Improving the Following Experience on Strava
Training Log Improvements
Many committed athletes on Strava enjoy viewing the logs of other runners as much as they like analyzing their own data. However, the most comprehensive way to view training data is only available for your own personal activities.
Objective
Identify places within the Strava ecosystem where it would make sense to view other athlete’s “Training Log” screen.
Background
Currently your options for viewing other’s training data is limited. On an athlete’s page, you can see aggregate data of their current week snapshot by day, by sport and their total weekly activity over the past two years.
Below that data, you can also view specific activities for that week in reverse chronological order. These views provide interesting insight, but lack the ability to understand the activities within a larger training period.
The Training Log Page
In my opinion, the most valuable page on Strava is the Training Log page. Here you can see snapshots of your weeks with color coded circles for “normal” activities, workouts, and races.
The reason the Training Log screen has so much value is it has the ability to display a high level view of a training block, while also being able to quickly provide the specifics of a particular activity with one click. From a personal point of view, it is a great resource to have to look at past training cycles and make quick comparisons to previous weeks and workouts.
The calendar view on the right side of the page also makes it very easy to click on a race and view the training immediately preceding that specific milestone. This is huge asset when plaining new training schedules and trying to iterate on previous training blocks leading up to a specific event.
Product Suggestion
While the Training Log page is the most comprehensive snapshot of an athlete’s activities on Strava, you can only view your personal data in that format. While many people using Strava are trying to emulate and learn from world class athletes, they have to dig through activities week by week and piece together their longer term training schedule. The reverse chronological order proves to be challenge as well.
When browsing historic weeks from the top of the list to the bottom, viewing the most recent activity does not provide continuity when reading athlete’s activities. Regular chronological order would make more sense in this instance, as the activity at the top of the week would be directly following the last activity viewed in the previous weeks.
In the culture of endurance sports, athletes like to see what others are up to. They do like to compare, learn, and emulate. That is part of the reason why Strava is so popular. I feel the product could be improved in a substantial way by offering users the ability to view other’s Training Logs in the same way they can see their own.
By implementing a simple search box on the Training Logs page, it would be easy to search for specific athletes and bring up their log. The added benefit of displaying activities in this way is that it can also be filtered by run, ride, or both.
Adding the same Training log link to athlete’s profiles that you can see on your own page would also make a great addition to easily access information.
Conclusion
With these simple additions, users would be able to understand the training of others in a larger scope than just a week at a time. It would be an easy addition to the product that would increase engagement with others activities. Especially with the emphasis on the recruitment of pros to use the platform, it could be an impressive way to show the work they put it in an easier to understand format.
