I went to the last SBRA meeting on Sept. 6th. The SBRA board has banned Strava from SBRA rides. The details will be in the next issue of the newsletter, Rolling Wheels. Pres Bob Devito announced no ride leader may mention Strava in their ride descriptions, nor may they participate in Strava segments or allow any rider to participate. If any rider participates, they are off the ride, stricken from the Ride Sheet and not permitted back on the ride after completing the Strava segment. The reason given is safety, insurance costs and fear of litigation.

IMO the board went too far with this ban. They rushed to make a rule based on how the lower SBRA ride classifications ride are conducted. When you ride one behind the other at a slow pace and always behind the ride leader of course chasing Strava segments would be disruptive. What they don't realize is that B+/A cyclists race on SBRA rides. Strava or not we race. We race up hills. We race rolling hills. We race long straights. One particular example comes to mind about 2 weeks ago. Towards the end of SBRA B+/A ride we turned on to Woodside heading East around 20 mph. We had about 2.5 miles to our next turn. A couple of riders took off. Then a bunch of us took off. We raced reaching speed of 30 mph twice and averaged just under 27 mph for the 2.4 miles. Then we did a wait up for the rest of the group. About half the racers were Strava enthusiasts. Half were not. In fact the SBRA board's biggest anti-Strava member was right up front in this race. He was not Strava segment hunting. He was just racing . . . like we do. Like we did before Strava. Like we will now that Strava is banned. Oh, BTW, one of us did win that Strava segment and still holds the overall KOM (King of the Mountain).

I think the board would have done enough by declaring that the SBRA Board does not support or encourage Strava and that all references to Strava are not permitted in ride descriptions. Also that it is up to each ride leader whether they allow chasing Strava segments or not.

One final point, Strava can also be useful as an individual training tool to compare how they are progressing in their hill training even on slower SBRA rides. The SBRA Board could have chosen to temporarily suspend Strava use until they investigated it further. I think they rushed to judgement.