We know how fast you’ll run your next race 👀

This has been long awaited - it's great to hear that the race result prediction is finally available! 👍

Just a question: how is this prediction working with the *current* level of the athlete's fitness? The reason I ask - I’m currently getting back into running after 3 months out due to a surgery. And it seems that the prediction gives way too much weight to my results prior to that - and very little weight to my current (almost non-existent) fitness. So the numbers are flattering but I’m afraid not realistic.

(There’s also a comparison to predictions from 30 days ago - again, that's great in general, one can see a trend and that's very useful, but also this is giving too much weight to the past and not enough to the present.)

Maybe there should be more focus/weight on the last several weeks, time in HR zones in relation to specific pace, etc - to get a more accurate prediction for any point in time. 

Thanks so much for the thoughtful feedback, ​@Jana_S! The predictions give our assessment of the athlete’s current race potential based on their last 6 months of training. So in your case, it’s possible that your running before surgery is being reflected in the predictions more than you would expect. In the future we’re planning to make further improvements to the feature to more heavily weight more recent training. Hope this helps!

Is this available in the web app or just the mobile app? 

And, in general, it would be great if you could keep the apps in sync.  It’s a bit annoying to have to keep track of what functionality is available where.  

Thanks!

Thanks for the question, @TGolden! Unfortunately Performance Predictions is only available on Mobile. We don’t have plans to add to Web in the short term. We appreciate the feedback and have this feature in mind for web expansion in the future. 

This is actually an existing feature request that you can / might want to vote for: 

I loved this news! I always used Garmin's, because it was one of the only things that Strava didn't have yet! 😍
 

But I'm worried about the accuracy of the numbers shown.
 

Take as a reference the data of my account, where I have a personal record of Half Marathon with 1:41:49. But the predictions show that I would do my next half marathon with the time of 1:41:44 with the green highlight of 7 minutes and 36 seconds below my current Personal Record. It’s wrong.. should be only 5 seconds difference.

I still don't understand if the numbers are correct or if I'm misinterpreting the numbers shown. 😬

​@marcelmp my understanding is that it's comparing the prediction to where you were 30 days ago. In the other words, a month ago your predicted HM time would have been 1:49:20, and you have improved by 7:36 in those 30 days (which sounds like a really big difference within such a short period). 

​@marcelmp confirming that ​@Jana_S is correct here!

So, where can I find my predictions on the website? Everything I see mentions “Progress” on the “You” tab, and this only exists on mobile.

See 

Thanks, I missed that. So it looks like Strava has really abandoned the website, huh. There hasn’t been any new developments in years.

I don’t see the section under the progress tab in my app (I am a subscriber and have done the required number of runs). Do we need to update the app to see the section?

Hello ​@u003f - just a note that we have escalated your question to our Support team and they will be reaching out shortly over email. Thank you!

Can anyone else find this? I am on the web and dont see the Progress tab. I have searched and checked every section of my profile and nothing. I dont use the App. I’m a boomer and like the web where I can see a TON more data on one single screen without having to scroll or click as much.

How do I dislike this? There is only a like button. Why does strava hate the web so much? I am getting tired of paying for features that you dont include on the web. Do you know how big my computer screen is compared to my phone screen? I can see SO MUCH MORE data on the web vs my phone.

I’ll start by saying that I think this is a really cool feature! The predictions are not currently accurate for me, but I’m sure with more fine-tuning they’ll become better.

My comment is about if there is any way to remove this feature from my home progress page. It is discouraging to put in a solid week of training, then see that my 5k performance prediction just got 11s slower. I know that I’m putting in the work and it’s just a problem with the algorithm/ML, but it still sucks to work hard at something then have Strava tell you that it made you slower. 

I love the feature and would like to be able to access it, just not have to look at it every time I visit my profile.

Our new Performance Predictions feature gives runners a sneak peek at how fast we think you can go in the classic race distances: 5K, 10K, Half, and Full Marathon.

 

Strava’s Performance Prediction feature is powered by an ML model that leverages over 100 athlete data attributes, plus the performances of athletes with similar training histories, to estimate times that are personalized and realistic for every athlete.

The feature is currently only available to athletes with 20 run activities within a rolling 24 week window to ensure the model has high quality data to generate accurate predictions.

 

 

Subscribers: Head over to your Progress tab and scroll down to see the feature!

This feature is actrually accurate. I saw mine and the predicted race times are correct. Perhaps an extension to this should be downloadable training plans on how to reach there or maintain as an idea.

I am having the same problem… has it already been fixxed?

I just noticed this feature, the predictions do seem to line up quite well with my Garmin predictions. Cool.

How do we set the default distance displayed on the Progress tab? Currently it shows the 5K prediction, which I don’t care about because I’m training for a marathon. If it isn’t possible to change the default, please add this capability. It should be a really simple code change, and removing that one extra tap to get to the screen with all predictions will be a great improvement in user experience when there’s only one distance you really care about.

Can you say what ML model is used? Is there a related article for on Strava’s developer blog? I’d love to see how activity data is labeled and used for the prediction! 

The prediction of performance is an excellent idea in Strava. Would it be possible to add a historical curve of this prediction in order to see the progress made with training?

Can you please add the ability to disable the feature? The predictions are SO wrong and I often provide this feedback. I raced a 10k today, and the Race Prediction on that activity said 2 mins slower than my time.
I was a collegiate athlete and have been doing triathlons for 10 years. I know how I’m tracking and what my performance level is, and hate feeling gaslit by these inaccurate predictions. Also I track everything on Strava. It’s not missing any data.

A suggestion for the algorithm itself: factor in rest/taper as a positive, not a de-training factor.

I agree that this feature is completely useless and would prefer to have the option to remove. For example, I regularly run 5k under 22minutes yet Strava gives me a prediction of just under 25minutes… that’s a relatively easy run for me and given all the runs I do and log in Strava each week, the algorithm must be trying to get it wrong at this point..

The Strava Performance Predictions are completely useless. They are not even close. Since they first started posting it, it was been way off from what the Garmin Race Predictor shows. The Garmin times are pretty much right on while the Strava time are a joke. Since they’ve had several months it’s hard to believe they haven’t fixed their algorithm yet. Here is a good example. During my training for a marathon I ran a half marathon last month. Garmin predicted I could run it in 1:45:33, while Strava said 2:03:44. I knew I could easily break two hours without much effort. Even without putting in a 100% effort my time was 1:50:43. A couple of days later I looked at both site and Garmin had adjusted my time to 1:43:52, while Strava listed my predicted goal time at 1:53:37. Since I had just ran faster than that time a couple of days earlier I was shocked to see how far off it still was. Seeing all these comments here I know I’m not alone. 

The issue a lot of us are seeing here comes down to how these generic ML models handle variables. Strava’s prediction assumes a 'flat course' and 'neutral weather,' effectively giving you a track-equivalent time. That’s why you see predictions that are slower than your actual races if you run on fast courses, or faster if you train on hills.

I actually got so frustrated with this 'black box' guessing that I built my own tool, RunAnalytics (AItracker.run). Not shilling.

Unlike the standard Strava prediction, I built it to specifically account for course profiles (elevation) and weather adjustments. It also gives you confidence intervals rather than just a single arbitrary number, so you can see the 'range' of your potential performance. It syncs with your Strava data but applies these specific modifiers to give a number you can actually race with. Would love to hear if it’s more accurate for you guys than the default stats.