There have been cases, warn police, of bike thieves targeting specific houses: tipped off to the location of expensive machines by rides logged on sites like Strava. It's better to be safe than sorry, and Strava makes it very easy to be safe. Go to the privacy tab on the settings page and you can create a "privacy zone" around your house, office or favourite lock-up spot. Rides that start or finish in one of those zones will then be clipped so thieves can't work out exactly where your bike lives. The distance and average speed of your rides remain unchanged.  3. Get a little boost  One for the unscrupulous, which we don't condone and include here purely for educational purposes...  Upload your rides to Digital EPO before logging them on Strava and you can "juice" them to make it appear that you rode faster than you actually did. Bump the average speed up one per cent for a subtle advantage, or go the whole hog and steal all the KOMs in your county - but you're only cheating yourself.  It's not wise to keep all your digital eggs in one basket; if Strava ceases to exist you could lose a treasure trove of bragging rights fond memories. Garmin Connect is a great option if you want to diversify. The only problem is that uploading your GPS files to both sites takes twice as long - unless you use Garmin Sync to automatically do half the work.  Email signatures are normally functional affairs reserved for job titles, phone numbers and addresses. But wouldn't it be great if you could somehow use yours to show off the fact that you hold the King of the Mountain across the local Tesco car park? VeloViewer will compile a small graphic (see above) concisely listing all of your Strava achievements.  Segments can be a great motivator, but that's just one element of Strava. The site also runs regular challenges that last from a single day up to a month. They normally involve running or riding a certain distance, or climbing a certain height. Whatever the challenge, it can be the difference between taking a long weekend lie-in or getting out and putting in some miles.  Sometimes GPS computers can have a momentary wobble in the presence of tall buildings or when satellite reception is weak; SNAP (Segment Needs A Polish) helps you to correct those errors. You can drag wayward waypoints in your ride back onto the path you actually took.  David Millar came back from a broken collarbone early last year to win stage 12 of the Tour de France. One fan took to Strava to pay tribute, using San Fransisco's grid layout as a guide to virtually etch "Millar Time" across the city. This might not be as easy if you live in the UK with its higgledy-piggledy road networks, but that just adds to the challenge.  What is Strava for if not competing mercilessly with friends and colleagues? This tool makes squaring up to one another easy, even if you don't ride together: enter your "athlete number" (which is in the address bar when you view your profile) and that of one or more other riders. It then searches through the archives and finds segments that you've all recorded times for, laying out the results out for all to see.  10. Drop off the grid  Perhaps the best Strava tip I can recommend is to take a day off, leave the GPS at home and enjoy a ride at your own pace with nobody peering over your shoulder: sometimes it's nice to take it easy.
Strava has forever changed cycling, for better or worse. The website tracks   you via GPS and publicly ranks your best time on "segments" of   road along with other users. Now even a short trip to the supermarket has an   element of competition. We look at ten of the best tips and tricks to get   the most out of it.