Strava - Amazing!

anto164

Looks like the people around my end are busy... I rode 19 segments today in total...

jibberjim

anto164 wrote:

Looks like the people around my end are busy... I rode 19 segments today in total...

Try riding once round richmond park in both directions, 22km riding probably get about 100 segments!

CRAIGO5000

It's just getting started here in Manchester regions. I went out this morning just to test the app on a half mile sprint that's local to me. The guy at the top averaged 30+mph which I knew I'd never get after the Xmas I just had. I was pleased to see that I placed 3rd though and only 12 seconds off his pace. It'll give me something to aim for.

I'm also looking forward to the commutes to work as lots of roads into the city centre have been uploaded by other users.

It's a great app!

kettrinboy

Need more roadies to use it around my way as i,m top on a lot of local segments but only because most of the other times seem to have been set on MTB,s, come spring though when more people get out on roadbikes i think most of my segment times are gonna get hammered.

springtide9

kettrinboy wrote:

Need more roadies to use it around my way as i,m top on a lot of local segments but only because most of the other times seem to have been set on MTB,s, come spring though when more people get out on roadbikes i think most of my segment times are gonna get hammered.

I think Strava is now really starting to take off in the UK.

When I was using it probably 9 months ago in Bristol, there were maybe one or two other people I could see within the timed segments, which basically means Strava ends up being a tool for timing yourself. It was a bit like Google+ compared to FB. I prefer Google+, but nobody uses it to make it that beneficial. There are now many riders around Bristol who use Strava, both on and off road. It's interesting to see the people in your area who ride the same areas on and off road.

The more people who use Strava there better it becomes. You will always get KOM chasers to get to the top of the leaderboards, but it's also very easy to click through to see the full ride when comparing data (so if you are planning on aiming for a KOM but plan on driving to the bottom of the hill, people will guess!!)

springtide9

duplicate post.

petemadoc

PeteMadoc wrote:

Personally I prefer endomondo. Easier to use, better map display and better social network stuff.

OK OK so after looking at the local map I can definitely see the appeal of Strava and the whole KOM thing. I can feel some pain coming on.

Fat-Boy-Roubaix

I reckon some are using Motorbikes on a few of my segments!!

springtide9

Fat-Boy-Roubaix wrote:

I reckon some are using Motorbikes on a few of my segments!!

There are some very fast people out there... but...

There have been occasions where people have used motorbikes - someone who was a marshal at the Tour of Britain uploaded the route data to Strava that caused some confusion.
Another issue that can sometimes exist is if a road runs parallel to another road - there is a section at Bristol's Ashton Court MTB track that runs parallel with the road, where Strava road users were messing up the MTB timings.

There is an option within Strava that allows you to 'flag' the ride (or section) so that it is excluded from the section/KOM ratings.... Obviously you should only do this if you believe there really is an issue with the ride (where is it very obvious)
The end user can overturn this 'switch' by contacting Strava... although I am not sure how they 'police' the flag switch - I can only assume that if you incorrectly 'flag' a number of rides for no valid reason, the Strava team will be on your back!

bigmat

Strava is great for interval training on my daily commute, although the overall effect has probably been to make me slower as I will on occasion take it easy, than hammer it for a stretch, then be dead for the rest of the ride home. Have managed to get there or thereabouts for most of my local segments, but still a way off on College Road in Dulwich (which had been my benchmark training climb) - PB (pre-Strava) is 2:42, the KOM is 2:25 or something ridiculous like that. Now that is a challenge for the summer months...

izza

jibberjim wrote:

Strava is really depressing though once your fitness deserts you, you get to see in black and white just how much you've declined. I've still got some good placings on Strava climbs, but I wouldn't be anywhere near them now

The art is to find a section which people use for "cooling down" then push as hard as you can and jump up close to the top of at least one chart.

I generally come in 1/3 - 1/2 the way down on my regular hills/routes but am currently coming second in one section. Goddamit I'm proud and I'll never know (can guess if I really wanted to) that I am up against someone who is freewheeling!

johnboy183

izza wrote:

The art is to find a section which people use for "cooling down" then push as hard as you can and jump up close to the top of at least one chart.

I generally come in 1/3 - 1/2 the way down on my regular hills/routes but am currently coming second in one section. Goddamit I'm proud and I'll never know (can guess if I really wanted to) that I am up against someone who is freewheeling!

To improve your position why not say 2/3 - 1/2 way up the leader board?

jibberjim

izza wrote:

The art is to find a section which people use for "cooling down" then push as hard as you can and jump up close to the top of at least one chart.

Problem with that is, you have clubmates, who see every ride you do, and are more than happy to go out and knock you off again. And with people like TarmacExpert of this forum and his 200 KoM's and competitive nature to match his speed!

Just looking now I've still got over 60 KoM's but most are not competitive ones, but ones from random hills in Luxembourg or hills where only me and Maryka have ridden up them (and it still gives me KoM even when I'm slower.)

porlyworly

I've been running endomondo on my iphone 4 and find it very good (although I'm not convinced by its accuracy), is strava better? Can you run both at the same time?!?

charliew87

PorlyWorly wrote:

I've been running endomondo on my iphone 4 and find it very good (although I'm not convinced by its accuracy), is strava better? Can you run both at the same time?!?

Yes. I run both Strava @ Bike Tracks on my phone. I have bike tracks open as it gives more detail about current speed, max speed, ave speed and then easy access to bike & road maps, and i like the export to google earth option that it gives after the ride. I then have strava minimised running in the background. With them both minimised I use about 5% iPhone 4 battery per hour, with one open and one minimised I use about 15% per hour.

Fat-Boy-Roubaix

I know it more than a little pathetic, but in the spring I am going to drive out to the last segment on my return journey and sprint up the fecker, it comes at the end of my commute home after 10 miles and a days work, the KOM has 2-3 mile warm up from home and does it in the morning. It is only a 150ft climb but it is over 1.5ish miles

I only have to beat my personal best by 1 min 50, no chance lol but at least I can then give up on the excuses...

izza

jibberjim wrote:

izza wrote:

The art is to find a section which people use for "cooling down" then push as hard as you can and jump up close to the top of at least one chart.

Problem with that is, you have clubmates, who see every ride you do, and are more than happy to go out and knock you off again. And with people like TarmacExpert of this forum and his 200 KoM's and competitive nature to match his speed!

Just looking now I've still got over 60 KoM's but most are not competitive ones, but ones from random hills in Luxembourg or hills where only me and Maryka have ridden up them (and it still gives me KoM even when I'm slower.)

Not in a club and not going to tell anyone which stretch of tarmac I am talking about!!

dearbarbie

just registered, cant wait to use it at the weekend!

dearbarbie

but how is it diff to endomondo?

Fat-Boy-Roubaix

dearbarbie wrote:

but how is it diff to endomondo?

Horses for courses, Endmondo is good for mile challenges, and decent for ride stats, Strava is great for segment challenges and I use Garmin Connect, just because it was what I started off using so holds my cycling full life data. Plus with connect I stell prefer the way the ride data is laid out, although this could just be because it was the first site I used.

So I upload to all three and do not pay any of them any subs for full membership

fred22

The selling point of strava is that it automatically identifies climbs in your uploaded route and automatically displays a KOM league table for each climb, showing how you fared against anyone else who's ridden that climb.
Afaik that's unique, endomomdo et al just show your route.
In strava you can also manually create segments, bits of rides that are "interesting"; again strava will then compare and display your performance in relation to anyone else that rode the same segment.

Mike67

Just started using it myself and I must admit it's great for inspiring me to put some effort in up the hills around here.

Does anyone know the criteria applied by Strava to automatically identify suitable segments/climbs?
On one of my rides it did all this automatically and picked out the cat 4 and cat 3 climbs etc including a couple of new ones.
On another ride it didn't select any climbs automatically, but when I added a section manually it classed it as a cat 4.
I'm wondering if they have to be a certain length etc.

okgo

They're obviously not 'proper' cat 4 or 3 climbs, but yes, it does spot hills, have a read on their site for definition.

Mike67

Found the criteria under the support section:

"If your elevation gain between two measurements is more than 3% we will flag a start of a climb. The climb will continue as long as your average grade is greater then 3%.

So, the basic criteria for a climb is avg grade of 3% or more.
For Categorized climbs 1-4:

% Grade multiplied by distance in meters > 8000 to be at least a cat 4 climb. So, for a 4% avg grade climb, it has to be 2km at least to be categorized.

Cat 3 = 16000, 2 = 3200, 1 = 64000, HC > 80000"

So I guess in my case I have a climb where a flatter spot in the middle drops the average grade below 3% so it stops counting it. The steeper sections either side of the flatter bit are not long enough on their own to count as a climb, but the whole thing when done manually comes out as a Cat4. :?

anto164

This weather has made me think that Strava is a little pointless now..

One of the guys in my club, he's not a whippet and went out for a pootle before. There's a segment along the coast which he said he put normal effort in, but went from ave of 20mph up to 29mph along the 1mi segment.. All because he had a decent strong tailwind. That's 3 seconds slower than the KOM of the segment..

Basically, to get KOM on a flatter section, people will now be waiting for the weather to allow them to gun it at a high speed with a tailwind, therefore skewing the results.

jibberjim

anto164 wrote:

Basically, to get KOM on a flatter section, people will now be waiting for the weather to allow them to gun it at a high speed with a tailwind, therefore skewing the results.

There's so many things like that - one of the segments I'm most interested in, I'm 3rd, the person who's 2nd was on my wheel for a lot of it and then outsprinted me right at the end. The guy who's first had a pro race peleton around him. Other segments are held by guys on TT bikes in full aero kit, others with a massive tailwind.

Of course it's not a fair competition - that's what races and time trials are for. It's a load of fun - and pretty interesting when there are 8 or more of you on your club ride doing the same segments on the same ride - you get to see the differences, and how you compare.

JohnBoyUK

One really annoying thing with Strava is that turbo work doesnt count towards YTD cumulative mileage when uploading from the Garmin!

kettrinboy

JohnBoyUK wrote:

One really annoying thing with Strava is that turbo work doesnt count towards YTD cumulative mileage when uploading from the Garmin!

For turbo workouts from my Edge 800 i upload the f.i.t files to the computer then from there to Strava, but make sure the checkbox for "stationary trainer" is not ticked, on a turbo workout this is ticked by default if it is you only get cadence and HR traces, if you untick the box you should get all data and the mileage added to your totals,also make sure the GPS on your device is turned off during the workout , reading the Strava Q and A section it seems turbo workout functionality is still work in progress.

JohnBoyUK

kettrinboy wrote:

JohnBoyUK wrote:

One really annoying thing with Strava is that turbo work doesnt count towards YTD cumulative mileage when uploading from the Garmin!

For turbo workouts from my Edge 800 i upload the f.i.t files to the computer then from there to Strava, but make sure the checkbox for "stationary trainer" is not ticked, on a turbo workout this is ticked by default if it is you only get cadence and HR traces, if you untick the box you should get all data and the mileage added to your totals,also make sure the GPS on your device is turned off during the workout , reading the Strava Q and A section it seems turbo workout functionality is still work in progress.

Oh I'm liking that a lot Cheers kettrinboy

waynobfc

Just started using Strava myself, was quite impressed that it uploaded all my historical data off my garmin & listed the achievements also. Been using garmin connect & runkeeper & where Garmin excels for me is that you can set yourself goals on mileaqge over time which cant seem to be done on Strava or Runkeeper.