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The Strava Files

bicycling.com

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Re: The Strava Files

#31

Post by alistairSH »

vondur wrote: post #3

As a mountain biker, I see some of the times listed on the trails I frequent, and wonder how people can ride them so fast. I'm too afraid to ride at top speed down some of these trails for the fear of colliding with someone else. I like Strava, it's and easy way to keep track of my riding. I wish that Google made My Tracks for iOS.

Being fast on a cross-country trail is about conservation of speed, not just going fast on the downhill segments. Several of the fastest mountain bikers I know grew up racing motocross and bmx. The speed they carry through corners if amazing.

Re: The Strava Files

#32

Post by nl »

nmcfarl wrote: post #29
nl wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does Strava know what the speedlimit it? From memory, Strava's most popular markets are the US, the UK, Australia, Japan, France, Italy. Speed limits vary widely across jurisdictions and change frequently. IMHO the best thing to do would be to remove the leaderboard from segments over (say) 3% negative gradient. (For non-Strava users, Strava does have segments where no leaderboard of the fastest users is shown, b…

You could start with this map: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_limits_in_the_United_Stat... It doesn't need to be precise - it just shouldn't encourage reckless, illegal behaviour.

For the sake of argument, imagine they did calculate the (average??) speed limit for each downhill segment.

Then what?

They hide anyone who goes over that speed from the leaderboard, so the leaderboard is full of people who managed to average precisely the speed limit?

Or as soon as someone goes over the average they hide the whole leaderboard like they do for flagged segments now?

My proposal is that they should hide the leaderboard for all segments over (say) 3% average negative gradient. Simple physics predicts that -3% gradient will put you over the speed limit in most jurisdictions, and it's much simpler to work out.

Re: The Strava Files

#33

Post by nl »

mikemaney wrote: post #15
ryankshaw wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Dangerous for you may not be dangerous for someone else He said in his comment that he's a cat 1 racer. I'm willing to bet if something's unsafe for him, it'd be unsafe for any strava user.

Not knocking him, but we have non-pro locals who are better descenders than Cat 1. Not everyone is an awesome descender. Also, who's to say an 18% descent segment is any less dangerous than a 3% descent being ridden by beginners going after a segment?

Also, who's to say an 18% descent segment is any less dangerous than a 3% descent being ridden by beginners going after a segment?

Isaac Newton.

(In his second law.) Don't misunderstand me: I think 3% descents are dangerous too. But the increased speed an 18% descent gives is more dangerous than a crash at lower speed.

Also, being an "awesome descender" doesn't make you safe - in some cases it means you just crash at higher speeds. Vincenzo Nibali is possibly the best (road) descender in the world at the moment (eg 2013 Giro exploits, his attack on the 2012 Milan-San Remo Poggio descent) and yet he crashed in the World Championship road race, and it was only luck that saved him from serious injury.

Re: The Strava Files

#34

Post by nmcfarl »

nl wrote: post #32
nmcfarl wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could start with this map: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_limits_in_the_United_Stat... It doesn't need to be precise - it just shouldn't encourage reckless, illegal behaviour.

For the sake of argument, imagine they did calculate the (average??) speed limit for each downhill segment. Then what? They hide anyone who goes over that speed from the leaderboard, so the leaderboard is full of people who managed to average precisely the speed limit? Or as soon as someone goes over the average they hide the whole leaderboard like they do for flagged segments now? My proposal is that they should hid…

I’d assume they’d do what you suggest they already do sometimes - make the segment without a leaderboard. Just show your times.

I like your suggestion better than mine. But it seems that Stava is trying to shirk as much responsibility as possible, and as such your suggestion seems less likely to get implemented.

My proposal doesn’t involve them doing anything good - it just has them no longer encouraging blatantly illegal behavior. It’s a minimum bar that should be code-able in minimum time. Almost all of the dangerous segments would still have leaderboards - only the blatantly illegal ones wouldn’t be and they could say that they "do not encourage illegal behavior" - something they can’t honestly say now.

Re: The Strava Files

#36

Post by bsimpson »

pcl wrote: post #7

I wanted to read this article -- I bike frequently, use Strava, live in the Bay Area, and am in the tech industry. But bicycling.com kept kicking me off their site and auto-launching iOS App Store links! I've never seen that sort of advertising before, and am surprised Apple / Google (I'm using Chrome) even allow JavaScript to silently throw me out to the App Store without clicking a link.

I doubt it's Chrome's fault. I read the whole thing on Chrome for Android. Moreover, Apple doesn't allow Chrome to use its own rendering engine on iOS, so problems with web rendering tend to fall squarely on Apple's shoulders.

Re: The Strava Files

#37

Post by [deleted] »

Moral_ wrote: post #5

I use Strava all the time. As a cat 1 racer it makes it fun to set KOMs and "race" against the elite in the state. That being said I think Strava needs to have a way to limit the Downhill segments. Some downhill segments where I live, utah, are outrageous with top speeds of 70mph. While I'm a Strong advocate for the segments I wish people would stop making downhill segments as they're far too dangerous. If I ever do…

[deleted]

Re: The Strava Files

#38

Post by mvkel »

nmcfarl wrote: post #17
notatoad wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>That being said I think Strava needs to have a way to limit the Downhill segments how about just taking a bit of personal responsibility? if a downhill segment is too dangerous, don't do it. blaming an app when you crash is one of the stupidest things i've ever heard of. I don't see how strava has any responsibility to do anything.

Not a Strava user - but the mention of 70mph winning speeds, makes me think that Strava should eliminate segments from their database where in order to win you need to violate the speed limit. As a baseline they should not be encouraging people to break the law. It's not just the user of the program that should be taking personal responsibility, but the coders as well.

Disagree. Lots of roads have a 25mph speed limit and it's trivial to exceed that on a bike.

Percent grade might be a better indicator.

Re: The Strava Files

#39

Post by vondur »

alistairSH wrote: post #31
vondur wrote: post #3

As a mountain biker, I see some of the times listed on the trails I frequent, and wonder how people can ride them so fast. I'm too afraid to ride at top speed down some of these trails for the fear of colliding with someone else. I like Strava, it's and easy way to keep track of my riding. I wish that Google made My Tracks for iOS.

Being fast on a cross-country trail is about conservation of speed, not just going fast on the downhill segments. Several of the fastest mountain bikers I know grew up racing motocross and bmx. The speed they carry through corners if amazing.

Yeah, that is true for XC trails, but I was referring to the downhill sections of trails that we have here in Socal. Some of these trails can get pretty crowded. I only go full throttle when at the bike park, or shuttling some of the steeper trails that usually only DH people ride.
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