always going to be riders fitter than me – It’s just a matter of time they will ride that segment and get the KOM? If I was a racer I’d go out and race 😉

Trouble I have is that I set good times durign those 2 dry weeks earlier int he year and it’s all been mud ever since so trying to improve has been difficult.

Still nice to see the segments on a ride though.

Best for finding hidden trails 😳

I like it and use it in conjunction with Endomondo, however living in Bristol which is has a massive cycling community and some very, very fast riders KOMs are not easy to come by.

Well that’s what I tell myself.

Its trashed my local trails 🙁

I’m still using it to record mileage but some of the times are getting silly on the central Manchester segments unless you’ve got someone on the corners looking out for traffic!

managed a KOM this morning on a commuting segment but that was more down to the fact i came in late so there was less traffic, there’s a TTer thats ridden a few of my daily ones at ~27mph (5mph faster than me!) so i’m only ever gunning for second!

tempted to have a go one day early sunday morning without the panniers 😀

how do u use it? i get to the map and load segments and select one but then what? does it automatically start/stop the timer? tried to use it on sat in tunstall forest but lost all signal

I’ve just bought a £20 GPS logger for Strava’ing,

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Navin-MiniHomer-GPS-Position-Finder-Logger-Yellow-/280920802356?pt=UK_In_Car_Technology&hash=item41682f4434

Hopefully it’ll get addictive as I really could do with some motivation to get fitter.

Its trashed my local trails

That’s the weather, not Strava, some people have always cut corners and ridden trails when they’re wet.

Best for finding hidden trails

So long as they’re not too long, and fit wholly within the tiny map display, and there’s not too many within that tiny window when zoomed out enough to fit them in.

it rocked for about a week
then i got bored

Think I gave it about a weekend. Not so much bored, but just a site that’s far too beta testing imho.
Now they’ve added the ability to delete the a/c, I’m seriously tempted to make use of that feature.

Still nice to see the segments on a ride though.

I use a legacy timing device called a watch to see how quick I go up the main hills. Half the time I stop to check some wildlife. Still there’s some XC lycra lout that’s probably having an orgasm at stealing a KoM from me.

I like it still, to be honest more for my own personal gratification than chasing KOMs. Although I did get a new one on my commute last week, which I was pleased about!

I use a legacy timing device called a watch to see how quick I go up the main hills.

If you’re that laid back why bother timing yourself at all?

If you are interested in timing yourself occasionally why not use a tool that does the job betterer?

You probably use disk brakes for stopping despite the availability of legacy technology.

I agree with njee personal gratification is part of it as well, for instance I’m aiming to shave 30 sec of a climb tonight, it won’t make me KOM no way near but it will give me my jollys if I succeed.

I enjoy it for chasing my own PR’s. I have about 7 or 8 KOM’s and it’s fun swapping KOM’s with friends but that’s rarely the case. There’s one KOM I held where someone has knocked 35 seconds out of it over two miles, and I was already significantly faster than all the others who did it. I’ll never beat that, I’m convinced he did it on a TT bike (and was really fast anyway).

At first there was a real buzz on it but that’s worn off for me now. It’s still nice to get a KOM especially somewhere where it’s clear lots of people are trying but at the end of the day, there’s always someone out there who is faster and could take it if they tried.

I think TwinklyDave pointed out that one of his KOM’s was taken by someone who is capable of climbing a cat 3 hill at 20mph+.

But then Dave does ride in the same places that Mr Wiggins will use for warmups.

I enjoy it.

Its good to see how much you can improve times on a segment with a bit of focus and practice.

I’m not going to be getting too many KoM’s but if I can improve my times to the point that I’m top 10 on a busy trail then I’m pretty happy with that

thisisnotaspoon it’s not the weather! It’s the extra traffic on the previously hidden trails 🙁

I agree with njee personal gratification is part of it as well, for instance I’m aiming to shave 30 sec of a climb tonight, it won’t make me KOM no way near but it will give me my jollys if I succeed.

which one ya looking at? Just interested as i’m in bristol as well

Some of the times for Bristol/Ashton Court are unbelievable! 2 Seconds!? Seriously!?? Did they just blast down the field rather than the trail?

EDIT: Just seen his average speed of 121.7mph ! 😯

which one ya looking at? Just interested as i’m in bristol as well

Tickenham Hill.

thisisnotaspoon it’s not the weather! It’s the extra traffic on the previously hidden trails

Then blame the person who posted them up, it’s unreasnoble to expect only some people to ride a trail, otherwise we’d end up like Surfing with really bad localism problems.

Trails round here seem to get trashed once the club finds them which effectively tells everybody once they’ve done a few runs and then told a few others etc etc. Nowt to do with strava, just the natural lifecycle of trails, in a month or so they’ll be less used as they’r no longer novel. Then by next year they’ll only be ridden by a hardcore of riders who ride in the area enough to get bored on the better surfaced trails.

Some of the times for Bristol/Ashton Court are unbelievable! 2 Seconds!? Seriously!?? Did they just blast down the field rather than the trail?

EDIT: Just seen his average speed of 121.7mph !

Well apart from Glitches like that, the rankings at Ashton Court got blown apart after the bikefest, although I’m still quite high up on two of the climbs. 😉

Strava would be great if you could hide trails and make them only viewable to people in a select group.I ride the same trails that Toons is talking about from time to time and was amazed a few months back by the massive increase of new riders there who had found all of the secret trails by using strava.

Luckily most people who mapped them out have now seen sense and removed them as the trails really could not handle all of the extra traffic and were looking rather knackered.

Hopefully Strava will add a feature in the future so you can set up closed groups which require you to join that group before being able to see the marked trails.

Clocked 110km/h in Morzine.
And Mach 1.2 uphill here in Germany.

Think my watch is more accurate and “betterer” than GPS 😉

Hopefully Strava will add a feature in the future so you can set up closed groups which require you to join that group before being able to see the marked trails.

I might come back if there’s proper “clubs” and KoM etc. within that group/club, plus the hidden but shared trails like that.

Strava would be great if you could hide trails and make them only viewable to people in a select group.I ride the same trails that Toons is talking about from time to time and was amazed a few months back by the massive increase of new riders there who had found all of the secret trails by using strava.

Well you can create private segments, or filter the results by team, so if you’re all in a team you can do just that.

amazed a few months back by the massive increase of new riders there who had found all of the secret trails by using strava

tbh, once an area gets popular it doesn’t take long for all the local riding to get ‘found’ and shared.

happened before strava.

Rock? Nah

Handy? Yeah

It’s nowhere near accurate enough for real racing, I use it for running and its got me running through brick walls and houses half the time. It’s fine for getting a rough measure but all this KOM/segment business is a load of cobblers as you’ll find distances/times differ from one minute to the next.

It’s nowhere near accurate enough for real racing

of course not.

it’s a fun way to motivate yourself to ride a bit harder or further and compare your results with your own ride and others.

I have one friend on Strava, Bristol Based (shut it :wink:)…
Anyone want to add me as a friend on Strava!? 😳

. It’s fine for getting a rough measure but all this KOM/segment business is a load of cobblers as you’ll find distances/times differ from one minute to the next.

Well, on piddly, pointless segments like the one linked above maybe but segments that take more than a few minutes the error margins are small enough to ignore.

Njee to be honest i have not looked into it much.After seeing the amount of people finding the hidden trails, i decided to only use it from time to time on trails that are not so sensitive and dont require the location to be hidden.

I really like it.

The mountain bike climbs are normally really easy to get unless they are at a trail centre. I’m fairly fast so can pick up KOMs fairly frequently. It is harder on the well worn road routes and impossible on race circuits.

It is good to log rides and on some of the harder segments see myself climb up the leader board. Also there have been a few KOM battles which have been entertaining as I’ve “had” to go back and try harder.

I find it quite good motivation for hard riding too. If I go out on a short ride and know there is a segment I feel obliged to attack it.

It’s mad how people defend KOM’s (and i’m one of them). IN Bristol park street seems to be the daddy. I’ve got a few around Bristol and hate it when they are taken back. Helps generate a bit of friendly rivalry in the club i’m in

it rocks untill you bust yer ass on a ride and then find it didnt record the bits you wanted it too.

to be fair that might be more down to the phone…

That, and riding round and round for 3 minutes before a segment, only to find it’s decided you already crossed the start line before that riding about the carpark, even though you know (well from the google map) that the start line is 20m up a trail.

Just dome the rapha rising challenge, just what I needed to get me off my arse, 7000m of up in 4 rides 🙂 2nd place in the STW group too.

Trails round here were mainly only mapped uphill, I added some DH segments as I’m not a lycra bandit (or whatever the term is as I must be a storm trooper strava warrior) has been good to measure how I’m going with very little racing that I can get to or afford to do.

As for accuracy after people kicked off I checked some of mine against the GoPro and it looks to the second accurate on a HTC Desire.

It’s fun, it doesn’t hurt people, people hurt people. (Oh and guns don’t kill people…)

Oooooh somebody has been looking at the segment I created in AC to take in just the DHy bit.

Yes, that time is totally out.

I take Strava as a bit of fun, but with a serious intention to get quicker and quicker. I recently went rapidly through the Taylored Cycles Swoop thinking I’d never better it – 2 months later and a lot of training, I managed to take 6 seconds out of it and tied 5th. A couple of my riding buddies are after me, and David Hynes is our annoyingly quickist rider…you can see where I’m going here…

Additionally, it’s not all fast DHy bits – I’m now enjoying the ups – I’m try to get quicker and quicker on the climbs, resulting in a 56th out of 533 on the horrible climb to Stella Nova.

All of this has a net result of Neil = Fitter = Faster = enjoy the ride more.

ps feel free to add 🙂

It is harder on the well worn road routes and impossible on race circuits.

Speak for yourself, it’s bloody impossible to get the popular road segments around here! Top 10% is a result! Then again, I’d not describe myself as ‘fairly fast’!

I’ve been on for a few weeks since geting a new phone and it’s good for a giggle, nothing more. Nice to see what my mates are up to when I’m not out with them but despite having a fair few KOMs I’m certainly not going to go out chasing them on purpose.

That’s what races are for!

I’d not describe myself as ‘fairly fast’!

Everyone else would beg to differ!