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I've been annoyed to find equestrians ranking on cycling leaderboards because MTB was the closest category. So there's one reason for inclusion.
It potentially would mark a departure into new territory... as far as I can tell, all sports listed so far are solely human sports, I haven't seen any human/animal sports. There are others contending for the addition of human/canine sports currently, and they have some compelling arguments.
I have mixed feelings about the potential ramifications of adding the human/animal sports because it kind of changes the scope of performance data that the app handles, and broadens the focus of what it means "to strava". Does that then open the door to animal-only sports?
I'm not against it, I'm just looking for more discussion and data regarding how equestians are using strava, etc.
I agree, it's interesting (for strava) to figure out where they draw the line. E-bike horsepower - yes; horse horsepower - no; windsurfer wind power and surfing wave power -yes; "sailing" windpower - no.
Adding the e-bike option removes the "pollution" of the cycle feed with assisted rides. As you say, Eric, one benefit is to make the most popular sports a clean feed.
I have previously suggested an "other" category for activities that people want to keep but that don't fit another category.
On reflection, an "other" category seems like a step that would help a lot of people who's chosen activity isn't included; so I've created a post about this to see if it gets kudos; although not sure how kudos works on this bit of strava...
I ride a race bike, mountain bike and my horse. Also like a walk in the woods. I like the argument of pollution because I now abuse ‘Hiking’. Looking at current expansion of the sport spectrum on Strava, I cannot understand objections. My criterion would be: all sports that create a trail, interesting for others to follow.
As I see it, there are two obvious groupings of equestrian disciplines here:
cross-country
field and arena
Cross-country
This covers cross-country (the discipline),point-to-point racing (steeplechase) and hunting.
They generate interesting trails. Regular hunt and hacking routes would be valuable to the community. Point-to-point segments would be appropriate for KoMs.
Cross-country and Point-to-point have defined courses and waypoints (jumps). Point-to-point commonly has two laps.
Hacking (or pleasure riding) is a casual sub-type of this, akin to a "workout run".
Field and Arena
This covers polo, polo-crosse, horse-ball and show-jumping.
Polo is outdoor and intensely physical though does not produce useful trails. It's similar to soccer in that regard.
This is the activity tracking that I'd (personally) be most interested in and I have a number of activities (all activities on my profile with gear 'Polo Pony') to provide sample data.
Polo-crosse, horse-ball and arena polo are closely related but more likely to be indoor.
Show-jumping is timed with waypoints (jumps) and no laps, but probably produces segments which are far too short to make useful routes - and even so those routes are temporary.
Would be interesting to see if sports watches can infer equestrian cadence / stride and gait when attached to the saddle. Again we'd have multiple CandenceStreams.
Gear vs Athlete for Horses
Gear works well enough for recording each horse that has been ridden but the idea of "gear" having a heart rate would require some API changes.
If you have a second data collector attached to tack would it make more sense to create a separate athlete profile for a horse? (The same idea has probably occurred so canine sportspeople.)
It'd be amusing to show "Gnomeza rode with Poppy the pony" as auto-linked activities.
Please please please add equestrian/horse riding to the options! There are millions riders around the world and yet you have nothing!!! Please add us in, our sport is just as important as all the others you have listed!
Strava only needs ask the community and we could provide plenty of HR, calorie, GPS, and other data to show that regardless of the involvement of the horse, we are working hard in the saddle. To ignore one of the oldest sports in human history is ludicrous to me. Several disciplines are represented in the Olympics, and there have been studies to show that we use as many muscle groups as swimmers and skiers.
I wanted to know if it was possible to add the "horse riding" category to the choice of activities. This would be really pleasant and beneficial for many riders who use Strava. Indeed, the existing categories are not in line with this sporting practice. This would attract new people to the application and make life easier for many riders!
Thank you in advance for the time you will give to my idea.
