We wanted to share a quick update with Zwifters regarding Strava segments.
As you may already know, on January 27, 2021 Strava made some major changes to Zwift segments: they marked everyone’s segments as private (so only the creator can see them) except for those created by Zwift Insider’s account. They also removed “(Zwift Insider verified)” from all of our segments, since that wasn’t really needed anymore because only our segments were visible!
Since then, we’ve received a ton of feedback from Zwifters requesting new segments. Others have questioned Strava’s decision (which we were not involved in).
Long-Term Plan?
Give Strava’s poor ability to determine which segments to hide or show (I’ve written about this before), we think Zwift and Zwifters would be best-served by Zwift taking control of the list of segments available in-game. It’s a core part of Zwift’s product experience, after all.
This would only work, though, if Zwift is able to quickly create segments for new roads, and respond well to community input when it comes to creating “extra” segments (for long climbs without leaderboards, for instance).
We’re talking to ZwiftHQ about what this may look like, but there’s nothing close to a firm plan yet. Until a better solution arrives, we’ll do our best to create needed segments beyond the 400+ we’ve already created.
New Segments
Since Strava’s big shakeup we’ve been hard at work creating a pile of segments that don’t correspond to known routes or leaderboards in game. This includes segments like KOM descents, or key climbs with no leaderboards. Here is the complete list of what we’ve created after everyone’s segments were privatized:
- 2/3/2021: Added misc New York segments: East Side Drive Climb, East Side Sky Loop Climb, Harlem Hill Climb, NYC KOM Reverse from Ground Level, NYC KOM Descent, NYC KOM Forward Up and Down, NYC KOM Reverse Descent, NYC KOM Reverse Up and Down
- 2/2/2021: Updated Watopia Figure 8 Reverse segment. Added misc London segments: Northumberland Ave Climb, Box Hill Climb from Richmond Park side, Fox Hill Descent, Up Fox, Down Box, Box Hill Descent, Up Box, Down Fox, Up Leith, Down Keith, Up Keith, Down Leith, Leith Hill Descent, Keith Hill Descent, Leith Hill Full Climb, Whitehall Rd, Classique Final 1km.
- 2/1/2021: added a pile of misc Innsbruck segments: Innsbruckring Reverse, Innsbruck KOM Forward Descent, Innsbruck KOM Up and Down Forward, Innsbruck KOM Reverse Descent, Innsbruck KOM Up and Down Reverse. Added The Über Pretzel from Start Pens. Added misc Yorkshire segments: Otley Rd Climb, KOM Forward Descent, KOM Reverse Descent, KOM Forward Up and Down, KOM Reverse Up and Down, Cornwall Rd Climb to Sprint Banner, Kent Rd Climb to Sprint Banner, Finishing Straightaway, Pot Bank Climb, Pot Bank Descent.
- 1/28/2021: added Libby Hill After Party: Libby Hill After Party, created new segments for Watopia’s Figure 8 Reverse and Volcano Circuit Banner to Banner because they went missing in the Great Strava Cull. Added misc Richmond segments: Finishing Straightaway, Finishing Straightaway Reverse, Governor St Climb, Governor St Descent, E Main St Climb, E Main St Descent, 23rd St KOM Reverse Descent, Libby Hill KOM Descent, KOM Reverse Descent, Sagan’s Winning Move. Created Watopia WBR Climbing Series.
- 1/27/2021: Watopia Epic KOM segments: Epic KOM Reverse w/Radio Tower, Epic KOM Reverse to Top of Radio Tower, Epic KOM Forward Descent, Epic KOM Forward – Up and Down, Epic KOM Forward to Top of Radio Tower, Epic KOM Forward – Up and Over w/Radio Tower, Epic KOM Reverse – Up and Over w/Radio Tower, Epic KOM Reverse Descent, Epic KOM Reverse – Up and Down, Epic KOM Reverse – Start to Jungle Intersection, Epic KOM Bypass – Eastbound, Epic KOM Bypass – Westbound, Epic KOM – Start to Bypass Intersection
See our complete list of verified Zwift Strava segments >
More to Come
There are a lot of segments that still need to be created. This includes running route segments, misc France and Paris segments, and plenty of misc segments in Watopia and elsewhere. Please be patient, and we’ll try to get them created ASAP.
Matching New Segments to Old Rides
One question that has popped up a lot recently is how to get your old Zwift rides to match new Strava segments. The answer to this is a bit weird.
It used to be that newly-created Zwift Strava segments wouldn’t match up with older efforts unless you did the “Activity Type Hack” explained below. But we’re finding that our new segments are in fact being matched to old activities… but it doesn’t seem consistent.
Example: I created the new Watopia Figure 8 Reverse segment on 1/28/2021. It is now showing activities from back in 2017, but has yet to match a single personal activity of mine.
The only reliable, quick way we’ve found to get Strava to match new segments to your old activity is the “Activity Type Hack” which can by done in the mobile app or via a web browser. It’s an easy process, but you have to do it for every activity you want new segments on, so that’s the pain.
- Edit your activity, changing it to any other type of activity besides Virtual Cycling
- Save the change
- Go in and change it back to Virtual Cycling. All done!
Here’s a video walk-through:
(If you use Strava in your web browser it’s even easier, as it says it’s changing the activity type, but it never actually does! So it attemps to change the activity type, and in doing so picks up new segments – but you don’t have to go back in and change it back to Virtual Cycling because the change doesn’t stick.)
Segment Length Requirement
Many Zwifters have requested the creation of segments that are too short. This includes some of the newer sprint sections that launched after Strava put this limit in place.
Strava’s limit seems to be 300m, which is ludicrous given their length limit doesn’t take gradient into account. Certain Alpe du Zwift turn-to-turn segments can’t be created due to the limit, and we all know those sections aren’t short!
We’ve reached out to Zwift and Strava about the possibility of lifting that limit for the Zwift Insider account, but haven’t heard anything back. Our guess is it’s a hard-coded limit that is system-wide, and they can’t easily fix it just for us.
Open to Suggestions
We asked people for segment ideas on the original Strava update post, and so far there are 228 comments! Please post your segment suggestions there so we have them all in one place.
Feel free to comment below if you have specific questions or ideas other than segment suggestions.
Ride on!
The 300m limit is unfortunate, I think there are some sprints that are too short as well.
Thank you for your effort, being chosen as the official strava segment creator sure has downsides. “With great power comes great responsibility” 😛
“Cometh the hour, cometh the Zwift Insider!”
Regarding segments. Can anyone explain the discrepancy between average speed of a certain segment when viewed in “analysis” compared to the “overview”.
On today’s ride with Fabian on “The Magneficent 8” I avg. 38.3 km/h (45:22 / 244watts) according to the overview. But when selecting “Analyze” avg. speed for the same segment is suddenly 40.2 km/h (still 45:22 / 244watts).
Same distance, time, watts… but 1.9 km/h faster!
Analyze:
I would think under analyzed Strava just ‘integrates’ the data points …
Thanks for all the work you’re doing on behalf of the community, Eric, you’re awesome!
I only noticed something had changed when I expected a PR om Innsbruck KOM and didn’t even get a bronze medal. For a second I was worried all the Zwift Insider segments had been deleted. When checking “My Results” though, I did indeed see all my previous rides.
Is this lack of “medals” on Strava related to the segment renaming?
I don’t fully understand what is being said in this article. For years, I have been hiding all segments that are not labeled with (Zwift Insider Verified). I have hidden 100s of segments. Lately I noticed that sometimes a route did not have any (Zwift Insider verfified) labelled segments. I thought you for some reason did not create these segments yet. Are you now saying that all the (Zwift Insider verified) segments are superseded by ones that are not marked as Zwift Insider Verfified and that all Zwift segments belong to Zwift Insider within Strava? So what does this mean… Read more »
Also, if its indeed true that all Zwift segments are now only from Zwift Imsider, then how come there is “Virtual TdF 2020 – stage 5 – la reine (Veloviewer)” as a segment?
Eric, thanks for all your work on these segments, over the years and especially since the shakeup. It’s insane that both Strava and Zwift are relying on a third-party volunteer to manage and maintain a key part of the infrastructure that tens of thousands of users on both platforms rely on every day. Your segments have always been the best ones out there, and the system is definitely a lot cleaner now that they are (almost) the only ones out there. Your hard work is much appreciated — keep fighting the good fight!
The segments on Strava are a complete waste of time. Unless you compare your own times in a free ride the leaderboard is completely messed up by the ‘keep together’ function on meetups. Many times riders get tailed off their group and ‘fly’ up climbs or through segments as the game tries to get them back in contact with their meetup. Someone in my meetup the other day did 25kph up the radio tower, which is of course completely unrealistic
Thanks for doing this. It is a good thing to have just the needed segments than a mess of segments on strava. Use yours to see how I am improving on zwift rides.
Well I used the activity hack to convert my real ride of 22-Dec into a Virtual Ride, which gives me the Yorkshire KOM segment and a lot of riding that is unique in virtual Yorkshire. However, I don’t seem to be able to convert it back into a normal ride! So maybe it is a deliberate Strava ‘feature’.
If you have the original file, you can just re-upload it.
May be able to download the file from Strava (not if it was a fit file previously) and re-upload. You’ll have to change the activity Id in the file so that it’s considered a duplicate (which Strava then won’t add)
this Is one of the few strava changes that I really like. People make so many stupid segments, it’s good to have a more controlled reduced list.
While there were too many segments on Zwift, we went from one extreme to another. Eric do a great job opening new ones. But I really miss many race segments. Like two times Richmond or for today’s TTT 3 times hilly route reverse. Therefore, I see this deletion of segments as a huge step back. Now I can not compare our team effort with older rides easily.
Thank you for your work in adding segments back for the notable places – it’s much appreciated!
Just what we need, Zwift to take control of segments with do doubt a >18 month zoon approach to all things. Too intens for me
On desktop, can’t you just refresh activity achievements? Then you don’t have to do activity hack
That works for IRL segments, but hasn’t worked at all consistently for Zwift segments in my recent tests. Sadly.
once the majority of segments have been made, maybe we can convince strava to recalculate all segments on virtual rides, because as of now the hack method is pretty tedious, i can ‘t imagine doing it on all my rides. right now i’m just focusing on races….
That method is VERY long, and does not work. Believe me – just force an activity change (it won’t stick in the Browser version) and the segments will be matched anew.
Forcing an activity changes brings in new segments but after doing a load i noticed some rides weren’t adding new segments in.I clicked on refresh activity achievements and this then worked. So it would appear it might need both methods to be sure. Surely with more new segments to come Strava need to sort out a way of matching them to old rides.
Eric, are you not worried that Strava will react in not a good way, by you adding a lot more segments? Or have they given you carte Blanche to do so? Seems like the reason why they cleaned up the segments because they’re was too many.
So the descent segments actually show up? I know IRL, depending on the grade, they’d be flagged as dangerous and hidden at the bottom. I swear I’ve seen the same before with Zwift. Unless they’re allowing them for virtual rides.
I’m not worried about Strava reacting poorly, no. The number of segments I’ll create is minuscule compared to what existed before.
Not sure on the descent thing! I DO know I’ve had Zwift segments flagged as hazardous before, which is always a hoot.
So, Eric, is this going to lead to the ultimate Veloviewer leaderboard which contains all Zwift Insider verified segments whereby we can establish who is the best Zwifter of all time 😉
ABSOLUTELY
I was thrilled about the cleanup of segments. Not so thrilled about you going on a rampage adding every new segment your users can think up. Please don’t just replace everybody else’s mess with your own new mess. There’s no reason for having every little feature on Watopia covered by a Strava segment 🙁
Or maybe it’s not just you going on a rampage – are you sure, you are the only one who can create segments, Eric? I was getting a bit annoyed after ZRL this week with no less than 12 segments on each lap, but they don’t seem to be yours (I didn’t create any…)
In the time it’s taken you to post twice* you could have hidden the unwanted segments in at least two rides.
*whine
The Fulgaz ones aren’t mine, obvs. The others are.
Yorkshire is a bit unique, because every full lap has several key spots. So yeah, you’ll get several segments per lap. Far different from the 50+ that used to exist, though…
So someone else can create segments it seems like. I’m afraid that will just lead to a new mess, then.
Also, I’m far from “going on a rampage” and I’m certainly not creating every segment people can think up. I’m creating sensible segments… just going beyond the standard “in game segment” list I had stuck to previously.
Glad to hear that – I just saw my rides go from very few segments to over-crowded again in no time. But if you create all the sensible segments. And someone else does too and… then the mess will soon be back. Do you know, why there are segments from others than you?
Thanks for all this segment work, Eric. I have more of a Strava question than a virtual segment question, but they’re related: When Zwift changed the Jungle Circuit from tarmac to gravel, the segment became, in general, a whole lot slower for everyone. Thus we still have recorded times on Strava from the pre-gravel days on the segment, but in practice it’s no longer the same segment (different resistance characteristics). Speaking for myself, I am nowhere near able to match those older times despite being currently a lot more fit and speedy in Zwift in general than I was. Is… Read more »
It’s a good question, and it would be nice if we could differentiate – but there really isn’t any way to.
Hi Eric, do you know why Strava activities before Dec 2017 have been mapped to these new segments, but no newer activities? Seems a bit odd?
I agree, it’s odd! I’m wondering if Strava realized it was reading in old data for new segments, then turned that off because it was too much load on their servers.
Thanks for your work on this Eric. I can’t believe Strava can’t have an intern write a script to walk backwards through all Zwift activities and provoke the segment refresh without expecting users to go back through potentially 5 years of Flat Route
Thank you, thank you, thank you for all the work you are doing!
Please don’t pollute it to the point that there are a hundred segments for a 10mile ride like before…
Thanks for the work Eric! Could you perhaps have a look at Northumberland Avenue results? Lots of people seem to be going “up” the 4.1% climb at 30mph and it doesn’t actually match their ride route. Not sure what is going on there but it seems way off.
Damn… you’ve been busy
Great work Eric and very much appreciated! One thing missing, that was flagged up during a rather painful Mega Pretzel Gran Fondo ride today, was the lack of a segment taking in the Epic KOM reverse from the jungle start and likewise the descent on the way back into the jungle. I guess this is because it cuts out the start of the reverse Epic KOM as a result of coming from the jungle. Given this section of road is a 15 minute+ climb for most and a long descent coming back it would be great to have those two… Read more »
You can see on the activity here https://www.strava.com/activities/4749724584 the ride segments skip from the Jungle Climb all the way to the Epic KOM descent, missing out 5km of climbing as a result.
…and 5km of descending on the way back, including the fan favourite kickers on the way down 😰
Thanks for your effort!
Wow. Can’t believe you’re spending time on this. Kudos to you for undertaking a totally thankless job you didn’t want. Outside of a few major KOM’s why do people give a flip about Strava segments on Zwift. Maybe the Zwift folks should just fix the stupid 30 day PR thing and make it a permanent PR instead
To track progress, obviously. For example I do the Bologna Time Trial and I like to see how I compare to myself and to other riders on the climb versus the flat part of the time trial. Also Zwift numbers are useless with a 30 day limit. With so many routes, I often don’t do the same KOM more than once in a 30 day period. So Strava segments are a big part of the experience, and not just on official KOM efforts. Another example is the Epic KOM + radio tower combo. In race-type events, we pace the whole… Read more »
I found a segment that is not renamed (yet) https://strava.app.link/YHFY7ItGJdb
Thanks so much for doing all of this work. You have rescued Strava on their behalf. I would have certainly not renewed my membership with them without your “improvements”
When descending from the Radio Tower the Epic KOM descent doesn’t seem to match (starts before the Radio Tower turn off perhaps?) and there is no full descent segment from the Radio Tower. This would be great, keep up the sterling work! 👍
What happened to comparing segment efforts of followers? Presumably Strava disabled that feature?
Is there a way to stop segments vein assigned on rides that are stay together meet ups? The leaderboards are full of these and they cause real skewing and aren’t representative of true efforts
You can edit your ride on strava to be followers only or private and it won’t show up on leaderboards, but no, there is no way to make these types of rides not show up on leaderboards globally for everyone.