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feature
World's most competitive Strava segmentsThere's a new fastest time up Box Hill — but what's the world's hardest Strava KOM to add to your collection?
It's been quite the week for Strava drama. First, Rory Townsend sharpened up for the Tour of Britain by smashing the previous fastest time up Box Hill, then just two days later a group of strong riders from Foran Cycling Team rocked up at the iconic Surrey climb, leading out Dom Jackson to a quite ridiculous 33.7km/h ascent and knocking another eight seconds off the KOM.
Sitting atop a leaderboard that includes the best of 1.39 million efforts by 128,000 riders, Jackson can probably make a decent case that he is the holder of the most competitive Strava KOM in the world, a 4:05 ascent that beats 2012 Olympic Games road race times, the fastest ascents of several editions of a WorldTour one-day race, and the best efforts of some of the globe's strongest bike riders. But is it the hardest KOM in the world to nab? Let's find out...
Box Hill, Surrey, United Kingdom —1.39 million times by 128,600 riders — current KOM/QOM: Dom Jackson (4:05)/Alex Morrice (5:04)
As those numbers show, this is one popular climb. Nobody's arguing it's the hardest (at least we hope nobody is given the five per cent average for 2.2km) but it might well just be the most popular climb on Strava by sheer volume, thousands of riders flocking to its hairpins from across London and the south of England every week.
It was, of course, made famous by its inclusion in the 2012 Olympic Games road races and hosted the WorldTour RideLondon-Surrey Classic event for several years after, meaning that if you want to set a hot time here, you'll have plenty of professional competition.
The fastest times on Strava are a who's who of cycling, numerous pros and former pros holding a place in the top 0.01 per cent of Box ascenders. Zeb Kyffin, who finished sixth at last year's Tour of Britain has the fourth fastest time, while EF Education-EasyPost's Neilson Powless nipped over the Channel after completing the Tour de France to set a 4:30, the 12th fastest time.
Oliver Naesen, Daryl Impey, Nathan Van Hooydonck, Niki Terpstra, Arnaud Démare, Thomas De Gendt, Ethan Hayter, Connor Swift, Stefan Küng, Yves Lampaert, Simon Yates, Andrew Feather, Dan Bigham and 128,000 others have all tried, none anywhere near Jackson's time.
Sa Calobra, Mallorca — 310,000 times by 143,000 riders — current KOM/QOM : Tom Pidcock (22:46)/Illi Gardner (29:09)
Good luck taking this one.
Ineos Grenadiers star Tom Pidcock and hill-climbing queen Illi Gardner (that's a name that'll pop up a lot on this list) aren't your average British cycling holidaymakers looking for some winter sun in Mallorca...
> Tom Pidcock smashes Sa Calobra KOM by nearly two minutes
As to be expected given the much longer, steeper nature of Sa Calobra, it's got far fewer overall times than Box Hill, but can compete on the total number of people who have ridden it. Add to that the fact the Strava leaderboard is packed full of pro riders testing their legs at team training camps and Sa Calobra becomes one of the most competitive Strava KOMs going.
Pidcock, current British hill-climbing champ Gardner, former British hill-climbing champ Ed Laverack, Rémi Cavagna, Simon Yates, Sebastián Henao etc. etc.
Alpe d'Huez, France — 324,700 times by 166,600 riders — current KOM/QOM: Sepp Kuss (35:58)/Illi Gardner (42:22)
Want the Alpe d'Huez KOM? Well, you're going to have to go faster than the best Tour de France climbers then, Visma-Lease a Bike's Sepp Kuss holding the KOM up here from the 2022 edition.
Gardner, back for another mention, did indeed go faster than the Tour de France, her time from this summer more than FOUR MINUTES faster than stage winner Demi Vollering's Tour ascent.
Again, Gardner, Vollering, Tour winner Kasia Niewiadoma, Emma Pooley, Kuss, Romain Bardet, David Gaudu, Thibaut Pinot, Pidcock... the competition is fierce (and almost certainly riding at the Tour).
Mont Ventoux from Bedoin, France — 193,761 times by 100,382 riders — current KOM/QOM: Tadej Pogačar (1:00:05)/Illi Gardner (1:10:44)
Any KOM belonging to Tadej Pogačar is probably out of reach for all of us.
Another one that was claimed during the Tour de France, Pogačar set this time during the 2021 edition, the second of his yellow jersey-winning years. More than 100,000 Strava users have tried, nobody bettering that KOM.
Longchamp (regular lap), Paris — 9.3 million times by 29,000 riders — current KOM/QOM: Thomas Bacon (3:38)/Noemie Bucamp (4:23)
Something a bit different, but possibly the most competitive Strava segment on sheer volume of attempts is... this 3.5km loop in a Parisian park where the city's riders flock to complete laps. See also London's Regent's Park and Richmond Park for a similar vibe, although you probably want to skip KOM-hunting while riding in a busy city...
Champs-Élysées, Paris — 80,000 times by 24,900 riders —current KOM/QOM: Amund Grøndahl Jansen (1:34)/Maria Giulia Confalonieri (1:53)
While some of these other ones you'll have a shot at if you magically become the best climber in the world, I'm saying this one's impossible to beat (without being a Tour de France pro). Logistically speaking, as anyone who's visited the Champs-Élysées outside of Tour time will know, there's no way you'd be able to/or want to/or be safe to compete with Amund Jansen's 30mph+ ride up the famous boulevard without the road closures, marshals and drafting that he benefitted from.
Lights, crossings, traffic. You'll need to make a Tour team to take this one... even if you claim to have the legs for it...
Norton Summit, Adelaide, Australia — 635,693 attempts by 25,942 riders — current KOM/QOM: Chris Harper (11:00)/Sarah Gigante (12:54)
Norton Summit is Australia's answer to Box Hill — not that 'hard' but incredibly popular (and with a steady five per cent gradient and some hairpins chucked in too)... plus it's a favourite of the Tour Down Under meaning, like Box Hill, many of the world's best have had a shot at setting a super fast time up it.
635,693 times set gives you a sense of what you're up against if you want to bag this KOM, Jayco Al-Ula's Chris Harper taking the crown off teammate Simon Yates earlier this year, setting an 11:00. To do that he averaged 30km/h up the five-and-a-half kilometre climb, Strava estimating he held 511w to do so.
Koppenberg, Belgium — 203,000 times by 77,400 riders — current KOM/QOM: Lance Decabooter (1:43)/Luce F (2:00)
We'll stick to trying to ride up it without unclipping and leave the KOM for the professionals of the Tour of Flanders who smash up this every year. Back when Mathieu van der Poel still uploaded his rides to Strava (with glorious full power data too) his 2021 Flanders file showed he pushed over 600w up here to get the fourth fastest time.
Any segment where a rider of Van der Poel's talent put out those sort of numbers but still couldn't crack the three fastest times is probably not for us...
Hilo to Mauna Kea, Hawaii — 319 times by 236 riders — current KOM/QOM: Levi Heimans (4:30:27)/Jennifer Real (7:20:58)
Only 236 people to beat to claim this legendary KOM, but a hell of a lot of climbing to do so... (not to mention the travel, money, logistics involved if, like us, you live on the other side of the world)...
Reckon you could add any of these to your trophy cabinet? Let us know if you do and we'll send you a suitably unworthy prize, probably in the form of a pair of road.cc socks. What more motivation do you need?
Dan is the road.cc news editor and joined in 2020 having previously written about nearly every other sport under the sun for the Express, and the weird and wonderful world of non-league football for The Non-League Paper. Dan has been at road.cc for four years and mainly writes news and tech articles as well as the occasional feature. He has hopefully kept you entertained on the live blog too.
Never fast enough to take things on the bike too seriously, when he's not working you'll find him exploring the south of England by two wheels at a leisurely weekend pace, or enjoying his favourite Scottish roads when visiting family. Sometimes he'll even load up the bags and ride up the whole way, he's a bit strange like that.
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37 comments
Assuming no motorpacing, I'd go with:
Most competitive proper climb KOM that a punter could get: Patios in Bogota (never raced, 2,593,946 Attempts By 76,657 People) https://www.strava.com/segments/3178893
Hardest proper climb KOM for a punter: Poggio in San Remo (absolute drag race, all the best times are racing times) https://www.strava.com/segments/626919
Hardest proper climb KOM that a pro could get: Plateau de Beille (Just thermonuclear Watts/kg given the length of the climb, would have to be during the Tour given peaking and drafting) https://www.strava.com/segments/665568
Hardest proper climb KOM for a pro: Gibraltar Road in Santa Barbara (no longer raced, too far for a mid-season camp) https://www.strava.com/segments/658277
I think a certain T. Pogacar has ensured that this one https://www.strava.com/segments/665568 might stand for a while - at least for men
Wow. Even just 10th place is 9 minutes back from Pogi.
Personally I have my Garmin set to Furlongs per Fortnight.
Its the only way to make my climbing speed look impressive...
You're in a league of your own there.
I'm not getting the Col De Rates KOM back. I got that in 2009 but despite being a minute and a half faster in 2022, I'm down to 32,444th
Illi Gardner's times stack up pretty well against male riders. If I was able to lose only 10 minutes to Pogi on Mt Ventoux I'd be bossing my local roads for sure.
Can we please stop this obsession with kms. Box hill is in England, where distances are measured in miles and speeds in miles per hour. When I go out for a bike ride, the signs on my route are all displayed in miles, not kilometres.
I'm all for Europe (even lived there for a while) but this nonsense needs to stop.
What a (Box) hill on which to choose to take a stand. Apart from the fact that everybody has a right to choose what measure of distance they wish to use, in cycling the vast majority of the most important races take place in countries where distances are measured in kilometres and heights in metres - the vast majority of professional bike riders come from these countries as well; this means it makes perfect sense to describe British races and challenges in the same units for international comparative purposes. Rory Townsend, incidentally, is Irish so why shouldn't he set his Strava to record using the system of units employed in his country? Do you get cross when people are described as racing the 100 metres rather than the 110 yards (or to be more precise 109.36 yards) than the 110 yards (or to be more precise 109.36 yards) in British athletics meetings, when you see a 5k Parkrun, or when a 5 m scrum is called in rugby at Twickenham?
Personally I like to follow the time-honoured system of describing my ride distance in kilometres but height gain in feet.
ETA Even if one agreed with your insistence that within Britain Imperial measurements should be used, this article is about comparing Strava segments from all over the world, so it makes perfect sense for all the segments to be described in the same units; given that 95% of the world uses the metric system it's not unnatural to favour its units.
To be honest, I quite think he might
I prefer to attend the park runs which are 3.107 miles
Monster, society should be protected from the likes of you. m and km makes so much more sense >10m/km = hilly ride, <10m/km = easy ride
Cycling has been a metric sport for me for more than 30 years (apart from the odd '10'). I did 1km/ 2km/ 20km etc races on the track.
Nope. Metric is the right and proper measurement system.
Cycling as a sport is widely measured in metric, including by many British cyclists.
Also, miles are a daft, archaic measurement.
I measure all my rides in KMs. And I always will. It's not like we are using some quirky measurement that only a few nations around the world use. I mean. 100cm = 1 meter. 1000m = 1 Km. nice and simple. Now we could use inches, yards and miles and they are all very easy to understand. How many inches in a mile? 63360 or 1760 yards . Such easy to grasp and calculate measurements why would be ever need something so simple as a system based on 10 and not random stuff like a foot (who's bloody foot) or hands or bits of string it's nonsense and we don't need it anymore.
as for road signs, I have a garmin! That tells me how far I've gone and how far I've left to go. If I really need to know 1 mile away is 1.6km I'm not caring about speed but if I'm honest 33kph feels a lot better average than 20.5mph
I can see how that's helpful in Wales though,
100%! A week ago a friend and I set out to do a century ride to mark the end of summer so I switched the head unit to imperial measurements so we could have a countdown. After 20 miles I switched it back to metric, looking at 20 mph on the display felt so slow. Even when we'd finished I couldn't help feeling that 163.2 km sounded better than 101.2 miles…
But you're only using half metric, hours are imperial units, if you want to be properly metric then quote your speeds in kilometers per kilosecond. That should be really impressive!
But then I would have to count the amount of time it took to do the century in kiloseconds which would sound really depressing – six hours and a bit sounds much better!
But now you're back to miles per hour, make your mind up!!!
Being pedantic, hours aren't "imperial" units - the Weights and Measures Act which foistered certain units onto the British Empire only defined units of length, mass (conflated with weight), volume and area. Miles per hour is considered an imperial unit for speed because it relies on the defined length of a mile.
Hours are recognised by The International Bureau of Weights and Measures as "acceptable" to use alongside SI units (an hour being a simple multiple of the SI unit second) - see https://www.bipm.org/en/publications/si-brochure
"Kilometers per kilosecond" is, of course, identical to meters per second which is the SI unit for velocity, and is not a particularly impressive number (1 m/s = 3.6 km/h = 2.2 mph)
A simple multiple of the SI unit? did you memorise up to your 360 times table at school?
Yes as an old fart who likes imperial measures I got confused with my prefixes, I obviously meant Kilometers per hecto second
Umm, hours are NOT imperial units. Well, not British Empire imperial units anyway. Babylonian Empire perhaps... All that multiples of 60 malarkey - 60 minutes in an hour, 360 degrees in a circle etc. - comes from the ancient Mesopotamian cultures. Bin around for a while, probly not gonna change it now.
Or just m/s
My rides measured in kms are longer, and my speeds measured in kms are faster. You'll take them from me when you pry them from my cold, dead hands.
+1.6
Isn't that your cold dead 10.16cms?
Damn how did I miss that!
I bet you voted for Brexit to take back control of random, poorly defined measurements.
Did you know that the International Mile (NB. due to all the different ways that "mile" has been used over centuries that it's best to specify which one you're using) is defined in terms of kilometres? It's exactly 1.609344 km
Who wants a list of failures caused by people using imperial measurements?
https://unit-converters.com/10-notable-mistakes-due-to-metric-imperial-conversion-errors/
Metric all the way for me. I could never fathom chains and furlongs.
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