[Closed] Strava times... Are they made up or am I that unfit ??

post up the segment?

theres ALWAYS someone faster

how do i post it up then ?

Conditions play a major part in it off road. Could have been bone dry and nicely worn in (or cleared or resurfaced) riding on fast rubber. CX bike maybe. Tailwind (in a gale) maybe. Just so many variables. MX bike maybe 🙂

theres ALWAYS someone faster

Mostly this is true though.

here it is ......

http://app.strava.com/activities/119380103/segments/2652830338

It should be the tentsmuir skills course.

Perhaps it was someone really good 😉

Im pretty sure you couldnt do it at that speed on a motorcross bike either due to the fallen trees etc

You managed a 5mph average on a flat route; were you walking?

Is it next to a normal walking track? IIRC some of the walking track in Tentsmuir would be pretty fast on a CX bike. If the track is close enough to the trail it can sometimes pick the segment up.

A friend was once praising my 'impressive' times on a trail in NZ, but it turns out it was me on the road next to it on my road bike (going at a not very impressive speed).

Tentsmuir is part of my commute ,maybe I was late for work that day 😉

[i]Oh hang on ,I don't have Strava[/i] 😆

I'm with stevious, looks like there are at least 2 fireroads or similar parallel and pretty close to what I'm assuming is a tricky MTB section (the skills course). Then 18mph is pretty slow for a 1 minute flat section, the guys at the top of the leaderboard should be ashamed!

In fact - being a nosy sod, looking at the leaders GPS track (click on his time for the segment which will take you to the gps track of his whole ride with the segment highlighted) he has indeed straight lined it on a fireroad or similar just to the coast side of the skills course! Your track is way more wiggly...

If you can be arsed you could do that for all the leaders and flag any that aren't on the proper track, you might jump a few positions and your time will look less bad!

I really wouldn't get worried about kom times, there are some pretty suspect or just weird ones, if the kom is like 20% faster than the second place on a popular segment then alarm bells ring in my head.

Given the amount of cut through lines in places like glentress that completely miss out corners, competing against anyone else but yourself or your mates is pretty pointless, you just don't know what people have ridden, and the combo of gps in trees and strava matching to segments just makes cheating or mistakes dead easy.

I did have to stop a few times to work out how to get through the flooded bits and also around fallen trees.

In fact having ridden exactly there a couple of years ago before I discovered Strava, there are a ton of parallel tracks with some nice twisty singletrack between (didn't realise there was a specific skills course though!). So it's probably one of the worst places for Strava times. So probably not cheating just close straight tracks accidentally recording as the skills course.

The floods and fallen trees presumably aren't there year round though - I'd guess you could get close to 12-15mph on the bits we rode one September after a dryish september if you were a decent racer and going for it. You have to go down to about 5th in the list of top times to get one nearly as wiggly as yours, and his pic makes him look like a fairly fast racer, so maybe 10-12mph is realistic without the trees/floods.

And as above, don't sweat it, there's almost always someone faster!

there are a ton of parallel tracks

I've had a really good Strava result for a tricky singletrack climb. Except that I was riding up the road next to it...

I find an engine helps, at least on some of the popular roadie segments.. 😉

In fact - being a nosy sod, looking at the leaders GPS track he has indeed straight lined it on a fireroad or similar just to the coast side of the skills course! If you can be arsed you could do that for all the leaders and flag any that aren't on the proper track, you might jump a few positions and your time will look less bad!

You could do, but you will always be fighting a loosing battle. Simple fact there will always be an error, and if two tracks are within a few metres you will be mis-attribution.

http://www.strava.com/segments/1394044

try and match that off road, through trees...

Probably just faster than you. 5.5mph is pretty slow unless it's a trials course! Someone more proficient than you will have ridden it on a jump bike, or an XC bike or whatever is the most suitable.

That and STRAVA is just showing you the fastest times, which will mostly be those random chances where the GPS signal 'started' at it's maximum error, finished at it's maximum error, and the sampling rate meant they gained another few seconds either end.

Quite easy to check, just click on the leader and look at the ride. It'll be obvious if they were on a Cx bike riding nearby, or sessioning that trail.

Oh hang on ,I don't have Strava

I don't have typhoid either, but if we were here listing stuff we don't have we'd be here a while, and it could get embarasing.

TBH if theres the possibility that someone wont be monitored/watched or tested he'll cheat. If you can prop all the farm gates open then storm down a section you are instantly ahead of everyone who slows, hops off, opens, shuts and back on. Imagine the speed you can crank out if all are opened for you...... (or by yourself at the crack of dawn).

Or you ride in a group and by chance descend through a string of open gates into Sadgill...

[url= http://www.digitalepo.com/ ]Why I never trust anyone else's times on Strava.[/url]

Realistically, the only purpose of Strava is to monitor your own progress, or compare one bike to another over the same segment.
Or you can use it to race against people you know, and trust not to cheat, if you must.
It's best to assume that anyone that you don't know who is faster than you has cheated.

I had a KOM on a popular descent in the Lakes for a short time, a touch over three minutes.

Now I wasn't hanging about, but the current leader is two minutes!

I might suspect foul play, apart from it's Adam Brayton.

I've had a really good Strava result for a tricky singletrack climb. Except that I was riding up the road next to it...

yep. there is a twisty ddescent this way that if you session and practice, when it's perfect conditions then you can get down to around 2 minutes. my mate who is super light whippetty whippet did it in 1:50.

A mate then smashed it with a time of 1:04 - turns out he was on the road!

the leader board is a mess. and almost useless.

How did he get an average like that then ??

I held a KOM for a section next to a railway line until someone 'rode' it faster with an average speed of 141kph!

How fast can roadies sprint? See this section [url= http://www.strava.com/segments/5176745 ]here[/url].

Can you hit 60 mph + on the flat if you steam in, peleton style? Only for 4 secs, mind, but doesn't seem possible.

That'll be GPS inaccuracy causing it to think it's covered a large amount of ground in a short time.

@Garry Lager, It is junk, sections that short always are. There is a sample rate from the GPS matched to the short section length and the result is crap.

I really do wish people would stop making segments under about 1min in length.

If you actually analyse the KoMs track he was doing 4.7mph...

strava? wot's that then? 😆

I really do wish people would stop making segments under about 1min in length.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=strava

iffoverload - Member

strava? wot's that then?

clubber - Member

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=strava

[url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony ]For clubber on behalf of iffoverload[/url]

Lost this one last week...

http://app.strava.com/segments/5969460

I'm suspicious especially since the data has just been uploaded from May 2011??

Have you looked at the ride the new KOM is taken from Haze?

http://app.strava.com/activities/118934807#2640591431

😀

Yep, reckon he was in a helicopter for the last bit...seems to have taken off from one of our local fields.

edit: thanks for flagging!

There's always someone faster, but Strava inaccuracies can also mount up, plus the parallel path issue, and changing conditions.

Near me, there's a Strava segment which has a parallel bike path; the fastest times are all clearly from the bike path. Last time I rode it, there were two trees down which obviously made a bit of a difference to my time 🙂

There's a short section in hamsterley forest called accelerator which takes about 30 - 40 seconds for the faster riders. It's been ridden 1000's of times on strava and the top times are all within a few seconds of each other with average speeds of about 20 - 24 mph.

However first place (before the ride was flagged) managed to ride it in 21 seconds with an average speed of 37mph, way faster than anyone else and oddly, way faster than his max speed for the segment of 20 mph.

Not sure how your average can be faster than your max and if thats a blatant case of digital EPO or just dodgy GPS data.

I know that on that section there are a lot of people faster than me, it was my first proper ride for about a year and a half and I didnt know the route at all.

Ive been back down there this morning and there is indeed a nice straight footpath/forestry road 3 metres to the left of the correct track.

would Strava be able to tell the difference and would that explain why my route was all windy and the KOM's route is arrow straight?

I held a KOM for a section next to a railway line until someone 'rode' it faster with an average speed of 141kph!

Flag it then, I do when I spot an inaccuracy like that, it's two clicks.

would Strava be able to tell the difference and would that explain why my route was all windy and the KOM's route is arrow straight?

No, yes.

Here's [url= http://www.strava.com/segments/1040060?filter=overall ]Accelerator at Hamsterley on Strava[/url]. I'm stunned at how consistent those top times are, given GPS inaccuracy, the treecover and the windiness of that trail.

I'm depressingly far down that leaderboard.

as above, no, yes.

There's a tricky, uphill tricky climb I was doing well on in woods outside Elgin. Turns out the new KOM had (inadvertently) simply pedalled up the road alongside to the end point, Strava was (within their remit) unable to tell the difference..

Not sure how your average can be faster than your max and if thats a blatant case of digital EPO or just dodgy GPS data.

simply the section is too short and the gps receiver sample rate. If you look a huge proportion of the faster times will probably be wrong.

I suspect that strava counts the number of samples and divides this and the time into the distance, rather than trying to calculate an average based on what each sample says.

would Strava be able to tell the difference and would that explain why my route was all windy and the KOM's route is arrow straight?

Some are definitely fake. Others... I looked at a segment on mine, man that KOM is stupendously fast, who set that? Greg Minaar.

I did a run the other day round a local resevoir. Only 4 miles. I did it at about avg 8.5 mph.

The top 3 or so guys did it avg 20-21 mph... thats running, not biking 😯

If you want to make yourself feel better, join the stwforumites thing on there and filter the segments to just show those results. Bang, I'm suddenly top 10! 😆

FunkyDunk, it's fairly easy to.make that mistake if you use a forerunner to log rides as it defaults to upload as a run. I was a running god briefly till I realised that!

If you want to make yourself feel better, join the stwforumites thing on there and filter the segments to just show those results. Bang, I'm suddenly top 10!

so I can compare myself against other old and fat people without paying for premier membership 😀

(i know there are some genuinely fast folks on here, just thought I'd wheel out the stereotype for comedy value)

that's not working so well. Just checked a few segments and I'm often the only STW-ite who's ridden it. Where I'm not, I seem to have gone from halfway down a very long leaderboard to the bottom of a very short one. There goes my chance of being a strava god 🙁

EDIT: the roadies in the club are fast, the mtb-ers not so much

Some strava time seem fake. On one of my local tracks some rider did 87kph on a tight twisty track with small berms and big jumps How the hell is that possible? I'm not the best rider but I've been riding that track for ages and I only have ever managed around 50kph and that is just about the fastest that seems fit for this small tight twisty DH track..

EDIT: the roadies in the club are fast, the mtb-ers not so much

when you say club? do you mean STW strava or your club????

For the former, take the leader-board with a pinch of salt it isn't a true reflection of fitness, I was only fourth last week on distance I just enjoy riding and consider myself as average fitness.

@akaskittles, is it a short track, 60secs or less? that is the answer, it is crap, gibberish, rubbish, however you want to put it. Strava does not work on short tracks, it also has issues with lots of twists , turns, corner cutting.

If you want to make yourself feel better, join the stwforumites thing on there and filter the segments to just show those results.

It was fun for a few minutes but I feel like I'm only cheating myself.

when you say club? do you mean STW strava or your club????

I meant STW strava. i looked at road segments and was last each time. I looked at off-road segments and wasn't last. I know I'm not fast in the wider world, was just interested to see the difference between comparing me to STW forumites on-road vs off-road

I can't believe there are more than 200 people in that Strava group! When only me and Aidan what I set it up!

Who's "Belgische Wafel"? Big miles!

If you want to make yourself feel better, join the stwforumites thing on there and filter the segments to just show those results.

I tend to only looking at off-road climbs as I do much better on those:

I'm 1/10 of STW forumites on the [url= http://www.strava.com/segments/1440617?filter=overall ]Transmission [b]climb[/b] at Hamsterley[/url], and [b]22/771[/b] overall.

On the [url= http://www.strava.com/segments/1152433?filter=overall ]Total Triple Tranny [b]descent[/b][/url] that follows it, I'm [b]1167/2136[/b] overall and 17/21 of the STW Forumites.

I know my strengths 🙂

Interestingly, on the [url= http://www.strava.com/segments/3363572?filter=overall ][b]combined climb and descent[/b][/url], I'm [b]57/964[/b] overall and 2/10 of the STW Forumites.

I lost one last summer on a twisty'ish climb that's I had at a smidge over 3 minutes and all the other riders in the top ten were within 40 seconds of that time, then along cane another rider (that I know of) and he promptly knocked nearly 40 seconds off it.

I'm not being an arse but there's no way he's nearly 25% faster than me up hill on that hill alone out of all the climb segments round here. Glaring gps/strava cock up.

I'm not being an arse but there's no way he's nearly 25% faster than me up hill on that hill alone out of all the climb segments round here. Glaring gps/strava cock up.

So flag it - they provide a very easy method to do so. GPS errors can't be helped, I've had erroneous rides come up.

I set some pb's at Glentress yesterday on the downs , quite pleased with myself but then had a look at the leader board , blimey charlie there are some quick riders out there ! cant imagine ever being anywhere near some of those times . No reason to doubt them when you see the names

I'm 1/10 of STW forumites on the Transmission climb at Hamsterley, and 22/771 overall.

On the Total Triple Tranny descent that follows it, I'm 1167/2136 overall and 17/21 of the STW Forumites.

Interestingly, on the combined climb and descent, I'm 57/964 overall and 2/10 of the STW Forumites.

interesting, 771 went up the hill, 2136 went down the hill, but... 964 went up and down the hill....

Interestingly, on the combined climb and descent, I'm 57/964 overall and 2/10 of the STW Forumites.

Interesting use of the word interestingly there.

I'm also endlessly fascinated with my own Strava stats, not quite so into the minutae of other peoples' though.

😉

interesting, 771 went up the hill, 2136 went down the hill, but... 964 went up and down the hill....

There's more than one approach to the top of the descent and more than one route back down again.

Interesting use of the word interestingly there.

🙂

Interesting in that that the climb performance makes up for the slowness of descent. Which confirms that climbing is [i]far[/i] more important than descending 😉

The combined climb / descend ones are usually a bit off as a lot of the time people will have a rest at the top, if you're in a group you might re-group whereas on your own you might just keep going and head straight into the descent.
Guess it depends if you're segment hunting during the ride or just riding and checking segments after.

The combined climb / descend ones are usually a bit off as a lot of the time people will have a rest at the top,

Slackers.

if you're in a group you might re-group

Losers.

whereas on your own you might just keep going and head straight into the descent.

Winner!

😉

I know the segment in tentsmuir and have gradually been increasing my speed on it. I got 13.1kmh and that's partly cos im on a ss and can't make it up a couple of the steep bits. How the leader has recorded the top speed is beyond me. I don't think there's a fast track parrallel all the way.

Before I signed up to Strava, I drove about 20 miles with my Garmin on to check the distance recorded s it was consistently reading 10% less than a mate's device.
Forgot that it was on there and uploaded all stored data to Strava when I signed up. Cue reports that this 'ride' may not have been pedal powered. The funny thing was I was driving back from a mate's house having been forr a ride and hadn't taken my HRM off, so there were sections where I was averaging 60mph with a heart rate of 65 or so.

Haven't used Strava so I may be missing some other great features, BUT these ridiculous competitive times seem to me a pointless distraction from what is essentially supposed to be a fun, non-competitive sport. When I'm riding I get much more pleasure from finding the most fun route, not the fastest although like anyone I love belting it downhill. Met a tit on a recent ride who kept droning on about his KOM time for some boring ascent. I was way slower but a) who cares and b) out all day on a long ride, not wasting my time practising one little section to get a fast time and post it on the flipping internet.

from what is essentially supposed to be a fun, non-competitive sport.

Sounds to me like you're the one writing rules about how people must choose to ride their bikes. MTBing is whatever people want it to be. For you and many it's about just having fun. For others it's about going as fast as they can. So long as they're not being idiots about it then I don't see the issue.

MTBing is whatever people want it to be.

^this^

Can't really argue with that.

hear hear

same argument as for that "why don't you try and get big air / do tail whips?" thread.

most reviews and all the marketing nonsense seem to suggest that getting from bottom to top to bottom fastest is the most important factor though, and that I'm wasting 10 seconds of the day adjusting my seatpost up/down, rather tham pressing a button.

[i]edit: grrr hate it when the pages changes like that.[/i]