10000000% could not have said this better myself. I haven’t been on Strava that long but I am already disappointed with the challenges portion of the app between the bogus winners who walked “34000km” in a month and the fact that walking counts towards running challenges? For the price per year I would expect a greater attention to detail.
Can running count for the swimming challenges?? Seems appropriate since walking is now running?
Couldn't agree more, totally ruined the challenges, and have removed the 200k and 300k badges from running, massive step backwards Strava
Agree I feel a subscription cancellation coming on
You can record your "walks" as runs if you wish and just skew your own data, this global change has removed that choice and now we all have to have skewed data, along with the removal of the 200k and 300k run badges, its a farce.
As a runner and a walker, I can’t understand why my walks should be included in my run challenges! They’re two completely separate activities. I dress completely different and the motivation needed for runs is completely different. I work hard for those run challenges, and would love to see longer distance walk challenges, but they’re two separate entities! Please separate them again.
I just posted the same before I figured out how this forum works. Completely agree. It makes zero sense. I walk and I run. They’re two different activities and I have very different goals for each. Most people have shoes and clothes for running and different gear for walking. Not the same activity! And those challenges motivate me. Not happy. I always thought they should have larger distance walking challenges (i walk a lot), but to combine walking and running makes absolutely no sense, and I’m purely a recreational runner!
Pleased to see so much support to get this absurd addition of walks to running challenges reversed. Remember to kudos the original idea at the top if you support returning the challenges to how they should be.
hi @srybarczyk this is so frustrating isn't it?! I posted about it w hile ago and there is growing support from others like us who run and walk separately (for obvious reasons.... walking is not running)
head over here and join the discussion: https://communityhub.strava.com/t5/strava-features-chat/remove-quot-walks-quot-from-running-challenges-and-expand/td-p/22939
It has been a month since I first commented on this thread. Glad to see so many others supporting this (vs the 6 people who wanted walks to be added to running challenges), but sad to see no official response! Why is the Strava team ignoring the needs of frequent runners? How does adding walks to running challenges or removing 200/300km challenges make the app more inclusive? I could barely run 50km a month when I started out, and these challenges were a motivation to get better. It is absurd to penalise those who can run that much for what is a mindless attempt at customer acquisition. By this logic, Olympics should be cancelled too for being too intimidating for regular people.
Please turn this off it’s ruining my running! The whole point of a running challenge is that is actually a challenge!
Same here, I do not like this and it confused me through January to my distances and elevation that I had run.
It’s an awful idea and in opinion is not working, it’s ruining My distance and elevation challenges…. Already failed the January 2000m elevation as I had no idea walking was now in the mix. Running is running.
I 100% agree with this! As someone who tracks their walks and runs separate why would i want them combining! I used to love the running challenges it really used to push me now i just achieve them easily with next to no effort because of them adding walking as an allowed effort. I can’t see why even if you are a slow paced runner that’s fine you are still a runner so track it as a run why track it as a walk anyway and ruin the strava running challenges. Im now not renewing my strava subscription and going to find a different app to use.
I wholeheartedly agree with this stance. As someone who was a non runner 4 years ago these challenges have been vital in building both my confidence and ability within the field of running. Now to have the accumulative and set distance running challenges cheapened with walking workouts makes me think what was the point.
I also hike and walk and track these all separately. I’m all up for inclusion but this just seems like madness. If someone’s walk felt like a run then they can log it as a run on Strava, no where on the challenges does it state a time limit so that does make it inclusive as clearly it’s all about finish lines not finish times. Everyone is in competition with themselves and Strava has clearly decided to ignore the wants of runners in favour of walkers. Such a shame, a change of app appears to be in order
Any word from Strava on this i.e. what is going to be done about it, if anything?
The change came in nearly 2 months' ago now.
It wasn't a bad idea to merge run and walk, but as an additional metric. I think it was ridiculous to do so and remove the individual activity data. I can't believe that on the world's largest fitness activity tracking app, where the most popular activity is running, you cannot see your monthly running stats! I can see how many hour's I've run, but not the total distance. There should be a thousand difference ways to look at that data for the user...
My paid subscription is due for renewal in the next few months so I’ve been checking out the stats on my Garmin Connect app. It’s linked to my watch which I use for all my runs and they’re actually pretty good. You can overlay things like heart rate, pace and cadence. You can see lap times, and a heat map showing faster/ slower sections on your route. You can also join a wide range of challenges including a ‘run 50 miles’ monthly challenge and guess what, your walks don’t count and ruin your running stats! You can also connect with your friends on Garmin Connect. Strava: you haven’t listened to your runners, so bye bye.
I asked Strava why they ignoring our voice and closing tickets without any explanations. They answered me that:
"As mentioned, we have made changes to our challenges recently. We are the support team and while we help with issues on the intended function of the application we cannot discuss the direction of the product. We welcome you to continue this discussion in our community hub. I apologize for the inconvenience this causes you."
I don't no is this is some kind of a joke or something? 😄
It's not a direction of the product, it's mistakenly hired people who completely don't understand what they are doing!!!
Any update on this? It looks like the March challenges are still only offering this new type of “running” challenge that includes walks but still no actual running challenge! Would it be so difficult to make this a “100K movement” challenge for the people who wanted the combined run/walk option and a separate “100K running” challenge for runners (who seem to comprise most of this app’s audience)? Please??
Absolutely agree. It’s totally ruined the main use of the app for me, which was to challenge myself and keep myself accountable with my running. It seems like Strava is making the challenges easier and easier which is ok for beginners but is completely ignoring and alienating its base audience of athletes! Why can’t there be “easy” challenges for beginners and then harder running challenges for people who already run? Why are beginners now the only ones who get to have fun with challenges?
@Jane11 @Scout - What the heck? I see you are continuing to completely ignore your users. Walks are included again for the March "running" challenges. Why do you bother to call them "running" challenges at this point anyway if you are going to include walking? You have defined walks as a different activity than runs, so they should not be combined for a challenged under the title of one specific activity. You had a whopping total of 6 (yes, six) people support the idea of adding walks to runs. You have had multiple times that number of separate threads (not to mention support of each thread) requesting you go back to separate challenges. Can you provide even a simple explanation as to why you are continuing this? You at least owe us that.
Someone else wrote this, and I can’t put it better myself:
“You have defined walks as a different activity than runs, so they should not be combined for a challenged under the title of one specific activity. You had a whopping total of 6 (yes, six) people support the idea of adding walks to runs. You have had multiple times that number of separate threads (not to mention support of each thread) requesting you go back to separate challenges. Can you provide even a simple explanation as to why you are continuing this?”
For context with the 6 people that wanted runs and walks merged, there are 3,200 in a group on Strava asking for it to be reversed.
it might be embarrassing for you, but the sooner you admit the mistake and correct it, the better
I am the same. I’ve started to pay more attention to Garmin than Strava. The irony for me is that I didn’t have a premium subscription before, but I am went for an annual one in December, they changed it so that you cannot track running!
I tried raising a feedback ticket, I was told I could go through my activities one by one in order to get a monthly total! What the **bleep**, why can’t the acitivity app I paid for do that for me!?
Absolutely never again am I going to pay for Strava again.
I also paid for Strava for the first time in December. If this doesn’t change, this will be the first and last annual subscription I buy. I run and I walk. I’m not a running snob, but for the love of God, I’d like to track my miles for each separately! I have different goals for each activity. Strava, it would be nice if you’d respond. But, in this culture where we can’t hurt feelings or have anyone feel “less” than the other, this makes sense. Walkers can pretend they’re runners, and I’ll “pretend” I’m an alpine skier and track running miles as alpine ski miles.
