With Strava, the race never ends: 24/7, anywhere you want. It was only a matter of time before they got sued.
In certain circles, the Strava app has taken off, particularly the road cycling and certain mountain bike communities. If you’ve not heard of Strava, it uses GPS technology and a smart phone app to record a ride, which is then downloaded to their site. The downloaded route and time essentially becomes a race course, and other users can then ride the same loop whenever they want and compare times. It feeds a certain competitive psyche, and it has certainly caught on (with 10’s of thousands of users).
It has posed some unexpected problems.
Land managers in the U.S. have caught on that it is a pretty easy way to catch speeders on trails with posted speed limits. Since they can’t actually ticket the the ‘user name’, they can target trail patrols or outright close access to trails that are proving dangerous from a multi-use standpoint. Bad news. Some land managers have petitioned Strava to have their park’s trail removed from the site (with no luck). Bike magazine editorials also lament the ‘every ride is a race’ mentality gripping some areas, trying to shave seconds off a personal best or beat some stranger online.
More interestingly yet, Strava been sued for negligence. The family of a San Francisco 41 year old man that was killed by a car while trying to defend his Strava ‘King of the Mountain’ cycling title for a particular route is suing Strava. According to Bicycle Retailer magazine, the suit “claims Strava was negligent because it failed to warn cyclists competing in the KOM challenge that the road conditions were not suited for racing and that it was unreasonably dangerous; didn't take adequate measures to ensure the KOM challenges took place on safe courses; and encouraged dangerous behavior.”
The suit states ““It was foreseeable that the failure to warn of dangerous conditions, take safety measures, and encourage dangerous behavior would cause Kim Flint Jr. to die since Kim Flint Jr. relied on [Strava] to host a safe challenge.” As the plaintiff is asking for (only) $25,000, this will likely be settled rather than see court.
Strava does encourage racing, which does not necessarily create a duty to care for those who choose to do so. Their website, though, has no explicit safety statement (not yet at least – the case is scheduled to go before a judge Nov. 21) but I expect will have one shortly. They do have a “what we believe” statement that reads “We Know The Rules: Laws and rules are created for our protection. Cycling, running and swimming are inherently dangerous and following the law, and common sense, when it comes to traffic, weather, or conditions, reduces our odds of getting hurt or hurting others. It is as simple as that.” Their note continues with much more regard for online risk than activity risk. We’ll see how this plays out.
Details of the lawsuit can be found here: http://www.bicycleretailer.com/sites/default/files/downloads/article/StravaSuit.pdf