Strava me up 12th marzo 2013
Strava has hit the headlines again - this time at the bbc which must mean that it is mainstream. Strava is a way to utilise your GPS data from things like cycle rides, runs, swims etc, and to compare your time on pieces (segments) of each route. For example, you can go and set a segment yourself of the piece of road outside your house. Then you can see who has ridden that piece, the time they took, heart rate, compare to age, sex, etc etc. You can compare your times, your times on different bikes / the ways to use it are endless. It is largely free - but for a small monthly charge you get access to detailed analysis. The ultimate is to get a KOM - King of the Mountain - that is the fastest time for a particular segment. You can use it from a GPS monitor, but also you can use a smart phone now without any equipment required.
I was shown how to use this by Smokey a couple of years ago. At that time there were very few segments in Italy but since then the number has really boomed.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21716686
Sadly there are people who go mental mental chicken oriental for KOMs and this has resulted in some legal cases against Strava. One is because a guy died whilst going for his KOM and his parents are suing, and another is due to a guy running into a pedestrian and killing them. This puts all this stuff at risk - not to mention all my KOMs ;) and all the history of every ride I've done in the last two years!
So - please support Strava because it's great and put down all the idiots who use it unsafely. It is a great training tool, and just a great fun piece of social media.
Meanwhile, the Tirreno-Adriatico finished today. On Saturday, Chris Froome took the lead. He rebuffed several attacks up a mountainous stage from Nibali, Contador and all the other big contendors, broke away and took the stage - this was a fantastical piece of riding and attacking, aided and abetted by an extremely strong Sky team, notably Uran Uran controlling on the front for much of the day, even when Contador was making his attacks, the Sky guys kept cool. And then he exploded in the last km or so and smashed a huge gap into the leaders. And remember that this race has all the big guys - Nibali, Contador, Evans, Cavendish, Sagan, Cancellara - bang full of class. On Sunday he positioned well as Wacky Rodrigez won the stage, and so moved into the lead. On Monday, there was a ferocious stage with some climbing reported being as 27% (although I heard 30% on Italian TV) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsOu76F7E7c. The climb was so severe that some pros even had to climb!! Contador - an excellent climber even reported that getting out of the seat caused him to slip - so if he's struggling then you know it's bang tough.
There were also riders who were "fa il serpente" - "making like a snake" - i.e. zig-zagging across the road to make it easier to get up. Including in this approach was the all round tough guy Peter Sagan - again, if he was doing it you know it's tough.
Froome lost the blue jersey, and Nibali moved into the lead and held on through the individual TT today to win. Chapeau - two years in a row for Nibs.
Froome is a guy that I have just taken a mild dislike for in the past. Same with Contador, Valverde / but surprising for me with Froome. However, I was very very impressed with the ride on Saturday, and it might have even done enough for me to start liking him. We shall see.
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