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Video: Strava asks athletes to reject image-conscious social media via selfies
Strava is encouraging its users to be ‘unfiltered’. It’s doing so with a video that mostly seems to feature stylish young athletes being cool. Even the guy emptying his nose at the end does it with a certain panache. Surely the unfiltered version saw the wind blowing what was expelled onto his shoulder.
The campaign encourages Strava users to reject the filtering that is such a feature of most social networks these days. Personally, I’d quite like there to be a way of filtering out my mates’ daily commutes and turbo trainer uploads, but I get what they’re driving at.
“Strava is asking its athletes to go against the grain (as athletes tend to do) by posting anti-filter photos, showing off awkward tan lines, flushed post-workout selfies, filthy hands, or just the unfettered joy of getting through a big day out. Strava is encouraging its community to forget about what people think, tag posts with #AthletesUnfiltered, and bring each other together with raw and ridiculous photos of the sports we love.”
The modern world being what it is, you can’t help but feel that this will only manifest itself as a kind of gritty, keeping-it-real competition of almost equal shallowness to the curated selfies of Instagram. It’s all a bit: ‘Show people just how much you don’t care what they think by broadcasting it to them via the designated hash tag.’
But (uncharacteristically) setting cynicism aside for a moment, the campaign is borne of solid sentiments.
Gareth Nettleton, VP of Marketing at Strava, said: "There are two key insights that drove the work, both inspired by what's wrong with the world lately. Firstly, we live in a terribly divisive time, and sport connects people across lines you might not expect. It is a positive, unifying force, and we want to shine a light on its power to bring people together.
“Secondly, Strava is a real, raw, very unfiltered social network. We believe that people all over the world are exhausted by the pressure to always present a perfect, curated self on other social networks. So we wanted to make it very clear that Strava is a place to put it all out there and be yourself. Unity and acceptance – that's what this campaign is about."
Tashia Palley, a London-based cyclist and Strava member who features in the film, said: “Strava is more real, more raw, in a way. So when you've done some exercise, people are just posting, no make up, sweaty selfies, of what you've done. And I think you feel such a buzz when you're doing your exercise; who cares if you've got no makeup or look a mess?”
Harx Kalsi, another London-based runner and Strava member, said: “I show off me, this is me. I have rubbish runs, I have great runs, like, this is what happens. This is who I am, and I am sharing that with you, whether you like it or not. I think it's also showing other runners and cyclists, that you should just be yourself, you don't need to be crazy, you don't need to be doing mad miles, or you don't need to be running this quick. Just have fun with it.”
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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38 comments
Here's the thing. 99% of the people who use Strava are not athletes (if you aren't sure whether you are an athlete or not have a look at your passport). The wrapped up irony of non-athletes posting pictures under the athletesunfiltered hashtag is difficult to unpack.
Well if you are going to be pedantic no cyclists or swimmers are 'athletes' as they don't do athletics. Sure most cyclists aren't professionals; since when does that stop people being serious or passionate about what they do? Of course the hashtag is aimed at the ordinary user.
I don't know why, but mention Strava and a set of people with chips on their shoulder come out.
Agree the Strava feed sometimes gets cluttered, though also agree that I'd like to have everything available to see, should I wish to. (and most often I do).
It's be childs-play to let users filter out commute/turbo activity from their feeds and childs-play for Strava to auto-detect and flag those activities so folks not wanting to see them ... wouldn't.
About time you added some functionality Strava.... over to you!
(and please lets not muck around like FB and give me a "highlights reel" of your own choosing, would be slightly ironic given the "unfiltered" campaign.)
My commute is 62km, it is the only sort of training I can do on weekdays(other than turbo).
It does feature several interesting segments and it goes up on strava pretty much all the time.
I'm not bothered if anyone else looks at it, the analytics are useful for me to compare efforts and track progress.
Turbo stuff goes up purely because of the auto link with my Garmin account but again, no intention for others to see.
80% of my rides are in the virtual world. If I didn't publicise them, my riding chums would think I'd given up riding
I don't record half of my rides, either too short or forget to put Wahoo Elemnt on bike. Virtual rides all done for me on strava, Garmin and other platforms.
Love it
Strava is very Marmite isn't it? I use it to log 300km rides, and 16km commutes. It really doesn't matter. I like to occasionally challenge myself on KOMs and just enjoy a long ride where I don't feel Strava affects or ruins anything. Me personally, I don't give kudos for Zwift or rides under 10 miles, unless the ride is really really short; then it deserves it for being so ridiculous. It's great to see the data from the pro races and I like to analyse local races so I know that to expect, average speeds, route, where people attack and back off, that kind of thing. I think it's a really useful tool. If it annoys you, then I suggest you stop using it, and stop complaining.
I think asking for something to filter out ride types when their current thing is #AthletesUnfiltered is perhaps not going to happen right now.
I had someone unfollow me once because I had saved a ride to school with my boy . He's got a Strava account, that first I just put a copy of my gpx in, but now he's got his own Garmin, doing nationals races, weeks at Assen, actually leaving me behind on sprints and climbs - there's a whole history of his riding over a few years now, so he can see how he's improved over the years, where the natural peaks and troughs are, all that
it's not the Clarion Club of my grandparents, but who cares. I've always treasured cycling culture for the sheer number of ways that you can be told that You're Doing It All Wrong. On a web forum, you're at least getting told you're wrong by those who accepted at least some form of digital communication, all bets are off when you're out on the road
do what you like, if you don't like what other people then don't look! Its all just riding a bike, somehow. That's always a good thing
I'd buy into their bullshit for 1 second if it was possible to upload photos through a web browser from a real camera.
Their obsession with smartphones is just a sign that they wanna be #instagram.
That's pretty dramatic. It's not ruined anything for me. Some days I ride to test myself, some days I just ride, Strava doesn't stop the latter and enhances the former.
Arguably the most willy-waving of social media apps asking people to just enjoy?
Easy. Ditch segments, KOMs and all similar shite that has ruined social and club riding.
Agreed. As for reducing conflict, how about they ditch the Uh-oh emails. That might lessen the 'red mist' provocation.
There's a 2 1/2hr workout on TrainerRoad (forget its name) - one of the hardest 'rides' I've ever done. Relentless. Horrible. I really don't want to do it again...
'Winter is coming....'
Private rides do count to distance totals, they don't count towards badges or that sort of stuff.
Right. I don't really care about totals. I do care about being able to have a look back at training I've done for certain events.
My point is that it's much, much easier for the person with the specific requirements about what appears in their feed, to control that feed, rather than complain about people that THEY'RE FOLLOWING posting stuff that they might not want in their feed.
My commutes probably are boring. But I want to see others' and have had chats on Strava about routes etc. Ditto turbo trainer stuff - some discussions about training plans, the trainer, software, garage setup etc has been prompted by just posting a workout.
Most of my stuff is boring. It covers a whole range of sessions across swimming, biking and running - most of which isn't 'epic', the vast majority is not racing, and there've been a fair few cock-ups, or sessions and events not going entirely to plan - that goes on there too. It's social media for that kind of stuff, not a messageboard to show how great I am. I post it warts and all, rather than try to predict what people want to see. If my 'followers' don't want to see 100 commutes before getting a glimpse of an ironman, I trust them to unfollow me.
I don't understand the comments about needing to filter out boring rides. Surely you only follow the people you care about?
Oh really? Strava appointed a VP from Instagram as the new CEO but now they'd like everyone to be #authentic??
Strava ignored feedback when they switched over from the black/orange interface over to the vanilla mess, same with how rides get listed. What they are doing is selling ride data to town and city planners for very tidy sums.
They are experts at "do not care what others are thinking", e.g. their users.
Indeed.
To be really #authentic, #ditchstrava
What's this Strava thing then? Is it a bit like Facebook?
Indeed, most of my rides are commutes, most of the time the same, sometimes a bit of variation, but sometimes things happen in those commutes, sometimes a PR, or even a cup or placing.
I didn't think of Strava as a trendy social network before I saw this ad full of young, nasal, Americans sportsboasting about how authentic and crazy/cool they are. This is a big turn-off as I just want to record my distances and occasionally give a thumbs up to a mate. Maybe I'm just too British for this..
#bollocks
Use it for that then?
Use it for that then?
In other news, this promoted hashtag is about photographs posted to Strava, not your ride? Not sure why you're all getting het up over the type of activities people post? or Is road.cc secretly The Daily Fail site?
There's a private setting?
This please, and definitely the latter. Fed up with all the bloody Z****ing polluting my feed. I don't care who you 'virtually' rode with in your arcade game.
Woop-woop! That's the sound of (strava) police.
Alternatively, you could stop following people you don't know or like on social media.
Why do you follow them, then? You talk as if you are forced too.
Because I like to see what proper rides they've done. I have a few friends who started from scratch and it's great to see their rides.
I don't mind commutes tbh, it's the virtual stuff that annoys me. I'm surprised there's not an option to do this already.
It annoys you? Really?
You know what? Some people who use Strava are not you, and don't share your experiences and preferences. I happen to like seeing some of my pals' commutes and what turbo training they're doing. It's a massive part of their training - as it is mine. I'm sure some people would find your 'how long can I ride slowly til I puncture/bonk/can't feel my hands/get ripped a new one by my saddle?' challenges deathly boring and pointless, but I've done a few audaxes and it takes all sorts.
'Proper rides': this is a minefield, isn't it - what exactly does this mean? Does my 15-mile commute not count as 'proper'? What if I run it and use it as the basis for doing ultramarathons, as I do sometimes - is that a 'proper' run? Or should I only make the race public? Bit easier to hope my 'followers' who are annoyed by my tedious training would just unfollow me, isn't it?
I wholeheartedly support your right to be annoyed by trifling matters and insist on using apps that cause you a negative experience. But do stop moaning about it.
I understand your request for a filter, but I'm curious why the virtual rides annoy you? Do you think they are any less hard work? Or that the effort is any less real? I use my Bkool trainer when I can't be out on the road because of family commitments. Doing 40km on that seems like much harder work, than my usual weekend runs in the country slide. Without the distraction of the real world it's a hard slog, but it's an essential part of my training programme. And I want the fitness/recovery stats from Strava. I'm not having a go at you, I'm genuinely curious about why it annoys you.
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