Posts in category 'cycling'
Strava Lost The Plot
Strava began rolling out a new beta feature where an LLM provides commentary on training activities, and in doing so provided a perfect example of how tech companies both cannot resist climbing aboard this latest bandwagon while having no idea how to make it useful beyond replacing their own jobs.
If you’re not aware, Strava is a social media platform disguised as a fitness tracking application. For years they’ve carved out a nice little niche for themselves in the space, first by offering some truly unique and value-added features like their heat map and route planner, which uses real user data to find routes where people cycle, run, and so forth, and second, by incorporating a number of social features to allow athletes to interact, whether it’s liking each other’s activities, commenting, organizing group events, and so forth. Notably, quite a few professional athletes use the platform, including legendary riders like Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogačar, which allows fans to follow their activities and so forth.
Strava opts for a freemium model, with a number of key features included in a paid tier, and as I’ve become more serious about cycling, I’ve found those paid features to be worth the price. As part of those packages, they include things like additional analytics, which provide various statistics about activities, a route planner with automated route suggestions based on their heatmap data, and leaderboards which, I have to admit, I kinda enjoy as they gamify community-defined segments for sprints, climbs, and so forth.
All of these features do one of two things: connect athletes to each other, or give athletes access to data, either about themselves or supplied by the community, that they can use to enhance their activities.
Unfortunately, recently it seems Strava has caught a nasty cold that is infecting companies the world over: AI. And in doing so I’m afraid Strava is demonstrating why tech companies ultimately fail to understand basic concepts like trust and empathy.
By the way, just a brief interlude: if you want to disable this mis-feature (for now), in the app you have to pick “Show More” on one of the AI generated callouts, select “Give Feedback”, and from there you can leave the beta. Given how difficult that option is to find, I’m comfortable calling this a dark pattern.
Alright, let’s get back to it, shall we?
Continue reading...Tour Alberta for Cancer Recap
That’s it! The 2024 Tour Alberta for Cancer is a wrap. I was once again blown away by all the support I received, and then by the event itself. A few thoughts as this year’s tour is behind me and next year’s lies ahead!
I know it’s a cliche, but it’s genuinely hard to believe how fast time flies. Not only am I over a year into this career break–a fact that I continue to have trouble processing–but now the 2024 Tour Alberta for Cancer is done and dusted. To my surprise, despite the trepidation I felt this time last year, in a lot of ways 2024 was the easiest Tour yet.
Why?
Well, I’ve said it so many times already, but the greatest credit goes to the many people who donated to my campaign this year. Its through your incredible generosity that we were able to raise $2,783 this year, well past my $2,500 goal. As for the Tour overall, we were able to blow past the $6M goal, raising an incredible $7,576,204!
Even more heartening for me is the rise in participation. While last year saw over 1,200 riders on the Tour (which is a fantastic number!), this year saw that number grow 17% to over 1,400 participants. While I’m far from an old timer (this was my third in person ride following the COVID shutdown of 2020), I was thrilled to encounter so many first-time folks, and did what little I could to make them feel supported and welcome. Let’s all hope that, like me, they find themselves compelled to join future Tours.
And yes, if you’re reading between the lines a bit, you can guess that I did indeed sign to participate in the 2025 Tour Alberta for Cancer! But I promise to give everyone a break from the fundraising emails… for a little while anyway (it turns out last year there was an early match in the fall of 2023 so you might see some canvassing a little earlier this time around, assuming I stay on top of things).
With all that said, let’s get to the fun stuff, and that begins with an announcement of the third and final sock draw winner!
Continue reading...- (https://b-ark.ca/ye8SQQ)
Tour day one done! The plan was to cruise with my riding partner for the 40k to the lunch spot, then do the 140k challenge route. Unfortunately directions got confused and I ended up on the 100k instead. So I decided to push pace and finish fast. It wasn’t the day I’d planned but it was still very satisfying!
Glad I brought tissues though. The morning speeches and the ghost bike get me every damn time…
Tour Update: T-Minus 4 Days
It’s been a long while since I wrote anything about the tour, so I figured I’d post an update about training and the final draw!
It recently dawned on me that I hadn’t posted an update about the tour since June 20th when I hit my fundraising goal. Yet, despite the radio silence, it’s not as though nothing has been happening! Certainly life has been happening, with a trip to Regina to visit family during that period. But the biggest thing that’s been happening is training. So. Much. Training.
Of course, everyone on the tour, from the riders to the volunteers to the event organizers will tell you the Tour is not a race. And it absolutely isn’t! The event is first and foremost a drive to raise funds for the Alberta Cancer Foundation. As for the riders, the primary goal is to finish while enjoying the event for the reward that it is. As I’ve said before, the event itself is an absolute joy to participate in; the large group ride, surrounded by fellow fundraisers and cyclists, is an experience that’s difficult to describe unless you’ve done it or something similar.
But let’s admit it, for a lot of us, we want to not just finish the ride but perform well, and to do that requires training.
And so I’ve been riding. A lot.
Continue reading...Fundraising Achievement Unlocked!
We did it! Thanks to the generosity of so many, including Taber Cares, who matched the donations that put me over the top today, I hit my $2,500 goal for my Tour Alberta for Cancer ride!
I am so very excited to announce that, as of today, I’ve hit my goal for my Tour Alberta for Cancer fundraising campaign! The key was Taber Cares, which held a donation matching event for up to $200,000 in donations to ride participants. Between my own self-donation, a couple of timely contributions from folks in my network, and the equivalent matching donations, all those funds pushed me over the top!
Of course, the fundraising doesn’t stop there. While reaching the $2,500 goal secures my participation in the in-person ride, I will certainly keep pushing to raise even more, as every dollar to the Alberta Cancer Foundation funds critical programs here in the province.
Continue reading...
