Sunday Times: Strava records achieved by speeding and ignoring red lights

Yes but some of the recorded speeds are set by people in or on motor vehicles breaking the speed limit. One of my local hills has an average uphill speed of 53.9kph fair play to them if they did it but I’m not so sure. The trouble is there are plenty of twats in all walks of life who break the law and they can not moan if they get caught.

The figures mentioned by the times are not even actual speeds, they are glitches due to recording via a smartphone: This is the segment they are referring to and if you look at the rides for the respective people you can see how the numbers reported for this incredibly short segment are simply gps recording errors, which are more likely when using a smartphone!

The segment for anyone interested is http://app.strava.com/segments/1080956

You only have to go down to about tenth position for it to be times that would be within the speed limit ± 10%

That's the trouble with any recording instrument, it is never the true speed, but a recording of it which is only as good as the instrument you are recording with.

Sensationalist tabloid article - a shame as I expect better from the Times. Whilst I wouldn't necessarily accuse the article of being one sided (interviewed @veloviewer for some balance), it did fail to mention some important points. Some of the following were briefly alluded to, some ignored: 1) it is not illegal in the UK for a bicycle to break a speed limit - they apply in law only to motor vehicles (although there are offences peculiar to bicycles which MAY be committed in specific circumstances). 2) There are a lot of cheats on Strava who record times in a car or motorbike / scooter, maybe even an ebike and so an AVERAGE segment speed of 41 mph is highly unlikely to be a genuine one. 3) As @VeloViewer tried to point out, even if that rider wasn't cheating it is very unlikely to be an accurate representation of his ride for technical reasons relating to GPS and strava's algorithms, more like 31mph. 4) It's clearly not in the spirit of Strava to create time trial segments on crowded and dangerous city centre streets - hence "King of the MOUNTAIN", but the onus for creating safe sensible segments lies with users and the terms and conditions of Strava, which every user agrees to, places responsibility for safety firmly with the user. 5) Cycling club time trials, where every second counts, and indeed many categorised cycling races (actual official RACES) are held on public roads open to traffic because of outdated laws relating to bicycle racing (you'll never find it hard to locate a close roads running event going on somewhere in the UK!) - its a shame the article didn't call for more opportunity for safe closed road events on a larger scale. 6) Strava does allow for reporting of segments considered as dangerous. To summarise my position - it's down to an individual user to create segments safely, for example, not ones that end just the other side of a traffic light controlled junction or that feature roundabouts etc. Segments should really be all about climbing - certainly the only ones I care very much about involve upward gradients. If you're riding a segment to try and move up the board or take a KOM and it goes through a set of lights, then if you get green - happy days, if you don't - bad luck, try another day! It's not worth risking your safey and that of others for an electronic honour only you and maybe 3 or 4 other people at the top of the leader board care about at all!

The KOMs on the vast majority of sections is under the speed limit. It's also massively time dependant. Many roads are empty out of rush hour of over Christmas. Set a couple of KOMs I can't hope to match when there is traffic on the road or people using crossings. I did nothing illegal at the time. People are responsible for their own behaviour on the roads.

Short segments in the middle of cities are not the kind of thing strava was aiming at really, I am sure most folk are interested in a proper decent hill climb challenge or long rolling sections rather than gimmicky londoncentric commuter sprints.

Strava is dead and buried. It was a good idea to start with but now all it does is ruin a good ride. Had to flag a segment today that went through a small village with a narrow main street, primary school and max speed limit of 20mph. KOM (that's a joke for a start) was just under 29mph. If the cops wanted to up their weekly stats they could just go through segments like this and nick the top 10.

this is the thing. the people cannot get booked. you cannot speed on a bike in a legal sense. its comical and odd but the law is what it is.

also not everyone is garmined up some people ride and have a phone in their jersey logging it. they wouldnt know they were speeding.

Its slowing being killed off by people like the above commenter. (iamelectron)

There were around 10 segments around my local routes not long ago, but people keep flagging them for no reason, they are on decent roads and with no speed limits or dangerous sections....

If idiots keep flagging segments, with no way to have them unflagged, its killing the whole idea of Strava off.

But I do think anything in cites should be taken off.

The hint's in the name, KOM. No mountain = no point. Descending segments or "sprints" are just ego boosts that people set up for themselves. If you want to race, go and get your BC license and find a local crit, Strava is a great idea and I love the power analysis features they've added recently which are making software like Golden Cheetah almost redundant, but the people who feel the need to set up segments to make themselves feel better about their riding are just pathetic. No matter who you are, there's almost always going to be someone faster than you.

I personally haven't read the article mentioned (wouldn't chuck that paper on the fire!) but correct me if I'm wrong this is the paper a certain Top Gear presenter writes for?
The very TV programme where a car will race another mode of transport across a set distance in which 9/10 times the car wins! Are you telling me this sets a good example? and is done by driving within the speed limits?

Completely agree at the retarded 1m etc sprints in traffic which depends mainly on catching a good draft be it uphill or flat. Also lately there's been a mass of almost duplicate and quite small segments as no doubt more and more people begin to use it.

Personally there are a few segments around my area that are through traffic lights and flat. If a light changes for me and I'm going well I think "well there goes my chance". The same on a hill with light or junctions - if something slows me down I try another time.

I like going fast downhill and if I get a "KOM" doing it then so be it, but to take big risks at 50mph for the sake of that KOM is beyond me. Sure it probably encourages more risks if you are trying to beat a long downhill mixed with almost flats etc but it's no doubt safer than doing that in a race rendering whole article redundant.

The thing that narcs me slightly is the quote of 20,000 cyclists on the segment. You might not be competing for a segment, but because you ride through it you're logged on it. Probably only 5% of those on that segment were aiming to 'compete' or log something special.

I only check my times against climbs, though if I get a podium it makes me interested to see what the segment was. It's a good site to just log a ride though.

Interesting to see Liestrong took his profile down. Actually I don't care if he keeps it up, but I can understand he doesn't need the scrutiny right now.

So you're saying that doing 28 mph through a narrow village street that has a max speed of 20 mph is fine? And you're calling me an idiot? It was flagged because it was dangerous.

In what way is it dangerous? Is it not the idiots riding it which are the dangerous aspect?

Of course it is! In this case you've got mini Cavs competing for the fastest time on a road that has cars parked on either side and space for one car to either go up, or down the street and a traffic calming measure at either end, a primary school and a blind corner. It takes one person (a child?) or car door to open...it's dangerous.

So, the riders, rather than the segment. People need to stop being dicks, rather than segment needs flagging.

So iamelectron, I suppose you also agree that electric cars are dangerous to pedestrians?

iamelectron - seems legit concern. Sounds really busy, but then is it busy all the time?

Apparently I was travelling at 389.6km/h on a Regent's Park Segment this morning, and still failed to get the KOM.

Strange.

The ST needs to make it up it's mind (not illegal for riders to "speed" either but you knew that eh NI)

Horse shit like this makes my bloody boil, every day with or without Strava people try to beat other people in their group, their previous best times recorded in the old fashion way with a watch, this is not new, even now my mates goad me into going faster because up and down hill, for some its an essentially part riding, because some people don't like it tough, I don't these people averaging 10mph do I, I wish all the do-gooders would F**k off and let riders ride how they have ridden for years... before we had stuff like GPS.

I am not saying that its fine, but its not up to you to try and control every rider that might want to ride like that.

If there was a way to unflag segments, I wouldn't have a problem with people flagging them, but as soon as it gets flagged, thats it shut down for everyone. Even the one's who did stick to the "speed limits" which as you well know, DO NOT apply to cyclists

What a load of old balls.
Only div s chase KOMs on downhill sections and likewise those with any traffic furniture on them.
Those people are just plain idiots whether riding a bike, driving a car or walking down the street.
Same old typecasting of cyclists - bore off.

Exactly, let the naysayers naysay.

I like Strava. I live in the Texas and have lots of mates in the UK still and it's a great way of seeing what we are doing, how training's going etc. I think flagging segments could kill it though; I've definitely seen some flagged that I would in no way consider dangerous.

And not sure of its real relevance to this story, but the cannon with 'Come & Take It' that LA used for his profile picture is the Gonzales Flag; it's a common sign of Texas pride here. It's a good story of when the Mexicans tried to take one of their cannons back and were defeated by the Texas rebels. Could easily be taken out of context in this case if you didn't know your Texas history...

There are some insane speeds on some of the segments I do in and around Sydney Australia. I used to live in Switzerland and Strava made a lot more sense to me in the mountains than it does here. People have become a little obsessed with the whole KOM thing. As for fake times I have to laugh at some of the more obvious blunders where people forget to switch off the Garmin before they pack it into the car.

I like Strava and enjoy using it as a fitness tool. Use it sensibly and it's very valuable.

Interesting stuff I think the Sunday Times point was that Strava is directly responsible by encouraging this behaviour just like having cars that do a top speed over 30 mph directly encourages drivers to break speed limits. Or having pubs and supermarkets encourages drink driving. Nothing to do with individual decision and free will

The link sends me to a list of news headlines - have they pulled the story, is it because I haven't paid, or do they hate mobile phones?

That rules out pretty much all of the UK segments then. And Netherlands. And Belgium.

Don't be ridiculous. The issue is with dangerous segments - just because a segment is flat (or downhill) doesnt make it dangerous. Last I checked, I still needed to make an effort riding my bike on the flat and on most downhills, and therefore I can improve my times by being fitter, which is exactly what Strava is aiming at. |Not everyone trains solely for climbing.

As has been pointed out above, lots of people behaved like idiots on the road long before Strava came along. I doubt whether the number has been increased significantly, but the answer is not to ban Strava segments, it's to tackle the actual dangerous behaviour.

I'm sorry, but that statement is a load of old balls! Not all of us live in cities. There are loads of perfectly safe downhill sections around my way - good roads, visibility etc and with no schools and very little traffic.

I only use Strava these days to compete against myself, there are so many dubious stats on leader-boards to take it seriously.

I've put together an article explaining why the headline fuelling "41mph" statistic is actually a not quite so shocking 31mph once you remove those riders with GPS errors: http://veloviewer.com/blog/41mph-the-evidence-against-the-sunday-times-a...
When interviewed last Thursday I pointed out to them how unreliable these speeds can be on Strava (he actually asked how the top speed could be over 100mph on the segment they mention) but chose to ignore the advice. (Although at least they didn't use the 100mph+ speed for their headline!) I also pointed out to him at that time that it wasn't illegal to go faster than the speed limit on the bike to which he said he would get the legal people to look into it.
Also worth noting that The Sunday Times itself was a contributing factor for those of us wanting to turn the roads into racetracks: http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/ireland/article1111334.ece
@VeloViewer/Ben Lowe

They'd already made up their mind as to what they wanted to write. Nothing you said could really change that. In essence there is no story here.

Sadly for cyclists, this fuels even greater contempt from the 'ill-informed' motorists who read this.

DaveO
@SouthernOwl

I tried using Strava, but I gave up on it pretty quickly. For 2 basic reasons:

1) a bike GPS just isn't accurate enough to reliably record you across a short distance, especially when Strava only uses recorded GPS positions and doesn't interpolate to the start and finish of the actual segment. the segment in question (just 290m long) is a perfect example, as ben so excellently explains in his piece, but even on a long climb i know people who've ridden together and had times more than 10 seconds different.

2) anything that allows a large user base to create their own data invariably fills up with rubbish. Strava's not well moderated or peer reviewed, nor is it currently clever enough to weed out multiple segments on the same climb. so it gets increasingly difficult to get meaningful data back.

Thanks Ben, I've added a link to your piece into the main article too

Dave: thanks for linking to my article. You can always view your Strava data on my site which gives you far more options for analysis and comparisons between your own segment and ride data rather than just against other people along with better maps and pretty pictures (like this: http://veloviewer.com/segment/780395/athlete/306128 )! Here's my data http://veloviewer.com/athlete/306128 along with a list of all segments I've covered http://veloviewer.com/athlete/306128/segments to give you more of an idea about what it does.
The calculated relative power field is the most useful for me and is what I built the site for in the first place: which climbs should I be able to push myself harder on.

Has nobody else thought of the possibility that the writer of this article fancied himself as a bit of a sprint merchant and whilst blowing out of his arse, checked his results only to see he was miles down the leaderboard and then decided in a hissy fit that it wasn't down to him being too slow, but that everyone else was cheating/jumping reds etc.

Just a thought...

My issue with Strava is that my commute to work can vary between just over 5 miles to just under 7, despite taking the same route. Endomondo seems to be more consistent.

If there are obstacles it could be dangerous even at the speed limit.

However I would argue that it doesn't make sense to apply speed limits wholesale to cyclists where visibility or space is not an issue. The campaign for 20mph limits in cities quite rightly points to survivability stats in the event of a collision at 20mph v 30mph. The fact that cyclist + bike is about one tenth of the mass of even a small car + driver changes this calculation non-trivially.

[fixed tags]

Thanks, guess I'm a div then. I agree with you in principal however for long, technical descents, a Strava segment is very useful especially if you want to improve your descending (Believe me I need to). So I'm currently working a segment (that I didn't put up) which I privately chopped up into smaller parts to see where I need to improve. I won't get near the KOM as it was set in a UCI pro-conti race and because the fastest part passes very close to a house so I always back off (I hope you approve). Just an example.

A small problem with Strava I think is that the flagging procedure is a wee bit confusing. I accidentally flagged a perfectly legit segment when I thought I was flagging a suspect ride.