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Just a free account that I have had for years so all my rides are on it so I just use it for logging rides and see how I compare to 10 years ago. I am not interested in the social aspect to it but do like to get in the top 10 for a segment (and that is all I can see now since it was moved to a pay feature)
I used to use it for cycling and running but stopped a few years ago. With a young family the amount and quality of cycling a running had reduced and become an almost 100% solo endeavour. I actually found seeing the stats a bit demotivational as everything was just numerically a bit shit compared to before. Also the social media aspect of it wasn't great for me as it was making me feel worse about the limited opportunities I had to bike / run rather than just enjoying what I was able to do. Anyway, it felt a bit liberating just to go out for a run or bike ride with zero expectations or tracking and I found I got my fitness back up a bit by doing this.
I have started logging some stuff again via Garmin but my focus is more on health / fitness monitoring rather than looking at segments and what anybody else has done. I liked using Strava, may well use it again, but definitely felt stepping back from it suited me at that particular point in life.
Segments are pointless around here as any of the climbing ones are pretty much all e-bikes in the top 10.
Ah, you obviously haven't gone to the dark side and started flagging obvious e-bikers 😆
They are few enough and obvious enough around me, I just consider it a favour to whoever's KOM they've stolen (it's typically obscure segments where I've sneaked in to the top ten)
Mine's just used to log how many miles I have done. Or haven't done as is more the case this year.
Use it for personal reference to keep tabs on mileage ect, never bothered with segment times as I'm usually not quick enough to trouble the top 10's anyway TBH! Used the premium version on a free trail but never used/cared about any of the extras so I'll stick with the freebie version
Still really like it here. Its cool to see what others are up to and can add a bit of motivation to head out if I can see others are. I really don't mind scrolling past people's Zwift rides, it takes like 3 seconds.
I'm not fast enough to really trouble any segment top ten's but I'm always interested to see how I stack up against myself on local ride climbs.
I use the training calendar and the fitness and freshness function too in an indicative/vague way to monitor training stress. Its my go to route planner too and its handy to quickly copy and paste road routes that others have done local to me if I fancy doing it.
If I'm planning on riding or running abroad its handy to pick a local segment, find the "local legend" and then just check what routes they have been doing to get a quick up to date idea of where's best to run/ride in the area.
I don't think Strava does anything that other apps can't do for you but it seems like the easiest single place for all of the above so happy to pay for it.
My premium is up in a few days, not sure if I’ll renew it or just use the free version.
I do like it, keeps me in touch with riding friends who I don’t get to see very often, it’s interesting to see what folk have been up to and gives some good ideas for future rides etc.
Not really interested in peoples commutes either but it really doesn’t take long to scroll past!
Free was great for years right up until they stripped all the interesting stuff out and made it premium only.
Free was great for years right up until they stripped all the interesting stuff out and made it premium only.
It's less than a Pound a Week.
I've used it for a decade - love the stats, love seeing what everyone else is doing and liking the newer features (route planning is good).
I do though ride with a large selection of folk AND live very near to one of the UK's most visited MTB destinations, so also good for seeing new descents.
I'm dropping off the paid version of Strava when my sub runs out later this year. I don't use it enough for route planning and segment leaderboards are mostly irrelevant to me. I use Trailforks all the time, both when riding to check where a trail starts and also for route planning at home - it's so much easier (for me anyway) to create routes using the data there.
I think pretty much every time I go to create a route on Strava I end up swearing at it - first I have to remember that you create routes within 'Explore', then I need to tick/untick load of options, try to create a route, then continually undo sections where it has autorouted the wrong way, or just doesn't recognise that a trail exists, so manual mode needed. It just drives me nuts!
I don’t think Strava does anything that other apps can’t do for you but it seems like the easiest single place for all of the above
so happy to pay for it.but I still just use other options
I paid for it a while back when it was cheap, and still use the free version just as somewhere to log rides and just skim through to see what others are upto. The commuting/zwift stuff doesn't bother me, mine are on there, and if you're logging in on a Wednesday what do you expect other than to see the same old commutes, zwift rides and evening ride loops as every week?
The premium stuff does look somewhat useful, but it's the end point of subscription fatigue. I don't need to spend another £55 a year to see power numbers, HR data and whatever else that I can already see in the apps that recorded them. So that just leaves being able to plan rides or crib them from others profiles. For which £55 is a lot, could buy a lot of guide books and OS maps for that.
I use it and pay the full amount. Being fat, slow and old I'm not the slightest bit interested in the competitive aspect of it but use the route plotting tool. Also if I'm in a new area riding, I search the heatmap for rides and upload to the garmin. Great way of finding trails.
I've never paid for it as I treat it as a form of social media rather than a training tool. I enjoy posting my photos from rides and hikes, and as a personal log for myself.
The dream premium feature for me would be to hide zwift rides, 3km commutes and gym sessions from my feed. I only want to see when my mates have done and interesting activity.
I'm in a riding whatsapp group and loads use it for KOM dick swinging and ego massaging. Even to the extent of planning MTB rides around a particular segment. I can't get on board with that.
AND live very near to one of the UK’s most visited MTB destinations, so also good for seeing new descents.
Can be a bit of double edged sword though. I used to live in the Calderdale valley and the KOM leader-board on popular segments is something to behold, there are thousands on some descents and I found that I was either killing myself to move up from 2,989 to 2,979, or I'd feel really shitty if I messed it up, and it would ruin my ride. Also one Strava segment used my driveway - as it was part of a very well known segment from Heptonstall down to Midge Hole, and without being a bit "anti bike" the amount of folks from out of the area who either get lost and ride into my garden, or would be riding down it a million* miles a hour without realising that a car maybe coming around the bend at the bottom, or that the descent in fact crossed a pretty busy road...
*some exaggeration may have been used
Oh, and don't forget that folks who're very anti MTB can also use Strava to find new descents.
So what is the difference between the free and paid sub?
It's been flakely recording rides for me recently, it's likely user error. But I didn't have the issue previously where I'd stop mid ride take a few photos and the app doesn't resume the ride when moving again. Not the end of the world, but not worth £55 if it's not going to record properly. Might as well save the money and put it towards a Garmin.
I basically use it to record rides, no bpm or data like that, and to see my mates times on segments etc.
Would I basically not be able to see mates times on the segments?
I pay for it still, it's buttons compared with the rest of the cost of owning bikes and I find the route planner, in conjunction with Heat Maps really useful for working out new routes. I like that if I favourite a route it automatically puts it on my Wahoo Elemnt for me and I like that if I favourite a segment it tells me how slow I am compared with 10 years ago as it heightens my agony on the climbs.
The trick with your feed is not to follow all your friends on Strava, I only follow people that I know through sport, ie actual athletes, not people uploading a 1.5m run at 11m/mile once every blue moon. The worst thing there now is that there's lots of commutes posted, but it's vaguely interesting to see that. I wish auto-upload forced you through the edit process and forced you to add a name to the ride. I hate the default "Morning Ride" that ends up all over the place.
The other day I looked at my dwindling list of KoMs and was pleasantly surprised to see no one has managed to get my 15s sprint segment from waaaaaay back still, some guy went through pulling 950W on his power meter and still didn't get me. That was nice! And there's still one that I've got with over 32,000 people having had a bash at, I like that they've archived my greatest hits like that.
I don't think the analysis is all that great as it's a bit of a pain to track my progress in a way that works well for me, but the API is there and I managed to create a program that gets my data back out automatically fairly easily, so I have my own live training tracker thing. It's nice they made that available.
The training vs tiredness thing is a bit bobbins too, it way over estimates the short-term effect of going for a ride vs years of bashing out the miles. I've not ridden properly for nearly 10 years and it's showing my 4 rides in 4 weeks recently as almost 90% of what it shows for my peak way back when the reality is my fitness is barely 10% of that!
I used to use it a lot and paid for it for a few years, but Garmin connect has got better (my upgraded devices I suspect rather than the platform itself) and it just seems a bit of a waste of money now as I’m not going to be troubling segment times. Not even my own.
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Without the free segment leader boards it doesn’t offer any more than any of the other ride/run logging sites I do think that was a bit of a misstep. The leaderboards were a good gateway for me, so much that I sold my first Garmin to just use my phone</span>
I used to live in the Calderdale valley and the KOM leader-board on popular segments is something to behold, there are thousands on some descents and I found that I was either killing myself to move up from 2,989 to 2,979, or I’d feel really shitty if I messed it up
Try living in the SE, there's tens of thousands on the trails!
Not the end of the world, but not worth £55 if it’s not going to record properly. Might as well save the money and put it towards a Garmin.
I basically use it to record rides, no bpm or data like that, and to see my mates times on segments etc.
Would I basically not be able to see mates times on the segments?
That's down to the recording device, phones are notoriously flakey as they're often burried in bags and pockets under all-sorts of bits and metal stuff. Paying for premium won't solve that.
It’s less than a Pound a Week.
As someone else later said...
... it’s the end point of subscription fatigue.
free account, i like stats so find it difficult not to record, i use it to record my swimming and riding, helps keep track of distance, time, fitness level etc
i've definately lost interest in racing segments and comparing times.
Agree with all the negative points about it - but still always use it and look at my ride in terms of leaderboards afterwards. Never get near KOMs anymore up or down. Now look at fastest of the year. Even more sadly look at fastest amongst people I follow. Feel a bit pathetic about it but do it anyway.
Not given up, but I use it less presently, and don't subscribe.
I found it really useful in lockdown when I was doing alot of riding in a small woods and chasing KOMs prevented boredom of the confined space.
I eventually caught covid in June last year, struggled through later summer, stopped riding completely over winter, and I've lost fitness and got fat. For a short period I was unhappy that strava showed I'm a significant way from my earlier performance, but I've since decided to enjoy what I can do, which is having a great time riding in the woods with my mates.
Strava doesnt measure that, but I do still use it for seeing what my chums are getting up to.
The worst thing there now is that there’s lots of commutes posted, but it’s vaguely interesting to see that.
I'm always amazed people give kudos to my commute, I went through a phase of muting them but it's too many button presses when I just want to get changed and start work!
Try living in the SE, there’s tens of thousands on the trails!
Oh yeah, I can imagine! Some KOMs or even top 50 on the leader-board are just unachievable either changed so much from the original on the ground, to just too much activity. I dunno how'd they'd change it though.
Although now it's got me thinking, I wonder what's the off-road segment with the most activity?
I went through a phase of muting them but it’s too many button presses when I just want to get changed and start work!
ActivityFix will sort that for you - just set up a rule to mute any ride that starts or ends near your workplace and never get pointless kudos again.
I still subscribe, mainly to support the platform because I get some value out of the features I do use, even though I don't use many of the premium features. I do enter a few challenges though and once won a £££ set of Assos bibs, so that offsets the subscription for a couple of years 😀
I use it for recording what I do, but I pay the sub so I can plan routes using heat map data, which is awesome and very useful in an area with lots of inconsistent PROWs and also stacks of cheeky trails, the areas for which show up like beacons.
I also set my first goal recently, which was 6hrs per week riding. It helps. I'm not chasing KOMs, I'm too slow for that although I have had a few on quiet segments before; but I do smash certain segments knowing they are there and that I have a reasonably good time on them. It's a good way to keep those endless local loops fun IMO.
I have a handful of people that I get Kudos from no matter what I do, I was sort of thinking they must be taking the piss, but I'm not sure now. There's two who live locally that I've never interacted with at all, no idea who they are or why they are giving me Kudos for my occasionbal pathetic efforts.
ActivityFix
What's that then?
I do enter a few challenges though and once won a £££ set of Assos bibs, so that offsets the subscription for a couple of years
Ahhhhh... along with commutes/walks to the shops/Zwift, it's the endless list of 'Challenges' that people enter that I wish I could mute, it's just more Stealth advertising despite my having paid for the package.
BUT I never realised I could win things! Maybe I'll just start entering seemingly pathetically easy challenges every month like I see others doing (Strava really shouldn't let someone who e.g. averages 200km a month to enter a challenge to ride... 50km a month etc. etc.).
and
Are two sites where you can define rules that then automatically change various things on your strava activities when (or shortly after) they are uploaded. I discovered them when they made the 3D map the default for MTB rides and I wanted to reset to the standard map.
I use the free one mostly for adding photos to rides and keeping track of bike mileage and have done for years. All this time I've had a Garmin and had it syncing there too. Just had a look and you can add photos and gear in Garmin Connect so I might start doing that there.
I also use Strava (free) for recording walks recorded with the Android App. Unless I'm being stupid (quite possible), I can't see a way to record a (walking) activity in the Garmin Android App, only add a manual one?
I think that other sites can offer to customize your strava feed, when strava seem to refuse to listen to customer feedback and requests to do the same, kind of shows where they are in terms of treating their customers.
There’s a “kudos all” button on the desktop version now 😉
If I’ve Kudos’d a run you’ve done- that’s why!! (because I operate a strict ‘only kudos bike rides’ policy) 🤣🤣
when strava seem to refuse to listen to customer feedback and requests to do the same
I think it's a deliberate policy to force-feed people Zwift and other 'challenges' with a sponsors name on them. Frustrating when you're a paying customer and arguably should be entitled to an 'ad free' experience.
https://business.strava.com/cases/zwift
one Strava segment used my driveway
that must be a bit of a pig... Now we'll all be along.
I use a free account, only follow about 25 people I know who follow me. It's nice to see where in the world people are riding, skiing, hiking or whatever. Occasionally comment, more to take the piss than to signal awe.
I put photos on maybe one ride a fortnight. Only give them names if there's a proper punning opportunity.
I'm getting more and more used to physical decline so can't remember my last KoM [humblebrag obv: I have KoMs] but do like to trouble local leaderboards still.
On topic: the one person I know who has gone from committed every ride user to v occasional user gave up because it was making him go for downhill segments in a way not conducive to good health and continued survival in unbroken form. Not that he seems to have slowed up at all.
that must be a bit of a pig
will go over the heads of most folks but, take a bow 👌
I still use it and enjoy it, not bothered with segments or times but I love seeing other peoples MTB routes and photos. I only follow friends and a few of them are scattered around the globe so great to see what they are up to. Also good for the route planner as it goes straight to the Garmin.
Yes.
I only used it to track my runs and rides to compare to myself - was I getting faster or fatter?
It was so unreliable and shonky, particularly compared to just using Google Fit, that I gave up and binned it.
Happier days.
I use it, and still like it. Not so much for Leaderboards anymore as there are too many variables these days - Garmin, Wahoo, iPhones tucked away in a pocket all produce different distances/speeds/altitude etc
I like to see where distant friends have ridden, and to look at pictures of different scenery (much like the weekend pics thread on STW)
I also find it helpful to download and follow other peoples routes too
My senses of self preservation and social responsibility are strong enough that I don't chase downhill KOMs. I did a fast run on a popular local descent, on one of those days when everything went right, and got a really good result. So I went balls out next time and got a top 15 out of thousands, but it was reckless and irresponsible given there are walkers on it regularly so whilst I could go physically faster it's just far too dangerous.
I've used the free version for years, just to have a record of my rides, cumulative distance and height gain. All recorded by my phone in my backpack. Suits me just fine. Weirdly, on my ride today my location and track didn't show until I saved the ride. Wondering if it was a glitch or that function has now become a paid for feature 🤔
I have a free account but don't have any gps, it just make it easier on the rare occasions I look at the global heat map.
My subscription is due next month and I'm not renewing. Can't remember when I last used heatmaps and used planning tool once in 12 months (normally use Kamoot).
Garmin Connect has segments, so will use that and Strava will just be used as a mileage tracker and to spy on friends! Connect is 'free' so over £50 p.a. for nowt doesn't make sense.
I'd resubscribe for half of that.
Yes, gave it up. best thing i ever did.