As we all know, I’m a big fan of Strava, but there is another website that runs alongside Strava. It’s called veloviewer and it runs a clever API that extracts all of your data from Strava and gives you a whole load more stats. These include details on every segment that you’ve ridden/run. You can sort your segments to see which one you’re nearest to obtaining a KOM or which segments have been ridden the most times. You can also easily find which segment that you’ve ridden most. For me this is Bailrigg Lane on the way to work, which I have ridden over 400 times.
Bailrigg Ln Hill near Lancaster University isn’t the largest hill by a long way and it’s not a very long segment either. It has been ridden by almost 300 different people though.
I have ridden the Bailrigg Ln Hill segment near Lancaster University over 400 times, with my quickest time only a week ago. My fastest time also puts me in the top 10 overall.
Why is this interesting? It’s not really, but I came up with a challenge. To try and beat my PR on my most ridden segment. I created a discussion on the Veloviewer group on Strava and a few people were up for it. The idea is that your most ridden segment will have a very fast time because you’ll hit it under every condition, wet, dry, tailwind, tired legs and one day you’ll hit it with fresh legs and a tailwind, making it a difficult challenge. It took me a few attempts before I managed to beat my PR on the 6th July 2014.
Of course the first reply to my discussion was `awesome beard mate’, but a few other people posted comments about how they were going to try it. A few days later the first few comments came in from people who had managed to beat their PR. Sometimes you need a little challenge to keep you motivated.
EDIT, updated 5th March 2017
Bailrigg Ln Hill has now been ridden by over 800 different athletes, and I’m down to 19th position. It is also not my most ridden segment. Top segment is now Dallas Road Pothole Dash, which I’ve done 529 times.
I also have 88 segments that I’ve done over 100 times, 88 cycling and 6 running. Top running segment is Hill through the woods, with 179 times by 137 different people, with my top spot at 6th.
The segment which has been done by most people is Ambleside Dash with over 15,000 different athletes, although my position is quite low as I’ve only done it once.
At some point in the future I will revisit this topic in more detail.
Beards and Triathlons 
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