Interview with Strava Co-Founder Michael Horvath

In December on a trip back to the US I had to opportunity to visit the Strava headquarters, in downtown San Francisco.

Being from a digital agency, the office looked familiar to me - a big open space with lots of Macs, Ikea desks, and coffee mugs. A tech team, a business development team, a user experience team, and a kitchen in the back.

The Strava office looks ordinary...

...but does your office have a bike rack?

What was different was the big bike rack and loft area with training equipment. Oh, and also the signed poster of Greg LeMond at the entrance.

I caught up with Michael Horvath, co-founder and Fearless Leader.

Here's Michael on the right

What gave you the idea of Strava? Was the original concept more or less the same as it is now? How has it changed or evolved since that first idea?
I started Strava with Mark Gainey in 2009. We both rowed crew at Harvard and thrived on the camaraderie and motivation of training with teammates. The idea for Strava came simply from our need to recreate those positive forces in our lives when we no longer had the structure and support of a team around us. In its simplest form, we imagined a "virtual locker room" where we could share workouts among our athlete friends. With GPS technology and mobile apps things got interesting very quickly when we bumped into Davis Kitchel who had been working on some similar ideas. Together we created the ability for friends to compare times on rides and runs automatically. It's not just maps and stats at that point, but a motivational experience that makes all the time we spend training and racing, much of it alone, more fun and more social.


How did you get the first prototype running? Who built it? Was that a very rudimentary project that grew on its own or did you have a formal business plan and fund it from the beginning?
Once we created the prototype with Davis Kitchel, we convinced two friends and Strava users, Mark Shaw and Chris Donahue, to join the team and upgrade the prototype into a publicly available website.  Things were pretty informal back then and a lot of that early engineering work was done in Mark’s living room.  In 2010, we took our first round of outside financing, began hiring more aggressively and by 2011 we started to see rapid growth in our user base.


I once searched Strava for the names of every 2012 Olympic cycling athlete in Strava and found quite a few there. Who are some of the most famous cyclists that use Strava?
There are quite a few pros on Strava like Tim Johnson, Ted King, Lea Davison and Taylor Phinney to name just a few.  You can see a longer list here: http://app.strava.com/pros.  It’s important to note that elite athletes enjoy Strava because the product is useful to them - it’s fun and motivating and also provides a way to connect with fans.  We’ve never approached an athlete and offered a bucket of cash in exchange for using Strava.


I work in a digital agency in Singapore and am very aware of user experience and the processes needed to create a good one. The Strava UX and interface is excellent, especially considering its complexity. Was it hard to put together a team that could do this so well?
We realized early on that one of the ways we could distinguish Strava from the competition was through stellar design.  I think with any function, the first hire is the most difficult.  If you can hire someone truly talented, he or she can attract a like-minded team.  I believe that we have one of the strongest design teams in the world and they are truly passionate about delivering a world-class experience to our users.


Where do you see Strava going in the future? It's very clear that you have passed your tipping point in getting new registrations, segments set up, and the daily usage of Strava, as I see it growing organically here in SE Asia. So that will continue. But where else can you see Strava going? 
We remain focused on the same objectives as when we started: Serve the athlete with a fun and motivating user experience built on really great software that works and is simple to use.  In the short term, that means adding more functionality for runners and we have plans for adding triathlon in the near future.  We take each sport seriously and try to build the functionality that someone dedicated to that sport would value and say “this is built just for me!”


I'm sure your analytics and the sheer amount of data you collect are fascinating. Do you have any thoughts on this? Maybe data visualization, or even just the ability for a user to compare his performance (segment-independent) with others of his age, weight, sex on a chart?
We have no shortage of data so the challenge for us is finding that perfect balance between performance features and social features.  We think that balance is critical and part of what makes Strava unique.


I know you have built an API. What are some of the most interesting uses of the API others have implemented?
Paul Mach built the site raceshape.com using our API.  We thought it was so interesting that we offered him a job and were happy to get him onto our Engineering team last year.  We’ve been incorporating some of the features he built for raceshape (like additional performance analysis) into Strava.


Does it surprise you to see segments in places like Easter Island, Antarctica, and Siberia? (There's one in N. Korea but I think it's erroneous!)
Our mission is to serve and motivate the global community of athletes so we’re ecstatic to see Strava being used all over the world.


Finally, I'd like to add that I didn't think I was a very competitive person, but now with Strava I am far more competitive than I thought. Also, by using Strava, I feel I am making a kind of social commitment or promise, and feel obliged and motivated to ride and run. Would it be a stretch to say that Strava has made the world a better (healthier) place?
There are a lot of different ways to describe Strava and what the product does but one thing we hear over and over is “Strava helps me get out of bed in the mornings.”  Whether it’s performance related (competing on segments, going for PRs, scrutinizing your Suffer Score) or social (receiving kudos and comments, knowing your friends will see your rides and runs), Strava provides motivation and an extra layer of enjoyment for athletes.  We’re really proud of that and hope that we are improving people’s lives in some small way.

Half Marathon with almost no Training

I detest running. I only started running as a way to keep in shape while I was off the bike due to bike-specific knee pain.

To me, running is the most painful, boring, worst, and hardest form of exercise. But I do it to keep in shape for road riding, which I do to keep in shape for cross-country mountain biking. That's the hierarchy. Running is only a necessity; a means to support my off-road habit.

Biking is thrilling. And fun. It is fast. You can coast. You can jump. You can skid. Cycling is awesome. Running is horrible. Or so I thought.

Over time, I started getting some degree of satisfaction from running: I set PRs on Strava, saw new things that I'd miss while cycling, and even did okay in the running leg of a triathlon with my brother and a friend.

Then Strava came out with their February 2013 Half Marathon challenge. When I saw this I figured I should give it a try. Running may suck, but here's another reachable goal, another key accomplishment, another physical limit - that I knew I could conquer. So why not?

The challenge

On the 1st of February, 2013, I had only done two runs the whole year (okay, the past month). The second of those was 13 km, the longest I had ever run in my life. An accomplishment at the time, but nowhere near the level I needed to be for a half-marathon.

So I went into the Runners World forum and asked around. At my age, with my level of fitness, and very limited background running, could I do it? The unanimous response was NO. There wasn't enough training time left for me, and I didn't have the base. I wasn't ready.

So the night of 1st February, before going to sleep and after a few pints, I made up my mind: I was going to run a half marathon the next morning.

I searched my Strava routes and found one that was perfect: 21.7 km, starting at my house, and ending at my house. A half marathon is 21.2 km.

I looked at my times and paces, and set a goal: 2 hours and 30 minutes. No stopping allowed, except for red lights or to eat/drink/take a leak. Walking allowed.

I had been experiencing excruciating knee pain for the past year, but it seemed to have subsided. I was very aware that it could come back during this run - during this test. That's all this was - a test.

I've been known to be a bit foolish at times in attempts to push myself too hard (see a previous post of mine where I describe how I put myself in the hospital in only 7 km). I knew I was at some risk. Risk of aggravating my as-yet-untested-and-maybe-unhealed knees, risk of dehydration, risk of twisting my ankle alone - anything.

The only support I would have was my Nathan running belt with two 10 oz bottles, $20 for a taxi, my phone, my Road ID, Hammer Endurolytes (electrolyte tablets), and the most important one: stashed water and food at the halfway point.

I woke up at 5:30 am, no alarm, and drove to the gas station by my house. I bought a banana, a bottle of water, and a sports drink. I also put peanut butter and raisins on a piece of whole wheat bread, and put it all in a plastic bag.

I drove to the halfway point, and stashed the bag under a giant tropical leaf by the side of the road. This was going to be my lifeline.

The start of the run was unremarkable. I suppose most half-marathons begin with a lot of noise, celebration, and hype. Like a bike race, there would be hundreds of other athletes, rallied into a frenzy, all competing for the best starting place, racing against each other more-so than the clock.

There would be checkpoints along the way with water, nutrition, and even medical support. There would be fans and spectators, cheering and encouraging the runners, friends and strangers alike.

For my run there was none of this, no medal, no placing, no encouragement. Just me, my shoes, and the road.

I tried to pace myself. In mountain bike races I can't help but get overly-fast starts, trying to secure a leading position in the pack. Pacing is not something I'm good at. But after 3 km, 5 km, and soon 10 km, I felt fine.

Ecstatic, in fact.

Immediately after my first half-marathon

The dreaded labor I associated running with had not even reared its ugly head. I was not bored. I was not tired. I was not counting miles, or wishing it to end. I had reached a running nirvana I had never experienced before.

And my mind was clear. No gears to worry about, or drafting to try to get right. I wasn't glancing at my Garmin every 30 seconds like I do on the road bike. I wasn't burdened with the thought and worry of traffic behind me, being on the sidewalk. Running, all of a sudden, became fulfilling.

At the 11th km, halfway, I retrieved my food and drinks. I refilled my bottles, strapped the banana to my hip pack, and started eating the peanut butter and raisin sandwich. It took me a good two minutes to stop, unwrap the bag, transfer the drinks, and start eating.

As I set off, I felt a tightness and burning in my hamstrings. I had cooled down too much. You can see in the image of my splits below how fast I was running up until km 11, and then how I slowed down. I believe it was because of that [critical] food stop.

Look how much my pace suffered after a 2 min food stop (km 11)

At around the 17th km, I felt my pace slow and the running became a lot harder. But I was almost home and knew I had it in the bag.

The last 2 km were the hardest, as one would imagine, but not the torture I had perceived.

I finished in 2:09, well ahead of my goal. My pace was 5:58 / km.

My new goal now is to do this in under 2 hours.

The final result

Strava have more challenges coming up. The next one is in March, and is a 20 miler. April will be a full marathon. Is there enough time for me to train up for them? Probably not, but I'll probably do them anyway.