Strava

Social fitness app for runners and cyclists to log activities, compare segments, and follow friends.

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Understanding Strava

Strava is the dominant social fitness platform for runners and cyclists, used by over 100 million athletes worldwide. It logs activities via GPS (phone or watch), enables social features (following friends, giving "kudos"), and provides performance analysis through segments, training logs, and fitness tracking.

Strava's killer feature is segments — user-defined stretches of road or trail where every athlete's time is ranked. Leaderboards for popular segments create mini-competitions within regular training routes, motivating efforts on familiar terrain. The segment system has made "Strava hunting" (running routes specifically to compete on segments) a subculture of its own.

Beyond social features, Strava offers training analysis: relative effort scores, fitness/freshness tracking, route planning, and integration with almost every GPS watch and cycling computer. The free tier covers basic logging and social features; Strava Summit (premium) adds advanced analytics, segment leaderboards, and training tools.

Key Facts: Strava

Key facts and insights about strava that every endurance athlete should know.

Over 100 million registered athletes in

Over 100 million registered athletes in 195 countries

Integrates with Garmin, COROS, Apple Wat

Integrates with Garmin, COROS, Apple Watch, Polar, and virtually every GPS device

"Kudos" is Strava's equivalent of a "lik

"Kudos" is Strava's equivalent of a "like" — social reinforcement for logging activities

Segments create ranked leaderboards on s

Segments create ranked leaderboards on specific stretches of road or trail

Pro Tips: Strava

Set your default activity privacy to "Followers Only" to avoid sharing your home location publicly

Use the "Hide Start/End" feature to obscure your home/work address on public activities

Join Strava clubs for local running groups — they're great for finding training partners

Don't let Strava pressure you into running every run hard — easy runs deserve kudos too

Frequently Asked Questions About Strava

The free tier covers basic activity logging, social features, and route viewing. Premium adds training load analysis, segment leaderboards, live tracking, and advanced metrics. If you're serious about training analysis, it's worth it. If you just want to log runs and socialize, free is fine.

Only if you make activities public and don't use privacy features. Strava offers: (1) private activities, (2) "Followers Only" visibility, (3) hiding start/end points within a radius of your choosing. Set these up before posting your first activity — the defaults may be too public for comfort.