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London top city (out of 12) for number of journeys logged on StravaLondon Strava stats

London top city (out of 12) for number of journeys logged on Strava

But they cycle further in Milan and faster in Amsterdam
by Alex Bowden
Tue, Oct 06, 2015 12:27
10

London has been revealed to be the most active of 12 major cities on Strava. The capital has seen more than seven million rides logged in the last 12 months. Amsterdam was in second place with 2.7 million rides logged (albeit that means around four times as many rides per person).

The figures come from Strava Insights, which compares the activities of cyclists and runners across 12 major cities. London also recorded the busiest single day with 37,226 rides logged on May 13, the day the annual London to Paris ride began.

- Six reasons to use Strava

The average distance of a London ride is 16.1 miles with an average speed of 14mph. However, riders in other cities go faster and further. Amsterdam clocked the fastest average speed per ride with 15.9mph, while Milan cyclists manage an average ride length of 33.7 miles. Even less surprisingly, London’s average elevation gain of 644.1 feet per ride is put in the shade by Barcelona’s 2,531 feet.

Strikingly, almost half of all London rides happen within the commuter windows of 7am-9am and 5pm-7pm. In contrast, a similar proportion of Sydney cyclists heads out between 5am and 8am. The top evening riders are in São Paulo, where nine per cent of rides start between 8pm and 11pm.

In June, Strava said that British women now accounted for a fifth of the distance logged on the site by all female users worldwide. The US-based firm said it had seen an 82 per cent increase in female members in the UK in just 12 months.

Strava
London
Alex Bowden

Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.

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10 comments

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marche | 9 years ago
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Who is this Strava ? 1

What about more reliable stats and less PR ?
E.g. weather, topography, time, distance, redundancy, e-motor-bike, commute or workout ride, quality of the roads, security, etc.

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Flustercluck | 9 years ago
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Why have you got any concerns with the data? it's not saying there are more cyclists in one place, or another. Just that these are the numbers of Strava rides logged. It doesn't seem to me to be suggesting that it provides a comprehensive analysis of cycling behaviour, but that it does have millions of data entries from the people who do use it, and as it happens, it's being most heavily used in London.

Also, someone mentioned that Amsterdam speeds might be higher because it's smaller and therefore shorter journeys, but actually their average journeys are nearly 20km longer.

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Ziptie replied to Flustercluck | 9 years ago
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Flustercluck wrote:

Why have you got any concerns with the data? .......

Also, someone mentioned that Amsterdam speeds might be higher because it's smaller and therefore shorter journeys, but actually their average journeys are nearly 20km longer.

I've no concerns with the data itself, It's just the conclusions are a bit meaningless because they haven't taken into account other factors like population size and geography. Good point re longer journeys in Amsterdam - just the sort of consideration that can lead to sime interesting findings with the data.

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bamboo | 9 years ago
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I guess the major factor is the number of people actually using Strava. Traditionally that has been heavier weighted towards the English speaking countries...

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shay cycles | 9 years ago
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I think the biggest factor not being considered is that ordinary everyday bike users in some of those cities, especially Amsterdam, frequently wouldn't be bothered about Strava; in the same way they aren't bothered with lycra and helmets.

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crazy-legs replied to shay cycles | 9 years ago
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shay cycles wrote:

I think the biggest factor not being considered is that ordinary everyday bike users in some of those cities, especially Amsterdam, frequently wouldn't be bothered about Strava; in the same way they aren't bothered with lycra and helmets.

That's the major concern I have with the data, the fact that it is very likely to be skewed towards the "traditional" Strava users - basically MAMILs. It would therefore probably not include significant subsectors like students or hire bike users. You can see that with the highlights of Regent's Park and Richmond Park - they're people bolting a training ride onto their commute.

Anyone remember the GPS pedal?:
http://road.cc/content/news/139960-new-connected-cycle-smart-pedal-track...
Get that on every hire bike, auto link it to Strava then analyse the data; I suspect it'd show some very different routes.

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FluffyKittenofT... replied to crazy-legs | 9 years ago
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crazy-legs wrote:
shay cycles wrote:

I think the biggest factor not being considered is that ordinary everyday bike users in some of those cities, especially Amsterdam, frequently wouldn't be bothered about Strava; in the same way they aren't bothered with lycra and helmets.

That's the major concern I have with the data, the fact that it is very likely to be skewed towards the "traditional" Strava users - basically MAMILs. It would therefore probably not include significant subsectors like students or hire bike users. You can see that with the highlights of Regent's Park and Richmond Park - they're people bolting a training ride onto their commute.

Anyone remember the GPS pedal?:
http://road.cc/content/news/139960-new-connected-cycle-smart-pedal-track...
Get that on every hire bike, auto link it to Strava then analyse the data; I suspect it'd show some very different routes.

Definitely. I don't see any logic in concluding anything about cyclists in general just from the very unrepresentative sub-set that use Strava. And it seems very likely that that sub-set would be even more unrepresentative of Amsterdam cyclists than of London ones

Still, does it not, possibly (not sure) imply that the fear that 'going Dutch' would be bad for cyclists who do want to go as fast as possible is misplaced? Could it be that those Amsterdam Strava-ists aren't having to stop at so many traffic lights?

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leaway2 | 9 years ago
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The weather is also a factor that has to be taken into account.

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Ziptie | 9 years ago
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Given that London is much more populace than Amsterdam, Barcelona, Milan etc. this is hardly a suprise. The higher average speed in Amsterdam is also no suprise given how flat it is, how small it is (so presumably shorter commutes) and how Dutch junctions cause less congestion for cyclists. Barcelona is hilly compared to London so of course rides will have more elevation gain!

I'm sure Strava data can give some really interesting insights, it just needs to be looked at by a decent data analyst!

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Niall Porter replied to Ziptie | 9 years ago
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I'd also say that the amount of commuters here in Amsterdam that use Strava is tiny.. Different bikes for different tasks..

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