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Insider Journal

Get inspired or learn something new by reading blogs on a range of topics written by our expert team members, including product tips, how-to’s, news and personal stories.

  • 79 Topics
  • 274 Replies
79 Topics
L
LouBStrava Alumni
published in Insider Journal
Exciting News! Strava Acquires Outdoor Adventure Platform, FATMAP

Some exciting news for Strava users everywhere. Today, Strava announced the acquisition of FATMAP, a mobile app for discovering, planning, navigating and memorializing outdoor adventures using 3D mapping technology. In the near future, Strava users can expect a new mapping experience upon completion of FATMAP’s proprietary 3D mapping technology being integrated into the platform. What does this mean? In the coming months, there will be more tools at your fingertips to holistically discover and plan an outdoor experience with curated local guides, points of interest and safety information. Designed specifically for trails and exploring the outdoor world, FATMAP’s technology helps you to safely discover, navigate and share adventures, even without a mobile connection. The combination of FATMAP’s 3D mapping technology with our data set of activities will make it easier to design routes whether you’re moving on the slopes, in the trails, city streets or neighborhoods.Your experience on

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J
12 days ago
-Charles-
Strava
-Charles-Strava
published in Insider Journal
Strava Live Segments on Rouvy

Strava is proud to announce that our Live Segments can now be ridden in the virtual world on Rouvy! This exciting new feature marks the first time that Strava Live Segments have been available for athletes recording a virtual activity. Find a supported route on Rouvy with Live Segments to compete against the King or Queen of the Mountain (KOM or QOM) or your Personal Record (PR) if you’ve ridden the segment in the past. While previously the changing of seasons meant that competing on Live Segments would need to cease until the return of warmer weather, the inclusion of Strava Live Segments on Rouvy means that your training and competition can continue all year long.   What is Rouvy? Rouvy is an indoor riding app which allows athletes to ride virtually on real world routes through the power of augmented reality and 3D avatars. Learn more about Rouvy on their website at https://rouvy.com/. What are Strava Live Segments? Live Segments give athletes the ability to compete on Strava se

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A
16 days ago
Geode
Strava
GeodeStrava
published in Insider Journal
Account Access Series, Part 1: Log In

Hello! My name is Geode and I am a member of Strava’s Community Management team specializing in account access inquiries. So, let me just say it… Login and account issues are frustrating! But, I have tools and I am here to help. Let’s work together to resolve the issue you are experiencing and get you back into your account. Start with Step 1 below to diagnose the issue you are experiencing. Then go to Step 2, the recommended section to troubleshoot the diagnosed issue. Most likely all the information needed to resolve the issue you are experiencing is included in this article. Let’s get started! 01Diagnose We first need to correctly identify the root cause of the issue you are experiencing. Below are the most common log in, email, and password issue descriptions I hear from athletes. Based on the description, I usually know which direction we need to go to resolve the issue. This does not always seem like a direct path to the athlete I am working with, but trust me as we navigate this

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A
22 days ago
Mason
Community Manager
MasonCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Recording indoor activities

 Weightlifting +   HIIT + Strength Training + Stationary Bike +  Pilates + Yoga +  Rebound +  Rowing + VR Fitness +  CrossFit + Circuit Training +   Rock Climbing + Stair Climber + Jump Rope +  Kickboxing +   Online Programs + Obstacle Fitness +   Zumba + Treadmill     As you can see from the list above, there’s a wide variety of ways to get active indoors. Chances are you’ve tried one of these out, but did you record it? If not, why?  In this blog, we'll teach you how to use devices you likely already own (your smartwatch or mobile phone) to record indoor workouts. We'll walk you through how to upload these activities to Strava so that you can benefit from tracking trends and progress over time.   I don’t have a fancy device to record indoor workoutsYou don’t need an expensive fitness device to record your indoor

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IanDK
1 month ago
Frank11
Strava
Frank11Strava
published in Insider Journal
Running Best Efforts - Keep Aiming Higher!

Best Efforts are a cool way to track your progress and they allow you to see which portion of an activity was the fastest at certain distances. Best Efforts tracks your top three all-time efforts and top five annual efforts at each distance, as well as your fastest efforts from each run. Follow your progress at benchmark running distances from 400 meters to 50k with Best Efforts.  How to access the feature:Mobile: Visit your profile page on the mobile app and scroll down to “Best Efforts”: Here you will find your top efforts for the distances that you have completed. At the top, toggle between distances to view the Best Efforts. You can tap into “View Analysis” to see more details on your progress at the given distance. You can also find your Best Efforts on an activity by going to the "My Results" page of an activity: Website: On your web profile page, look for "my stats" on the right side of the page, select the "run" icon, and you'll see your Bes

452
IanDK
1 month ago
Jane
Community Manager
JaneCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Understanding Your Fitness Score on Strava

At Strava, our mission is to help people live their best active life. For many of us, one of the goals of being active is to maintain or increase fitness. In this article, we'll talk about your Strava Fitness score (available to Strava Subscribers), how we calculate it, and how it can help you analyze your progress. How to view your Fitness Score: Mobile App: You>Progress>Scroll down  You'll be able to view your Fitness score graph over a number of different timeframes and see how your score has increased or decreased over that time period. In the example above, we're looking at fitness over 6 months and we can see it's increased by 2% over that time period. Web: Training>Fitness & Freshness A couple of things to note about viewing fitness on the Web.  You'll notice the web view shows a change of -7 in fitness. This value differs from the value you see on Mobile, because the Web view value is derived from fitness changes over the last 7 days. The Web

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Jan_Mantau
Superuser
1 month ago
phil11
Strava
phil11Strava
published in Insider Journal
Backcountry Snowboarding (or Skiing!) With a Furry Friend

Greetings! What do backcountry snowboarding and dog ownership have in common you might ask? Both have grown increasingly popular in recent years! I’m here to share some tips for maximizing safety and stoke when venturing into the backcountry with your pup.First, meet Lily! My beloved 5-year-old husky/shepherd mix who loves nothing more than a good romp through the snow. Cold Weather and Long Days  Lily’s athletic build and thick fur coat make her well-suited for snowy backcountry adventures. It’s important to make sure that your dog is able to handle cold weather and long days of strenuous exercise. Shorter-haired breeds can benefit from a doggie jacket to help them stay warm in the snow.  Train, train, train! This is arguably the most important piece of advice, but it’s imperative that you’ve developed a strong bond with your dog through consistent training. Training your dog to obey voice commands and stay away from the edges of skis/snowboards is crucial to ensuring a sa

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S
2 months ago
Ariel
Strava
ArielStrava
published in Insider Journal
Football is more than “just” a game

If you are a football/soccer player or enthusiast, you may find this article interesting. Do not worry if you are not an expert in football, I still miss a few offsides when the referee blows his whistle; or, mix-up some professional players' positions but, as with most things in life, it only takes a little bit of passion to get you somewhere— and, if a person is determined enough, those times spent on street matches with careless abandon for any rule may have been the first crucial step to develop the skills they need to get hired by the best football clubs in the world. Given a few more years of hard training and experience, they could be on their way to winning their first Ballon d’Or. The funny thing about football is that you do not really need a very high budget to play it —where I am from, kids learn how to play it in plazas, rules are secondary, and being the top scorer is what matters the most. Nevertheless, over time they learn that one of the most important elements in foot

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H
3 months ago
Scout
Community Manager
ScoutCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Strava Messaging is Here!

Want to send a message to a friend on Strava? Maybe have a group conversation? How about sharing an Activity and/or Route? Now you can! SENDING A MESSAGE: You can message a friends or create a group message for you and other members. Messages can be sent to Strava athletes who follow you but you may not be able to message another athlete depending on their privacy controls.-Tap the Message button on the profile of the athlete you wish to message -Tap the speech bubble icon from the Home and Groups tab. Tap the pencil icon in the upper right to choose from a list of athletes that follow you. VIEWING MESSAGES:To access messages and invitations you’ve received, click the speech bubble icon found on the Home and Groups tabs in the Strava mobile app.Note: Messaging is available via the mobile app; it is not presently available on the Strava website.SETTINGS:  You can control certain aspects of individual chats by opening the chat &

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ActivityFix
Superuser
3 months ago
Jane
Community Manager
JaneCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Why We Love E-bikes on Strava

Hello Everyone. I’m Jane, I work at Strava, and I love e-bikes!  Today we’re going to talk about why e-bikes are so great, the best way to use Strava with an e-bike, and lastly, chat with Mona and Erika, both Strava employees and e-bike enthusiasts. Before we jump into any of that - let’s talk statistics. According to statista.com, the global e-bike  market in 2021 was worth more than $26 billion and is forecasted to roughly double by 2027. E-bikes are becoming increasingly popular worldwide.  We’re also noticing that more Strava members are using e-bikes. The share of cyclists on Strava with an e-bike ride increased 26% in 2022 compared to 2021.  Europe in particular, is embracing e-bikes. So what’s the big deal? Well, e-bikes have a number of benefits.  Benefits of E-bikes: *Convenient Commuting The pedal assist and increased speed makes e-bikes an excellent option for commuting or just helping you get outside to move y

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P
3 months ago
Scout
Community Manager
ScoutCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
The Ultimate Guide to Strava Beacon

Want to let your loved one know where you are when you go out for a solo activity? Exploring a new route and don’t want friends or family to worry? If so, check out Strava Beacon...our live location sharing feature available to everyone. Beacon was built to give athletes more control over their own safety, and to keep them connected to their community when they need it most. You don't have a subscription? No worries, Beacon is available to all when you share using the Strava app on your phone.  You can select up to 3 contacts keep track of where you are, in real time. Your location should update about every 15 seconds, depending on cell service. Your friend doesn't use Strava? Not a problem; the person following you does not have to have Strava on their phone to follow you. As long as the recipient of your text message has access to a web browser they will be able to see your activity. Please note that Beacon sharing from connected devices including Apple Watch and

3955
A
3 months ago
Jane
Community Manager
JaneCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Strava's New Integration with SoulCycle

If you ride with SoulCycle, your Strava journey just got more complete. Now you can now sync SoulCycle rides to Strava and connect your entire active life. As a part of this integration, we are also teaming up with SoulCycle to offer discounted walk-in studio rides on Mondays if you show proof of an upcoming event, now through November 3. Visit this link for more information and terms on Marathon Mondays Don't forget to join the SoulCycle community to stay in the loop on their official Strava Club  For more information on how to connect and more details about this integration, please visit our Knowledge Base article: SoulCycle and Strava  Now every time you hit the studio, you'll be able to relive it on Strava. Questions? Drop us a reply below and we'll be happy to help out.

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Jane
Community Manager
4 months ago
Scout
Community Manager
ScoutCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Strava's new integration with F45

We are happy to announce a new integration that allows F45 members to connect their Lionheart devices to their Strava account via the F45 Training app.  F45 Training is a global fitness and lifestyle community that brings you a complete wellness solution from functional training and HIIT, to nutrition, challenges and accountability. Workouts will automatically upload to Strava, displaying class type and location. Paired with Lionheart, members can track F45 points. Synced activities will include a photo that can be grouped with other athletes who attend the same class as you if they have also set up their app and enabled Group Activities Privacy Controls. Read more about how to set up the new F45 integration here and check out the F45 Training Strava Club to connect with others. And learn how to get a free F45 class here!

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S
4 months ago
clyde
Strava
clydeStrava
published in Insider Journal
Discover Recover

Howdy! I’m Clyde and I work on the Community Management team at Strava. I’m also a runner, and like most runners, I have been injured. I’ve always been excited to see more injury and recovery-related features on Strava so when Strava acquired Recover Athletics, I was thrilled I was able to be part of the Community Management team working with Recover. So what's Recover? If you don’t know, Recover is an app meant to help you reduce the risk of injury via personalized routines based on your activity data and an in-app soreness tracker. It provides athletes with warm-ups, drills, general strength routines, lots of prehab activities, and post-activity recovery routines. As hard as I fight it, I continue to grow older and I’ve learned (the hard way) that I need to take better care of my body. I have had to manage a few injuries that require consistent care and this app has helped me keep those injuries at bay through a series of mobility and strength routines and post-activity reminders. T

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theplugin
4 months ago
Jane
Community Manager
JaneCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Fitness for Parents of Young Kids - Top Tips

Any parent will tell you that life changes when you have kids. Exhilaration, joy, exhaustion and increased stress are just some of the experiences reported by parents of young children.   Life can go from ordered and structured to seeming unpredictable and out of control. Many parents report feeling low on both time and energy - two things generally needed for a fitness routine. How then, is it possible to build or maintain fitness while parenting a young child?   We recently caught up with Stephen and Stephanie at their home in Colorado. Stephen works full time for Strava and Stephanie is a mental health therapist working in both private practice and hospital settings. Both are avid Athletes who love the outdoors, and are the parents of one year old Willa. They agreed to share their experience and their tips around staying active and fit when you have a young family. Can you tell us a little bit about your Athletic lives before becoming parents? Stephen: We both ran 5-7 day

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W
4 months ago
Jane
Community Manager
JaneCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Getting Started with Strava: Importing Historical Activities

New to Strava?  Welcome!  Our mission is to help people live their best active life. Our Getting Started with Strava series is designed to help you get the most of your Strava membership and Subscription. If you've been tracking activities using another App or platform, read on - in this article, we'll provide some tips for importing your historical activity data into your Strava account.   The first step is to determine if your activities are located on a platform that you can connect directly to Strava.  If they are, some of these integrations are designed so that at least a portion of your previous activities will sync automatically.  Some examples of these are Garmin and Apple Health.  Visit this link for the complete list of available integrations.    If you still have un-synced historical activities after setting up any available integrations, the second step is to see if you can get your activity files in one of

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Scout
Community Manager
4 months ago
-Charles-
Strava
-Charles-Strava
published in Insider Journal
How Do Your Profile and Activities Appear When Logged Out?

Listen up! This one’s important. Well, all of our privacy tips are important, but this one applies to anyone who uses Strava, no matter what you’re here for. Yep, we’re talking about how your Profile and Activities show up (or don’t) on the internet to logged out viewers. Read on to find out what shows up by default, what options you have, and what someone sees when they view your profile or activities without a Strava account. Profile Page Like many other apps, Strava allows you to share your Profile information with people even if they don’t have a Strava account, or if they are logged out. We allow this but we don’t require it. You can use your Privacy Controls to choose the option that suits you. Public profile: If you have Profile Visibility set to “Everyone,” your Profile page will appear in search engine results—even to someone logged out or without a Strava account. Please note, this is the default setting for Strava users unless you’re under 18. To see your full profile, the v

1932
-Charles-
Strava
4 months ago
Scout
Community Manager
ScoutCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Strava's new integration with Ladder

We are happy to announce a new integration that allows Ladder app members to connect to their Strava account via the Ladder app. Currently, this app is only available on iOS and not Android. Ladder gives you a strength training plan that fits into your schedule, every single day. And now you can automatically send your Ladder strength workouts to Strava, combining your running, cycling, and hiking data with your strength training data. Read more about how to set up the new Ladder integration here. FAQs: Do I need to change my activity type? All activities will be uploaded to Strava as the "weight training" activity type.  Can I use the Ladder app on Android? The Ladder app can be used on an iPhone or with an Apple Watch, not Android.  Can I record my heart rate during my activity? For your heart rate to be recorded, the Ladder app must be installed and opened while recording your activity on your Apple Watch.  What dictates the stats shown on the image sent from Lad

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Scout
Community Manager
5 months ago
Bryant
Community Manager
BryantCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Getting Started with Strava: Achievements

New to Strava? Welcome! Our mission is to help people live their best active life. Our Getting Started with Strava series is designed to help you get the most of Strava. In this article, we'll talk about achievements.  Competing with others on Strava through achievements can be a fun and motivating experience. If you prefer focusing solely on your own progress, achievements can also be utilized for personal goals. When you upload an activity with GPS data to Strava as a subscriber, you may be awarded “achievements” for outstanding performances. They include KOMs/QOMs/CRs, Overall Top 10 Leaderboard Placement, Personal Top 3 Placement, and Local Legend. Crowns are awarded to the fastest athlete to date on a segment’s overall leaderboard. A trophy is awarded when you place near the top of an overall segment leaderboard. Trophies exist for 2nd place to 10th place all-time efforts.    Medals are awarded for your best personal performances on a segment. If you clock

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D
5 months ago
Jane
Community Manager
JaneCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Fitness & Pregnancy - Strava Employees share their experiences

Nausea, fatigue, moodiness, these are just a few of the physical signs that come with pregnancy. Trying to maintain your fitness routine while pregnant can be quite challenging. With a number of colleagues at Strava who have experienced pregnancy, we took a poll to find out their experiences. Here’s what we found:        We also asked employees to share their best tips on fitness and pregnancy. Here's what they had to say:                       Can you relate? We would love to hear your experiences and tips! Drop us a reply below. Postpartum? Check out this post about how one mom incorporated running after giving birth. 

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Jane
Community Manager
5 months ago
Jane
Community Manager
JaneCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Getting Started with Strava: Tracking Performance

New to Strava? Welcome! Our mission is to help people live their best active life. Our Getting Started with Strava series is designed to help you get the most of Strava. In this article, we'll talk about tracking performance. Strava provides a variety of features to track your performance against yourself and others. Whether you’re interested in tracking distance, time, speed, or other data points, we provide numerous tools and features to help. This article isn’t intended to be a comprehensive description of all our tracking tools; today I’m going to talk about my 3 favorites: segments, goals and relative effort.   Segments Segments are available for GPS based activities and define a portion of a route – such as a climb, or a section of a trail or road Each time you complete a segment, your time is recorded and your speed is calculated. If you're recording heart rate and/or power meter data, we’ll also show your average heart rate and power output With a Strava subscription, you

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Jane
Community Manager
6 months ago
SkippyVasquez
Community Manager
SkippyVasquezCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Riding Best Efforts

If you haven’t heard, Best Efforts are now available for your Ride activities. Best Efforts compiles a Strava user’s top all-time performances and their top five performances per year in each category except power, where it shows your power curve. This new feature is available on both web and mobile. Performances are tracked automatically with GPS and power data from your cycling activities. A power meter is required to collect power data. Virtual rides are not included in Best Efforts except for power data. What to Know: Riding Best Efforts will track four categories. Longest ride: Tracks longest rides by distance. Elevation: Tracks performance in two elevation categories: Biggest Climb - vertical gain on individual climbs, and Elevation Gain - vertical gain from the entire ride. Distance: Tracks fastest performances at 5 miles, 10k, 10 miles, 20k, 30k, 40k, 50k, 80k, 50 miles, 90k, 100k, 100 miles and 180k Power: Tracks top performances for average power over 5 s

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Jan_Mantau
Superuser
6 months ago
Jane
Community Manager
JaneCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Commonly asked questions about Apple Watch integration

Strava integrates with a wide range of devices and platforms.  Today we're going to talk about the Strava/Apple Watch integration and share some commonly asked questions. You can record and upload activities from your Apple Watch to Strava one of two ways: using the Strava watch app or the native Apple Fitness app.  With the Strava watch app, activities are synced directly to the Strava mobile app on your phone. Using Apple Fitness, activities are stored in Apple Health and synced to Strava once a connection between the two apps has been established.  3rd party activities (from Zwift, for example) uploaded to Strava can be synced to Apple Health, however 3rd party activities synced to Apple Health will not be available for import to Strava.  If you are using the Strava watch app and have a Strava subscription, you will have access to Beacon functionality, which when enabled will automatically send a text to your chosen safety contact during your activity. Frequentl

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L
7 months ago
Marc_
Strava
Marc_Strava
published in Insider Journal
Introducing Strava Routes on Polar Devices

Polar is officially joining the crew of partners that will now be able to sync Strava Routes to their devices! Athletes with a Strava Subscription can sync their Strava Routes to the following Polar watches: Grit X Grit X Pro Grit X2 Pro Pacer Pro Vantage V Vantage V2 Vantage V3 V650 V800 The unique thing with Routes on your Polar watch is that it allows you to follow a route in multiple directions (forward and reverse) and even start your route part-way through in both directions.  This allows for more flexibility in how you want to follow a route to best suit your needs.  If you have a Polar Vantage V3 or a Grit X2 Pro you can also download offline maps that will allow your device to also guide you to your Strava routes, or the nearest point if you start mid way through. You can read more about the offline map features here on Polar's website: https://support.polar.com/en/polar-maps For more information about how to sync your Routes to your P

250
Marc_
Strava
8 months ago
Jane
Community Manager
JaneCommunity Manager
published in Insider Journal
Strava's new integration with the Fi Smart Dog Collar

We're happy to announce Strava's integration with the Fi Smart Collar for dogs. The Fi collar uses GPS and the LTE-M network to remotely track your dog, and also tracks their sleep, activity and steps.  Find out more about the Fi Collar Fi automatically records your walks with your dog, and with our new integration these walks will be uploaded to Strava to share with your entire community. When your Fi walks are uploaded to Strava they will include a graphic featuring stats on steps taken, and how your dog ranks among other dogs on Fi. If you’ve been waiting to try out Fi, now’s the perfect time because Strava athletes can access a special offer of $20 off and up to 3 months free. Use the code “STRAVA20” and learn more about the smart collar here Find out how to integrate Fi with Strava To celebrate, we've polled Strava and Fi employees about the dogs in their lives.  If you like looking at pictures of dogs, sit back and enjoy.   Meet the Dogs:     &nb

1217
B
9 months ago

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