[Closed] Is Strava, in fact, the root of all evil in the universe?

Won't be long until someone dies. You mark my words.

According to the press, someone has already died...one of the first very busy Strava posts on here had someone saying similar and about 2 posts later, there was a link to a news article...

Personally, I'm finding it amusing that people are getting so addicted to it...I had a good belly laugh at those posting up saying they have now added a bell to their bikes to let people know they are on a Strava!!! Very funny...

I reckon it's just the usual "blame something other than your own selfish will".
I use it to map and track my rides. I don't use it as an excuse to act like a git.

it's all funny till someone loses an eye

I'll stick with Endomondo (till that blows up)

Yes

Is a strava KOM = 'winning' a sportive .. ?

I honestly didn't realise it was used widely enough to be an influence on anything.

It's the most awsum fing ever innit, propa racin'

I think how it’s been designed and marketed is an act of genius.

There’s a number of elements and principles to Strava that remind me of computer/console gaming, with the achievements/rewards, creating segments and leaderboards ... the tech graphs etc. All this leads to a sense of progression.

It motivates people to better fitness - and that must be a good thing. The pro's outweigh the cons IMHO.

EDIT - I would add that I kick ass on First Person Shooters but I'm mid-table obscurity when it comes to Strava.

Why not start an underground anti strava movement,soon as some *"%# rings his bell or tries to push past block them spoil their run. Going to get slaughtered for this for sure.

Somebody's created a downhill road segment on my regular ride. Pretty steep start with a sharpish bend into quite heavy tree cover and also often gravelly.

Of my last half dozen rides I've had 3 mounted horses on the road on one ocasion (no idea why as there's a bone dry path in the woods about 10 yards away 🙄 ) and 5 loose horses on another

SOmebody will get hurt there soon 😐

[i]MTB [url= http://www.aidanharding.com/ewe/rules/ ]Rule 1[/url][/i] applies, even when chasing a Strava KOM

[b]Rule 1:[/b] Don't be a dick.

Well I saw a chap on a road bike the other day who appeared to be drafting a VW Transporter along a very busy road. His nose was literally about 2 inches from the rear window.

I thought to myself he must be on a Strava segment 🙂

God knows what the guy driving thought though.

Downhill segments were the thing that impressed me so much about strava and why I started using it. Now I'm beginning to think they're the worst thing about it. They're pretty inaccurate (at least over short distances) and they encourage stupidity. As someone said, if you're a fast rider you'll prove it in a race. Not on Strava. Having said that, I think some of the uphill segments are great - there's a few round me and it's great to track your fitness over the weeks/ months.

As a slight aside, I reckon that by about November time, everything will be wet again and it'll be impossible to set a KOM on any well-used trail. Perhaps people will get bored then?

You can flag a segment as dangerous if you like. In fact I noticed recently the White Level Initial Climb (afan) segment has been flagged as such for some reason.

Odd, but then on the other hand I did clip a rock on the climb and tumble down the side! Wasn't me who flagged it though.

Problem with Strava is aside from the competitiveness and the cheeky trails, there is wild variation in the accuracy of the GPS tracks. Phone GPS differs so much between models and their accuracy is tailored to car navigation, most phones don't have barometers and have poor altitude accuracy, dedicated devices are more accurate but still vary between them, there are issues where other apps are used and then imported to Strava (especially if auto-pause is used), and even with the most accurate a loss of GPS signal screws with Strava.

Strava seems to not recognise any signal loss or pause and think's you've gone faster than you have, which leads to false KOMs.

And then you get people who were actually on a motorbike or in a car (okay less likely off road).

I don't get it personally.
Not saying it's wrong, just don't get it.

MTBing isn't all about speed is it? Unless you're racing.
Speed stats are for roadies I thought, because there's not much else interesting about road riding.
So is it for roadies who MTB? or MTBers who aren't good enough to race?
Or have I missed the point entirely...

Only been playing with it a little recently and tend to use it as a tool to improve on my own rides (eg commute to work) rather than compete with others. If not taken too seriously I think it's a good thing. Taking risks to be KOM, especially on the road is just sad !

Point for me mainly is about the routes. It's been very useful to see trails marked with names and now I know what people are talking about.

But this is the risk as well as the cheeky trails are appearing on there too. Very useful, but sooner or later a fuss will be kicked up and people kicked off.

On the speed side, the main thing I'm interested in is how I've improved. Really just a fitness and skills thing, not that I've gone some blistering speed. I'm not trying to hammer it down as fast as possible in a reckless manner either, but as my fitness and skills improve I find I go quicker on a segment and yet haven't had to put in a huge effort. In fact that's the odd thing as sometimes I think I didn't do it as hard as my fastest and yet end up with a personal record. Reason probably because I've done it more efficiently.

What's a KOM?

Aside from that, I use a basic computer on my road bike to see if my commute is a bit faster and more importantly, judge my MTB rides by how good the last trail/climb felt and how big my grin is.
I don't like the idea of trails being mapped for all landowners to see though. An occasional ride will never cause the amount of damage regular point to point racing is gonna cause. Not just for the amount of traffic but corner cutting and trail drift aswell

King of the mountain. Fastest overall time on a segment.

Or reading the OP, yes, Strava is the root of all evil!!!

it's good because:

Leaderboard // My Results

Rank Name Date Speed Time
1 scaredy pants May 26, 2012 14.7mi/h 7:16
2 scaredy pants May 23, 2012 14.7mi/h 7:17
3 scaredy pants May 17, 2012 14.6mi/h - 7:20
4 scaredy pants May 16, 2012 14.4mi/h - 7:25
5 scaredy pants May 12, 2012 14.4mi/h - 7:27
6 scaredy pants May 19, 2012 14.2mi/h - 7:31
7 scaredy pants May 06, 2012 14.2mi/h - 7:34
8 scaredy pants Apr 06, 2012 13.8mi/h - 7:45
8 scaredy pants May 04, 2012 13.8mi/h - 7:45
10 scaredy pants Apr 13, 2012 13.6mi/h - 7:51
11 scaredy pants Apr 03, 2012 13.4mi/h - 7:58
12 scaredy pants Apr 08, 2012 13.1mi/h - 8:10
13 scaredy pants May 28, 2012 13.0mi/h - 8:16
14 scaredy pants May 13, 2012 12.9mi/h - 8:17
14 scaredy pants Apr 21, 2012 12.9mi/h - 8:17

It's bad because:

Kom anon Mar 13, 2012 17.2mi/h - 6:14

I don't rate segment times, its whole ride times for me. Do one section in awesome time but destroy yourself for the rest of the ride, fail imo. I think Strava will encourage a number of other bad things, but bad things that were happening and will happen anyway.

I'm also getting really bored of hearing about it, it seems to be everywhere. Can't we just ride bikes and enjoy that?

#unklehomer's phone can make calls, send sms messages and take very bad pictures and thats it. It is utterly unfondleable.

If Strava is evil..then racing is too.

EDIT: It will change a the way a lot of people ride. In fact tonight, when I usually ride as the above says to better my overall average as a measure of improvement, I found myself resting on the non Strave sections and sprinting on the segments. When out, I found a guy sessioning a bit of trail that you would normally just ride through, so I joined in and pushed back up and did another run 😉

Its just more, different riding inint, and actually reflects the growing interest in Enduro style riding.

EDIT EDIT: thinking back to tonights ride I should have been enjoying the flow of dry dusty trails but was pre-occupied with speed on a segment. And I think that detracted from my overall enjoyment of the ride. Its not all good.

Third and final thought. Its a useful tool to measure self improvement if you measure that in speed. So, keep your segments private and just score yourself its a good DBase.

So people are listing quiet cheeky trails on it and setting times, then others go and race for fastest time on that trail?

rule ~1 is being broken ..

I suppose actually rule 1 gets broken verbally all the time, otherwise not many people would chance across the same bit of trail, unless it was blindingly obvious, in which case Strava cant be blamed as it was inevitable. But these are digital times, word is passed digitally rather than verbally.

I did note tonight though a LOT of new signs from our local council stating that said bits of trail were NOT FOR CYCLING. These were not around last year.

I uploaded a gpx of a quick hour loop that my friends are using as a little fitness test. Both nasty climbs are segments - brilliant, along with a couple of other sections - fine. But a bridlepath that comes down off the hill? not brilliant. I took my time down there on a hardtail with saddle up and still have KOM on it but hate to think what would happen if people take that seriously and hammer down it on full suss bikes.

Didn't realise you could flag sections but think I will on that one, just not worth it.

Bigyinn, you're just beelin' because I beat your time up that Boniface Down climb segment by nearly a minute. Don't take it out on Strava. 😉

As above

Rule 1 don't be a dick
adding
Rule 2 don't blame technology for a human beings failings
and
Rule 3
If you are going to be a dick don't shout about it on the internet

These threads sound like the Daily Fail some days

Like most things, some folks take it super serious, some folks don't give a hoot. I like it as it gives a chance to see where you're progressing, a bit like the quarter lap checks in motoGP. A little competition that drives us to improve isn't a bad thing I reckon.

I like Strava as it has given me an appetite for riding and actually pushing myself up climbs where beforehand I would just stick it in the granny gear and pootle up.
What I don't like is the amount of money I've had to shell out on replacing worn out parts in the last week.

BAN IT NOW!!! just spent all night dreaming racing down segments that dont even excist!! dont feel like ive slept, all because mate put on facebook that hed moved me one place down the leaderboard, enough to worry about in life than adding this trivial app, ive only had it a week!!!!

Strava = the biggest threat to mountainbiking in Britain. Unfortunately the geanie is out of the bottle and it wont go back in. A symptom of the Me Me Me and sod everyone else culture. Expect spoiled trails and the closure of those nice woods you have ridden quietly for years with no complaints.If you want to race, enter one. If you want to beat your mates score get a playstation or something.Just take a mental snapshot of how things were pre Strava for your future reference in a couple of years time before you forget. What I mean is its plain selfish.

on this note, i have a few segment KOMs and just got my first email this morning saying i'd lost one. haven't yet planned my course of action.

So how long before someone (maybe even me, I need to do something to add some fresh technical skills to my CV) writes a simple app that takes a GPX file and fiddles with all the timestamps to speed it up by x%. Ride like a numpty, fiddle file, claim KOM - job done.

Or do some road sections with GPS in the car.....

I don't use it on the trail but It has added a whole new dimension to my commute. I get well chuft when I get a KOM 😀

It's great for uphill segments, it's plain stupid for downhill. They should just make it impossible to create segments which lose altitude - that would be pretty simple. After all KOM's are supposed to be for going uphill - I'll even accept it off road as well as on.

It is a great tool to compare your fitness against other riders and does make training rides at least more interesting - STRAVA for training, the Jo Burt Stravasectomy for just riding along with mates....ie, no cadence, no heart rate monitors just good old fashioned bragging rights and banter at the end of trails....

The recent change they've added where you're notified when someone claims your KOM is asking for a comeback attempt.
Personally I only use it for climbs really.
It does make it much easier to see how your ride was against your previous times.

If the phone app added a strava alert alarm and virtual partner for the KOM holder every time you entered a segment - that would be cool!

TBH Strava isn't as such a new idea it stands on the shoulders of various pre-existing apps and websites (Sportstracker, Endomondeo, map my ride/run, etc), it's just the version that's caught more peoples attention and coincided with mature enough technologies and widespread enough web access to make a better go of it.

Strava is still most useful as a training/fitness monitoring tool, the KOMs serve as a useful gauge for anyone looking to see how competitive they might be but anyone obsesive enough to cheat on a KOM has totally missed the point...

For my own part I think it's an overall good thing, gets people out riding trails/routes or running and looking at their own performance...
I think the obsesive ego warrior cheaters will tire of it in due course and it will revert to being a useful website for those genuinely interested in looking at their performance...

Is strava 'Bad'? No, it's just a website, any behavious people engage in when chasing KOM glory is more down to the individuals skewed personality traits than anything Strava has actively encouraged them to do, they would still be pricks even if strava didn't exist...

I'm generally quite a polite rider, never jump lights etc, but I have to confess to my first incidence recently of "riding like a dick" to get a Strava KOM, this one a single segment consisting of a 15 mile loop...

http://app.strava.com/rides/9101674#165767413

Once I finished I did admit to myself that I had indeed ridden like a dick & won't do that again. Probably not the best choice to do it during rush hour I suppose. Worst of all, I got 2nd place by 4 seconds over a 44 minute route! Bah.

.If you want to race, enter one.

THIS!

They should just make it impossible to create segments which lose altitude - that would be pretty simple

This is a good idea, and would solve potential issues. But they'll never do it, why would they deliberatly hobble their own product.

I have my own way of checking my full ride fitness... As I leave I look at the clock... When I get back I look at it again. I'm yet to come up with a catchy brand name though...

I created some segments the other night on cheeky trails but I have kept them private.

Don't want people knowing about them. If i could share them with mates on Strava I would but I'm not making them public.
Others however might make their cheeky segments public to share with mates but that will mean everyone can see them.

I have asked Strava if they plan on putting a "share private segment" feature in but not heard back yet. Can I suggest you do too? Would solve at leat some of the issues.

support@strava.com

Ride like a numpty, fiddle file, claim KOM - job done.

Never done strava, sounds a reasonable idea if you adhere to Miketuallys 3 rules.

*anyone cheating just to mess with everyone elses heads, there's a special circle of hell set out for you along with the trolls 😈

Ride like a numpty, fiddle file, claim KOM - job done.
this sort of shit is infuriating

(I'd be interested to see a list of wind strengths/directions vs KoM times on a few rides round here - it can make at least 20% difference to my efforts)

If you're in to willy waving with your mates then its a good tool.

I use it for my commute and although I claim I'm not interested in seeing how other folk are doing I'd love to be KoM up Levers Causeway!

I have my own way of checking my full ride fitness... As I leave I look at the clock... When I get back I look at it again. I'm yet to come up with a catchy brand name though...

Does that tell you whether you were slower today because you weren't climbing well or because of that headwind on a flat stretch? GPS (any GPS, not just Strava) can.

Strava is great. I just got my first KoM and feel very proud of the effort I put into that segment that I wasn't aware was there. I guess the 7 other people in my group also got a KoM that night aswell.

Its great to prove my climbing worth over a total elevation gain of EIGHT feet in 2 minutes. Come at me Strava.

you're a prime target for having the piss ripped out of you

Yes strava is willy waving, any kind of competition is, bit of light hearted "first to the top/bottom of the hill" with your mates is the same, plenty people do it. Why BS/cheat about it?

I still think people are overstating the importance of Strava. Do you really think the Strava police are coming to get you?

Does that tell you whether you were slower today because you weren't climbing well or because of that headwind on a flat stretch? GPS (any GPS, not just Strava) can.

OK no, can it really detect wind speed?

I can normally tell that sort of thing myself though...

Why not start an underground anti strava movement,soon as some *"%# rings his bell or tries to push past block them spoil their run. Going to get slaughtered for this for sure.

[img] [/img]

I don't get it either, but each to their own, it'd be a boring boring world if we all liked the same stuff. As already said if you want to know how good you are then enter a race, you can't compare weather conditions, traffic on Strava etc.. get out and get your elite MTB licence or first cat road licence then you know you're quite a good rider 😉

OK no, can it really detect wind speed?

I can normally tell that sort of thing myself though...

No, but you can see if you were slower than usual on the headwind sections or not. On my last ride, there was a horrible headwind all the way home so I assumed I'd be slower, but my speed seemed to hover around 20kmh as it always does on that section so I can see that I wasn't.

I did the same ride two weeks running, with the second time being an hour faster. I could tell that by the clock. With GPS I can see if that was down to reducing stops, faster climbing or whatever.

if you want to know how good you are then enter a race, you can't compare weather conditions, traffic on Strava etc.

I'm only competing against myself though, not others. Can't really do that without GPS 🙂

I think the cheating aspect is fine. Afterall, surely Strava is just meant to be a bit of a laugh ? Draughting a truck or a tractor is a bit of a laugh, especially if you beat some goon on a forum who brags about how many KOM's they have.

I'd find it a bit cringe worthy if you were taking it seriously. Seriously duking it out against an anonymous person on the internet, its just like singletrackworld.

If you want to see how good you are, go to a race or a hill climb or a time trial or a sportive. Or are you scared ?

Yawn......

D0NK - I guess irony doesn't come across too well on the web. I was aiming a shot at the (alleged) 'Strava run!' brigade - not that I've ever come across one of them. I've got no interest in using Strava, or cheating with it - I'm more focussed on how well I feel I've ridden rather than whether I was a few seconds faster or slower than I was on the same trail some time last October.

I can see the uses of this sort of application as a training aid, but 'competing' against a bunch of people who rode some/all of the same trail on a different day seems pretty irrelevant ([i]to me[/i]).

I guess irony doesn't come across too well on the web

I think the cheating aspect is fine. Afterall, surely Strava is just meant to be a bit of a laugh ?

If it's not serious, shirley there's no reason to cheat. Competing is a little juvenile, competing for no reward is arguably even more juvenile, cheating for no reward is even lower, as I mentioned on a par with trolling. If you're competetive then take part if you're not then step away, no need to break it for everyone else.

Again not a strava user, just impotently arguing on the tinterweb about the infantile competitivness of blokes and the petulant cheaters.

I've been timing my rides on the Quantocks since the late 90's, (Polar Protrainer HRM, Polar S710 HRM, Garmin eTrex Vista GPS, Garmin Edge 705 GPS & Garmin Edge 800 GPS) and all it's proved is that at 55 I'm slower than I was at 35 😥

I dont know D0NK, you're not comparing like for like there. A game of pool is a real competition. It may be a bit of a laugh, but you're both there, in the room, duking it out.

Its about pride, honour, skill, nerve, mettle, true grit and real men. It may still be a bit of a laugh, but you're both strong enough characters to stand there and try and crush each other.

Strava is for people who are too scared to do this. I mean, how is draughting a tractor really any worse than riding with a 30mph tail wind?

It cant be taken seriously at all. Just do what you can to win. Get a lift in your mums car if you want. If you want to beat people properly then race.

Its about pride, honour, skill, nerve, mettle, true grit and real men. It may still be a bit of a laugh, but you're both strong enough characters to stand there and try and crush each other.

Dunno, strava is badly done, GPS units are rubbish, wind conditions, ground conditions, driving/walking to the start point so you've got fresh legs, drafting trucks straightlining twisty trails, it's all bobbins so some of your scorn is starting to sounds reasonable.

Strava is not a proper racing but then again "who cares just cheat" [b]is[/b] proper cheating.

Never seen so many disgruntled middleaged biffers with their gonads in a twist over something so trivial.

Don't like it? STFU and don't use it.
Like it? Great, enjoy!

Not quite that simple palookah, when it affects others. Im talking about trail straightening and publicising cheeky places.

trail straightening has always gone on.

The other day I got a KOM that was 30 seconds faster than the previous best by dint of pottling alogn a fireroad next to some singletrack. I've now succesfully challenged my time and Strava have removed it but I can see there's two or three others on the same segment that are fireroad.

Strava's fun - not the end of mtbing as we know it.

Personally I have yet to have encountered a problem but can see why people worry about it/have complaints but like 99% of things people complain about it's not the thing that's the problem, it's PEOPLE!

Last time I went to Glentress I took my Garmin to see how I compared to others around the trails but a Saturday afternoon was clearly not the best time to do this so just accepted getting held up...like if I was riding with out GPS. I don't see anything wrong with having downhill sections on it (other than KOM seems a bit odd for a decent) you just have to ride with respect to others; Clearly you should be doing this anyway and if being at the top of a internet table is the be all and end all to you, you seriously need to look at your life! And that's coming for a fairly competitive man that likes using strava!

Strva is not the problem, people are the problem.

Racing on the Queen's Highway is illegal (for good reason). I "think" that includes straight time-trialling a-la Strava.

It's mainly the cheeky trails that I think will cause the most upset.

Sharing segments within private groups and having leaderboards for them just within those groups perhaps would help, but it doesn't stop people making them public.

So maybe there needs to be a kind of moderation of the ones created.

A bit like on Open Street Map. The trails on there have typically just been official trails and the unofficial ones not marked, perhaps because it takes peer review/moderation to add or remove them. That said, some cheeky ones have popped up locally recently and I wonder if they have just because they're on Strava so they assume it's okay now.

The big crap will hit the fan round my way on the MOD land. They are kicking up a fuss as it is and getting less tolerant of bikes (though they have allowed them within reason and obeying the rules, for some time). The unwritten rule though was no published GPS else they'll kick everyone off. Strava now shows segments all over their land. Not good.

A dilemma as I find the segments helpful, but that means I'll go ride a trail I didn't know about before, and so will loads of others.

Racing on the Queen's Highway is illegal (for good reason). I "think" that includes straight time-trialling a-la Strava.

Surely that would make time-trialling illegal too?

I love real racing, but due to having a young family I don't get the time to do it as much as I'd like. Strava does add a bit of competition to the riding I can squeeze in.

Im using it to push myself against my previous "bests". Although the cheeky trails is possibly the only negative.
Did managed to knock 1m20s off a personal on a regular climb which im rather pleased about.
In other news the world continues to turn on its axis, inclined at 23 degrees.

Racing on the Queen's Highway is illegal (for good reason). I "think" that includes straight time-trialling a-la Strava.

Surely that would make time-trialling illegal too?

Time trials with published results need to be notified to the police at least 28 days in advance.

It's generally accepted that just riding against the clock, as per sportives, Audaxes, MTB marathons and the like, doesn't, as the results aren't publicised and there are no prizes for the winners.

http://www.sussex.police.uk/advice-and-support/laws-and-licences/cycling/

Whether this makes Strava a legal time-bomb or not, I have no idea. I honestly can't see the police giving a monkey's unless it becomes much more widespread than at present.

Genius. https://twitter.com/gilespock/status/207078908737224706

in a nation that is becoming increasingly apologetic, overwhelmingly inefficient because of its desire to be fair to all and competitiveness being seen as a negative thing, I welcome Strava as an easily accessible way of breeding healthy competition between individuals and the internet; a community of like-minded hobbyists who can bring life to their otherwise mundane commute/ local ride/ training ride and for a moment in time ignore their dull, repressed, constrained daily routine of consumption and excretion.
probably.

As ever STW never fails to deliver. Whilst practically every other cycling forum treats Strava as a bit of fun and a decent way of ripping the piss and friendly rivalry...

The STW hivemind wrings their hands in middleaged angst and talks absolute bollocks, genuine laugh at the thought of the popo getting involved in Strava, get a grip.