3 Reasons to Follow More People on Strava

Don’t tell me you’re not at least a little bit curious what your rival at the local 5K does in training to give them the edge every Saturday. Or how about that Tour de France cyclist who makes scaling mountains look like light work? A little bit of good-natured curiosity is just part of human nature. In fact, observing what other people do is one way we attempt to make sense of the world around us, and that applies to the sporting world too. So, for today’s article, we’re going to be talking about following people on Strava. 

Following people on Strava can be about a lot more than just indulging your curiosity. It can actually be a tool for learning about your sport, finding inspiration and realizing you are capable of more than you knew was possible. So, let’s get straight into it. 

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Privacy Settings

Before we dive into why you should follow people, let’s do a quick refresh on privacy settings. 

Strava has two layers of privacy settings: profile level and activity level. You can read more about each here and here. It’s the profile-level settings that determine your follower settings. Your profile can be set to “Everyone” or “Followers”. When you select “Everyone”, all Strava athletes can follow you without your approval – exactly like a public profile on Instagram. If you select “Followers”, anyone wanting to see your profile will need to request approval to follow you. You’ll get a notification which you can choose to accept or decline. Activities have their own privacy settings, so you could still have a Followers Only profile but have public activities that appear on segment leaderboards. 

Okay, now we’ve covered the serious stuff. Here are three reasons to start following some folks today. 

Inspiration Station

It’s obvious, but that doesn’t make it any less valuable. Following people is a sure-fire way to get a daily dose of inspiration. I like to build my inspiration like a sandwich – the biggest layer, the nice crusty sourdough, is friends in the sporting world. This could be people from my running club, work colleagues who join me for a lunchtime run or family members who I’ve persuaded that running really isn’t so bad. It’s cool to see people just like me, getting it done.

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The smaller layer, the filling of my sandwich, is pro athletes. When you stop to think about it, it’s pretty incredible that you can see, often in intimate detail, all the training of some of the world’s best athletes. From Tour de France cyclists to Olympic marathoners, the daily training details of so many of the world’s pro athletes are documented on Strava, and not just the training – lots of athletes will add photos, and post-workout thoughts. 

Following the pros is like a double shot of inspiration espresso, where you’ll find yourself asking, “holy cow, how did they do that?”. And while us regular folks shouldn’t be trying to replicate their workouts, or massive mileage weeks, there are lessons to be learned from following them. The biggest lesson I’ve personally learned is that the pros know how to train hard when that’s the ask, and how to go easy when the plan calls for a recovery day. I’d wager that you’d be surprised how easy some of their easy days are – give them a follow and see for yourself. 

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Friendly Competition

Just as we’re all a bit nosey, most people also have a competitive streak. And one of my favorite things about following people on Strava is unlocking the “Followers” leaderboard on segments. Let’s be honest, getting a crown can sometimes feel like a near impossible task. I live in London and I swear that statistically speaking London has to be the hardest city in the world to nab a Strava crown. Either way, it’s safe to say that I’m not adding a lot of crowns to my collection. But once you’re following someone, they’ll appear on your followers leaderboard. This leaderboard just includes people you’re following, so if you want to see how you stack up against your cycling buddies on the local climb, give them a follow. 

Find the Way

This probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind when you think about following people on Strava, but discovering new routes is an underrated benefit of following fellow runners and cyclists in your local area. I’m not very consistent about getting out on my bike, but when I do, the quality of the route is often the thing that will determine how long it is before I get out again. 

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Generally, it’s a pretty good bet that someone who cycles regularly knows the best routes. I can’t tell you how many times looking at the route of someone I know, who is a more experienced cyclist than me, gave me a workaround for a busy road or a safer route out of the city. Copying someone’s route couldn’t be easier, just open up their activity and tap the three dots in the top-right corner and you’ll see the option to “Save Route”. It’s as simple as that. 

Five Athletes You Should Be Following on Strava

If you're looking for other athletes to follow on Strava, why not check out:

• Athletes to Follow on Strava This Summer

• Runners You Should Follow on Strava

• Cyclists You Should Follow on Strava