Strava Art

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 6 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

It’s no secret that I enjoy cycling – and I’m also a bit of a geek. My cycling and my tech come together in various places but Strava is one of the most obvious… I have been known to say “If it’s not on Strava, it didn’t happen” (of course, that’s in jest – but I do get annoyed if my GPS traces get messed up).

There’s something quite wonderful about maps too. Maybe this is another side of my geekiness but I love looking at a good map. So, what if you could have a map of a ride you’re particularly proud of turned into a piece of art to display on your wall?

As it happens – you can do exactly that. Cyced produce high quality Strava Art for runners and cyclists. So, when Angus from Cyced asked me if I’d like to review their service, I was interested to give it a try.

I settled on the ride I did with my son last year to raise money for his trip to the Kandersteg International Scout Centre and I provided a Strava link (a GPX file would have been another option). Soon afterwards, Angus sent me a PDF proof to review and, a couple of days after I confirmed the edits, the final print arrived.

I was impressed by how well it was wrapped – indeed, I’ve never had an “unboxing experience” quite like this for a piece of artwork: wrapped in tissue paper; sandwiched between sheets of heavy-duty card; all inside a sturdy card envelope. It would be pretty difficult for my postie to accidentally bend this package!

The print itself is really high quality and the simple (Strava-inspired) colours look amazing – greys, whites and orange highlights. The print that Angus created for me is A4 but there are A3 and A2 options too. I’m now considering buying a second print for the “Man Cave” when I have a suitably big ride to be proud of (or maybe with last year’s London Revolution route).

If you’re looking for something a little different for your wall – a piece of art to celebrate a ride, a run, or maybe a present for a runner/cyclist friend or family member, I’d recommending checking out the Strava Art from Cyced. As the website says it’s “worth more than just a kudos”!

Full disclosure: Cyced provided me with an A4 print in exchange for this blog post but that doesn’t influence my review. Everything I’ve written is my true opinion – but it’s nice to have the artwork for my son to keep as a memento of our 70 miles MTBing along the Grand Union Canal towpath last summer!

Combining GPX files for Strava

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 7 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

This morning was spent on my bike… as was a fair chunk of this afternoon… as is a fair chunk of many summer weekends, much to Mrs W’s disappointment.

My friend Andy and I put in 60 miles in the sunshine, on a big loop around Milton Keynes. It seems my route planning is pretty spot on, as it was almost the exact opposite of a charity ride going the other way around (we passed the same riders twice!). Unfortunately, my ability to “press the start button on my Garmin cycle computer” is clearly less good – I was about a mile from home and heading out of town when I realised I’d forgotten to start tracking my ride!

My OCD can’t cope with this. It would be able to cope with turning around, going back up the hill, starting the computer and starting the ride again – but not with some missing kilometres in my ride data! Luckily, Andy was also riding with a Garmin bike computer. Even though he’d also forgotten to start his, he was wearing a Garmin watch too – so I could combine his data and mine (we’d ridden side by side for the first part of the ride…).

I’ve blogged before about GPS Track Editor, which is a fantastic piece of free software. Using this, I could edit Andy’s data to just the part I had missing, then combine it with mine and merge the two tracks (the short gap doesn’t matter – Strava will straight-line the route between the two points). I also tried merging the files with a tool from gotoes.org – unfortunately, that ended up with a ride that was effectively double the length of what we rode (two loops). it would probably have worked with my edited files but I could also merge them in the GPS Track Editor…

Combining tracks in GPS Track Editor

I then deleted the original (short) ride from Strava and re-uploaded. Sorted.

Just one thing to sort out – all of the PRs I got on today’s ride (and there were a few) were recorded as second places by the second upload. No worries – Strava has a “refresh my achievements” tool. which sorted out that particular issue. Now my ride has the complete distance… and my achievements are correct too…

Generating a GPX file for Strava after the tech let me down

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 8 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

This afternoon was glorious. The sun was shining and, even though it was a work day, the company I work for had arranged an afternoon out for staff at Cannock Chase (Go Ape). High ropes, Forest Segway, or Mountain biking activities were all available – right up my street!

I decided I’d like to Segway but I was in the second group (which meant waiting around for an hour or so), so I took a bike out for a little ride whilst I was waiting. Unfortunately, I didn’t have my Garmin with me and my iPhone’s attempts to capture my movements on Strava were woeful.

Shortly after setting off on “Follow The Dog“, I lost the rest of the group (whilst messing around with Strava!) and decided that I would rather come back and ride another day with my son than ride on my own and (potentially) miss the Segway opportunity. But I still wanted to capture the details of the (admittedly short) ride…

Generating a GPX file to upload to Strava is straightforward enough – I used Mapometer for that. Unfortunately though, Strava won’t allow GPX files without time information to be uploaded.

The workaround is to estimate some time data and insert it in the file – which is where the excellent Gotoes site helped! Goetoes has several utilities for Strava and Garmin Connect including:

  • Combining FIT, GPX or TCX files
  • Merging heart rate and position files (FIT/TCX)
  • A bookmarklet to export GPX from Garmin Connect
  • The ability to upload to Strava via email

and…

Using this with an estimate of my time, a known distance (so an estimated speed) and Gotoes’ ability to work out what my speed might have been at different points on the route came up with something approximate to put into Strava. I’ve hidden it from leaderboards – because it’s “fake data” – but it’s enough for me to track the distance and the fact I did go for a little bimble.

Strangely, the iPhone’s GPS performed OK for the Segway ride (which I’ve recorded as an eBike and alse hidden from leaderboards):

Recovering data when the Zwift iOS app crashes whilst saving an activity

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 8 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

One of the most popular posts on the blog at the moment is about recovering data when a Garmin cycle computer crashes whilst saving an activity. It’s great to know that my experience has helped others to recover their ride data and I’m hoping that this post will continue in the same vein… but this time it’s about Zwift.

You see, earlier this week, I decided to try out the new Zwift app for iOS. It’s much easier to use my iPhone than to take a PC out to the garage and use a mobile app as a bridge between the turbo trainer and the Wi-Fi network. Instead, it’s all taken care of in the app.

Unfortunately, after an hour on the trainer, I went to end my ride and Zwift told me it couldn’t log me in (and refused to let me in on the iPhone until I forcibly closed the app).  Logging in on another device told me that partial ride data had been captured for the first 10 minutes but that was it.  I wasn’t happy and my usual petulant self resorted to a whinge on Twitter, to which I was really surprised to get a reply from the team at Zwift:

A few minutes later I logged a support call and was directed to some advice that helped me recover the .FIT file created on my device by Zwift:

If you’re riding on iOS, you can reach your .fit file through iTunes.
1. Plug your device into your computer and open up iTunes.
2. Click on your device in iTunes, then click “Apps” and scroll down to the “File Sharing” section.
3. You should see Zwift listed, and it should have a “Zwift” folder. Click that, and then click “Save To” and save it to a location of your choice.
4. Find the saved Zwift folder, and copy the fit file out of the Zwift/Activities folder.

After this, I could upload the .FIT file to Strava (though not to Zwift itself… apparently this is “a highly requested feature” and “as such, [Zwift are] exploring adding it in the future”):

Turbo trainers, Zwift and other such things

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 8 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

A few weeks ago, with Summer turning to Autumn, the wind getting up and the sun going down, my thoughts turned to Winter cycling.  I’ve been considering getting a turbo trainer for a while now and I originally ordered a Jet Black Z1 Fluid Pro until I saw a smart trainer on offer at Wiggle for about £85 more than the “dumb” fluid trainer I was going to get… added to which I got nearly a tenner’s cashback via TopCashback…

Bianchi C2C Via Nirone mounted on Tacx Vortex smart trainer wit Zwift running on a Windows PCThe trainer I’ve gone for is a Tacx Vortex and it’s proved pretty easy to set up.  Ideally I’d use a spare wheel with a trainer tyre but I don’t have one and my tyres are already looking a bit worn – I may change them when the bike comes out again in the spring, meaning I can afford to wear them out on the trainer first!  All I had to do was swap out my quick release skewer for the one that comes with the trainer and my bike was easily mounted.

Calibration was a simple case of using the Tacx Utility app on my iPhone – which finds the trainer via Bluetooth and can also be used for firmware upgrades (it’s available for Android too). All you have to do is cycle up to a given speed and away you go!

I found that the Tacx Utility would always locate my trainer but the Tacx Cycling app was less reliable. Ultimately that’s not a problem because I use the Zwift virtual cycling platform (more on that in a moment) and the Zwift Mobile Link app will allow the PC to find my trainer via Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.  There is one gotcha though – on the second time I used the trainer I spent a considerable time trying to get things working with Zwift. In the end I found that:

  • The Tacx apps couldn’t be running at the same time as Zwift Mobile Link.
  • My phone had a tendency to roam onto another Wi-Fi network (the phone and the PC have to be on the same network for the mobile link to work).
  • My Bose Soundlink Mini II speakers were also interfering with the Bluetooth connection so if I wanted to listen to music whilst cycling then a cable was needed!

I’m guessing that none of this would be an issue if I switched to ANT+ – as my Garmin Edge 810 does. The trick when using the Garmin is to go into the bike profile and look for sensors.  Just remember to turn GPS off when using it on a stationary bike (or else no distance is recorded). Also, remember that:

“[…] when doing an indoor activity or when using devices that do not have GPS capability, the [Garmin Speed and Cadence Sensor] will need to be calibrated manually by entering a custom wheel size within the bike profile to provide accurate speed and distance.” [Garmin Support]

[Related reading: Bike wheel circumference and its effect on recorded distance]

And, talking of ANT+ – one thing I couldn’t work out before I bought my trainer was whether I needed to buy an ANT+ dongle for Zwift? Well, the answer is “No”! as the Zwift Mobile Link app works beautifully as a bridge on my trainer – it’s worth checking out the Zwift website to see which trainers work with the platform though (and any other gear that may be required).

I’ll probably write another post about Zwift but, for now, check out:

In the meantime, it’s worth mentioning that I started out riding on a 14 day/50km trial. I was about to switch to a paid subscription but I found out Strava Premium members get 2 months’ Zwift free* and, as that’s half the price of Zwift, I’ve upgraded my Strava for a couple of months instead!

So, with the trainer set up in the garage (though it’s easy to pop the bike off it if we do have some winter sunshine), I can keep my miles up through the Winter, which should make the training much, much easier in the Spring – that’s the idea anyway!

*It now looks as though the Strava Premium-Zwift offer has now been limited to just November and December 2016 – though I’m sure it will come around again!

Recovering data after Garmin crashed whilst saving activity

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 9 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

Yesterday was a beautiful day. Unfortunately I spent most of it in my home office but I did manage to get out on the bike for a quick ride before sunset (the first time I’ve worked at home in weeks, with a correspondingly low occurrence of exercise on a work day…).  Unfortunately, when I got home, my Garmin 810 cycle computer froze whilst saving my ride.

It actually needed a reset (holding the lap and power buttons together for about 5 seconds) before I could get it to respond at all but my biggest concern was whether my ride data had been lost (if it’s not on Strava, it didn’t happen).

The Garmin Connect app on my phone wouldn’t upload the ride, so I tried installing Garmin Express on a PC.  It decided that there was a file on my device that couldn’t be uploaded. Sadly, that file was the data from last night’s ride.

Garmin Express - Some files could not be uploaded to Garmin Connect

I ignored Garmin Express’s offer to remove the file and, thanks to Chesilboy’s post on the Garmin forums, I managed to rescue some of the data.

  1. First, I connected the Garmin to my PC and navigated to \Garmin\Activities.
  2. There, I located the .FIT file for the ride and copied it to somewhere safe.
  3. Next, I uploaded the .FIT file to Strava.
  4. Strava read the data, warning me that the file was damaged, possibly truncated and that some of the ride would be lost. Importantly though, it would use the data that could be read (as it happens, almost all of my ride – only missing the last 1.5 kilometres).
  5. At this point, I could export a GPX file and import it to Garmin Connect, but I’m not really that bothered about my records there (I find the site clunky and unreliable and I only really use it to get my data to Strava).

As Chesilboy notes, shame on Garmin for a) not keeping the data safe (why not write it throughout the activity) and b) actually offering to delete it! Thank goodness Strava is better at data processing!

My activity tracking ecosystem

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 10 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

After I wrote my post on Monday about the Fitbit Charge HR, Dan Delaney (@Dan_Delaney) and Gregg Robertson (@GreggRobertson5) both tweeted me to say “try MyFitnessPal“. Well, after putting aside the really cringeworthy name (although “MyNetDiary” is not any better), I thought I’d give it a try and, so far, the experience has been really positive.

Not only does MyFitnessPal seem to have a decent UK food database (albeit one that could do with some tidying up for consistency in naming – although that’s probably just my pedantry again) but the app is pretty good (just as good as the MyNetDiary app I paid money for…) and, more importantly, the ecosystem of connected apps is pretty good (Strava and Fitbit are both there, which is what I need – but many more besides). It’s growing too; only yesterday Endomondo emailed to say they were joining the “Under Armour Connected Fitness suite”, which includes MyFitnessPal.  The only slight downside (and it’s really not an issue when I think about the data that I need to keep, long term), is that MyFitnessPal bundles up each meal into a summary when it passes it to Fitbit:

So, this is what my activity tracking ecosystem looks like now:

Ultimately, I only have to enter or capture each item of information once (exercise via Strava unless automatically captured on my Garmin Edge 810 cycle computer; food/drink/weight via MyFitnessPal; daily activity/calorie burn automatically from my Fitbit Charge HR) and it flows into Fitbit and onwards each day to Microsoft HealthVault.