Oh No. The French have discovered Strava!

bernithebiker

Always amongst the last to the internet party, the French are finally waking up to Strava. As of up to end 2012, it was very difficult to find Froggies on Strava in France, most segments being populated by English speaking riders.

But there must have been some kind of article pushing it recently as they're now coming on in droves. The problem is that the ones coming on aren't your run of mill weekend riders, they're Cat 2, 1 and Elites. They are therefore decimating my best times!! Almost every day I'm getting an email to say another KOM's gone, and gone in style.

I thought a 2km 3% climb at 30km/h was quite good, but one Elite just did it at 36.5km/h and he had a slight headwind! I ain't ever getting that one back! It's a bit depressing, but at least it's a target to aim for.

When you look at Alpine segments it can be quite flattering if you're say 80th out of 600. But bear in mind that there are hardly any French on there, and they're quite good......

At least most of the segments are named in English.....!

Mikey23

Aww...

cougie

There should be an option on Strava to disallow the French their records. They have an unfair advantage.

team47b

cougie wrote:

There should be an option on Strava to disallow the French their records. They have an unfair advantage.

what by being better, or just for being french?

dabber

I met up with my French riding buddy as a result of Strava. I'd ridden one of his favourite climbs and he made a comment on my ride. To cut a long story short, we ended up meeting up the next time I was over (I spend about a third of the year there) and we'll meet up again in a couple of weeks.
The great thing about Strava in the area of France I go to is that pretty much all of the segments are what I think of as proper segments... pretty much all climbs, no traffic lights etc.

bernithebiker

Dabber wrote:

I met up with my French riding buddy as a result of Strava. I'd ridden one of his favourite climbs and he made a comment on my ride. To cut a long story short, we ended up meeting up the next time I was over (I spend about a third of the year there) and we'll meet up again in a couple of weeks.
The great thing about Strava in the area of France I go to is that pretty much all of the segments are what I think of as proper segments... pretty much all climbs, no traffic lights etc.

It's a great way to link up with Brits abroad too, I've met several like that. Had a great ride today, warm, sunny, deserted roads, no jacket for 1st time this winter!

dg74

bernithebiker wrote:

Dabber wrote:

I met up with my French riding buddy as a result of Strava. I'd ridden one of his favourite climbs and he made a comment on my ride. To cut a long story short, we ended up meeting up the next time I was over (I spend about a third of the year there) and we'll meet up again in a couple of weeks.
The great thing about Strava in the area of France I go to is that pretty much all of the segments are what I think of as proper segments... pretty much all climbs, no traffic lights etc.

It's a great way to link up with Brits abroad too, I've met several like that. Had a great ride today, warm, sunny, deserted roads, no jacket for 1st time this winter!

You Swine!!!

team47b

that's terrible, winding people up by telling people here that you have not been wearing a jacket!


What's a cycling jacket look like? I don't even own one

LittlePlums

dg74 wrote:

bernithebiker wrote:

Dabber wrote:

I met up with my French riding buddy as a result of Strava. I'd ridden one of his favourite climbs and he made a comment on my ride. To cut a long story short, we ended up meeting up the next time I was over (I spend about a third of the year there) and we'll meet up again in a couple of weeks.
The great thing about Strava in the area of France I go to is that pretty much all of the segments are what I think of as proper segments... pretty much all climbs, no traffic lights etc.

It's a great way to link up with Brits abroad too, I've met several like that. Had a great ride today, warm, sunny, deserted roads, no jacket for 1st time this winter!

You Swine!!!

And there was me thinking I'd done well as it is looking like this is going to be the first week in well over 6 months that I won't get wet at least once on my commute. Still, it's only Wednesday and the weather can get a whole lot worse by the weekend.

Tony09

Ah ah, yes I'm french, just discovered Strava and it is an amazing website/app, I must share that with all my friends, even if we are very late...
For example, around "Longchamps" famous circuit in Paris, where all the parisian's riders used to go very often, during the sunny day the main bunch are pretty impressive (like 300 riders...), when you look at the segment on Strava, you find just 377 riders who have ridden it and use strava.
When you look at the same kind of place in London (Richmond park), you find over 5000 riders... :shock:
British, American etc. got a new and young vision of cycling, in france the amount of cyclist with GPS is very poor, it is "too new" over here.

I've already spoken about it to some friends, put it on a french forum, everybody enjoyed it immediately.

For the elites and competitors, sometime they put the segment recorded during a race, it's why we can find very impressive results.

Happy to know that french people are still "des bétes noirs" for you in cycling

http://www.bikebasque.co.uk

TakeTurns

cougie wrote:

There should be an option on Strava to disallow the French their records. They have an unfair advantage.

Now, that'd be straight up segregation! Instead, they should implement a new filter so you can remove all results from the Frenchies. Like they do with weight categories and all that.