Getting rid of motorbike rides

At least you know how it feels for all the mtbers having to see all e bike times on our segments. Fair play to you though for using the proper e bike section, so many dont although maybe strava need to highlight the different sections more

Hi stclaus,

Thank you for your post.  Sorry to hear you are noticing vehicle data on Strava.  Flagging those activities is the first step, and thank you for doing that.  If an athlete isn't correcting their behavior after the community flags their activities, you have the option to report that Athlete to Strava Support so we can follow up.  We do ask you provide us with as much information as you can to help in our investigation.

There is a correlation between power and heart rate, and the two usually fit close to a line as described here: https://www.cyclinganalytics.com/blog/2013/06/heart-rate-vs-power-chart

It should be possible to detect rides done on e-bikes (If they've used a heart rate monitor)

Check this one: https://www.strava.com/segment_efforts/3000031675224289442

He's grabbed some KOMs with a heart rate of less than 100. That kind of performance should be easily detectable and exempted from segment calculations.

e-bikes are getting segment rankings everywhere. I live in a cycling hotspot (Bédoin Mont Ventoux) and the place is crawling with them. One very fat person just BLASTED by me on in the last 2k of Ventoux on Saturday. Like going 25mph up the mountain. 🙎

Hi @Animal - I agree with you - I've recently flagged people "riding" uphill at 40 mph with a HR of 95 who are clearly in a vehicle.  However, I also recently saw what I think to be genuine good performance with a HR of 113 - the issue was that the HR was a constant 113 for the whole Activity and I assume was a measurement problem.  I also see that quite a few "suspicious" Activities don't have a HR monitor (why bother if you're on an e-bike ?) or the athlete that hasn't entered a weight and hence no power estimates are available.

It's usually quite obvious where Activities need flagging - such as someone who "rode" over a beach at 3 mph for 20 mins, followed by a 5 min pause and then 60 mph on a highway or someone else who usually rides at 10 to 15 mph and then does a 20 min ride where the speed doesn't drop below 30mph, accompanied by an updated profile picture with their new motorbike !  However, there are still a few that I am suspicious of but don't feel confident enough to flag - such as someone who has done very few Activities and then gets a KOM at 30 mph on a Segment done by 2,000 others and nobody else has got above 25 mph (it seems improbable but not impossible).  Hence I think the auto-flagging algorithm could definitely be improved but there will always be a grey area of suspicion and doubt (and we should err on the side of believing the athlete and only flag things with strong evidence).

Hi Animal,

Thanks for your post!  We do have a system on Strava that detects and prevents many invalid efforts from appearing on segment leaderboards. We don't catch everything but we are always working on refining and improving this process.

If you see invalid times on segments, the first step is to use the activity flag tool.  If the Athlete doesn't correct their behavior after getting their activities flagged, you have the option to report that Athlete to Strava Support so we can follow up.

We had another Community Member start a conversation on this same general  topic here.  I'm merging your post into that one, so everyone interested in this subject can get together and discuss it in one place.

Thanks again for your contribution, we appreciate it!

I'm one of those who'd get wrongly flagged all the time if it was looking at HRM data, because apparently my body isn't sending a clear signal to sensors (I really need a device manufacturer to introduce "most plausible out of multiple HRM")

As a road cyclist my most common encounter with activities that should be flagged is mountainbikers who forgot to stop their tracker while driving home from the trailhead, so I believe that auto-flagging should focus on suggesting a "trim activity" fix.

I suspect that Strava is very reluctant with auto-flagging ideas because of false positives. But would that really have to be an issue? Don't make the process "this looks suspicious, let's delete!", make it a fix suggestion: "hey, this ride looks truly super-human! Has that really been your legs and nothing but your legs? If your answer is yes, awesome, please [confirm]. If it was a tracking mistake please take a minute to [trim start/end]" Bonus points if the trim UI gets an option to convert the trimmed part into another activity type.

For what it's worth, I had some experience with "auto-flagging".  I had taken my bike in my truck for a group ride 2 years ago.  When we finished my hands were so cold and wet I couldn't use fingerprint recognition to unlock my phone and stop the recording, so I let it run as I drove home and planned to fix it later.  After a few minutes I got a message from Strava to say my Activity had been flagged as it seemed I was in a vehicle (this seemed to happen when I got to about 50 mph).  It gave an option to trim the Activity, which I duly did when I got home, and the flag was removed.  This all seemed to work quite well, although it requires the athlete having the ability to crop Activities.  If this auto-flagging is still in use it's not clear why I still occasionally see obvious vehicle use at the top of leaderboards.

“After a few minutes I got a message from Strava to say my Activity had been flagged as it seemed I was in a vehicle (this seemed to happen when I got to about 50 mph).  It gave an option to trim the Activity, which I duly did when I got home, and the flag was removed. “ 

So it's already there, nice. Shouldn't be surprising that some activities still make it through that self-filter. I guess most of those must be from people who simply don't look at Strava from the performance angle in the same way the stereotype "kom hunter" does, we couldn't really fault them for that. That would be an unfavorable side effect of the platform's success.

Can a marker be set within software that detects when speeds are implausible with peddle power for incline? A number or sections on Emtb sections have leaders who have used motorbike not electric bikes yet these remain as KOM’s one such section is added below with the leader heading uphill for 1.29km and an incline of 8.4% at 51.9km/h and only 4th having any semblance of pedal power!

https://emea01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.strava.com%2Fsegments%2F33137207&data=05%7C01%7C%7C010cd48ab09342ed0a9308dadd316fdf%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C638065501632123175%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=JTl0TBbMmUeilJ%2FWH3%2BRRMhk2cDnvqG2FF5SsJsXLLQ%3D&reserved=0

I know, it's totally nuts.

I've not personally experienced it, but a friend has for a genuine ride.

It utterly baffles me that a genuine ride can get auto flagged, but not people going over 100km/h.

Having said that I agree with @usr above. Don't be scared of auto flagging people, most people I know would be chuffed to get a false positive. It is far more important to flag the fake rides, than worry users will get offended for being told they are speedy!

Hi Jane,

Writing this as a Strava paying subscriber.

Let's be honest: the system for auto-flagging is nearly inexistent. As Strava is built around network effects & QOM/KOM, it should be priority zero to deliver at least a working system.

As a developer myself, this is not rocket science. You should definitely do better, or just actually do something, in fact. Specifically as data quality is the core tenant for your business. I'm not even talking about the fact that this should have been done years ago. Relying on community to painfully flag activities all day does not make sense.

Best.

Exactly.

Why isn't Strava ashamed that their auto-flagging system is so ineffective. I've just had a KOM nicked by someone very clearly in a car. This should be resolved automatically and not waste my time having to manually check the "ride" and then manually flag it. Which I still can't even do on the app.

This system doesn't work either. One of the most popular segments in Europe (Longchamps in Paris) was set on a scooter and the rider simply said he did not - the record stands now for 8 years and cannot be flagged.

Why not add a motorcycle tag?

Or just make a Dirt Bike Sport Type and all is fixed.  If a dirt bike is riding the trail it means it is a trail with OHV axcess amd most likely funded by OHV Dollars that are letting bicycles and other myliti use on them so how else can a dirt bike record?  It can be a very intense sport with high Heart Rate and Muscle use.  Maybe Strava should get with the times and add it as a sport and BAM problem gone!

Bump

It baffles me that this situation has been going on for s long as it has with nothing really done about it.