Strava - good or bad?

[Dave W]

I use it and so do my cycling buddies.

Good -
gives you incentive to ride harder and compare previous times over selected segments, shows generally if your fitness is improving or declining (a bit dependant on wind strength). Records your rides and routes giving totals, averages etc. Bit of fun.
Bad -
only bad side I can see is possibly taking risks downhill to achieve faster times (but that's half the fun of cycling?)




What are your opinions?

[eileithyia]

Like everything you are either in control or let it control you......

[al_yrpal]

To me cycling is not a race, least of all with myself. However I understand that some people like that sort of thing, good luck to them. To me its unimportant, so it would be bad. I have other ways of planning and executing routes.

Al

[Bicycler]

Oh go on then I'll take the bait The potential downside is where people prioritise improving their time over adopting a sensible speed for the road conditions. Find your local section of busy Sustrans path, look it up on Strava and chances are that some numpty will have considered it perfectly okay to time trial along there.

[eileithyia]

Oh go on then I'll take the bait The potential downside is where people prioritise improving their time over adopting a sensible speed for the road conditions. Find your local section of busy Sustrans path, look it up on Strava and chances are that some numpty will have considered it perfectly okay to time trial along there.

+1

[andrewjoseph]

You don't need strava to see if your fitness is improving. Just log all your rides, you could use an exercise book!

I log all my rides, initially on a spreadsheet, now using ascent for Mac. I have tried endomondo, ridewithgps and strava. I occasionally put some of my rides on strava, mainly to share routes with friends and family.

I've got a few kom's, but that's mainly because no one else has ridden it.

If strava ended if wouldn't worry me.

[BV1961]

I'm not into being competitive, I've suffered TTs in the past - I'm never going to be as fast as some committed (often obsessed) testers - so Strava is not for me. Beware about sharing your routes on-line; I know of one group who were targeted by thieves who had worked out where expensive bikes lived by tracking Strava data - they were doing regular group rides with pick-ups at their various homes. Now they start their Strava recording at a random location away from home.....you were probably already aware of that.

[Dave W]

Aren't cycle tracks flagged up and removed if deemed dangerous? I rode one recently and it didn't register at all so I I guess it was taken off?

[squeaker]

The potential downside is where people prioritise improving their time over adopting a sensible speed for the road conditions.

+1: I am of the opinion that any 'racing' on the public highway, in whatever type of vehicle, is generally not in the public interest, in its broadest sense.

[mrjemm]

http://www.thevisitor.co.uk/news/local/ ... -1-6079664

Folk on Mogum prom were getting bothered by inconsiderate users of Strava. But then you don't need Strava to have inconsiderate cyclists, or indeed any other category of society. Was annoyed recently by one cyclist who appeared to be using peds as slalom cones, swooping around folk with little room to spare. And he was dressed in black and white 'lycra' on a black and white Trek IIRC, so probably could've been assumed to be doing something like Strava, but I'd say not as he wasn't exactly holding a good line weaving in and out like that. Not sure if it did get taken off Strava, but you still see plenty of riders appearing to be challenging themselves or the clock on the prom.

I recall Gentlegreen (not seen lately?) saying that the cycle path he used in Bristol (IIRC) was terrible for this too.

[BSRU]

Just use RideWithGPS, a far more civilised place .

[TrevA]

I use it and find it gives me an extra incentive to ride, especially with the various Challenges that come along. I don't agree with downhill segments or ones that go through sets of traffic lights, as I think they encourage dangerous riding. It's interesting to compare yourself to others. I'm ranked 12,255th on Alpe d'Huez with my 1hr 53m ride (I did stop 4 times on the way up though).

[Mark1978]

I find it very useful especially in getting me to push a bit harder up hill as I'm fundamentally lazy!

[A1anP]

Good: All of these GPS apps are great, making it easy to keep track of your rides, with lots of stats to pore over for those of us at the far end of the autistic spectrum. I like to use Veloviewer with Strava to take the stats to another level, keeping track of my miles, elevation gain and ave speed, etc on three separate bikes.

Bad: is when I find myself in the bottom 1% of riders on any particular segment. I'm aiming to get above the bottom 5%

[Mick F]

Good or Bad?
I'm half way.

I joined for a trial, and found it did nothing for me. Not that it was Bad, it just wasn't Good either.
I cancelled my membership.