Interesting data from Strava...

[KTM Bike Industries UK]

Well who'd have predicted this...

"Most importantly, cyclists don’t spend all day riding at 30mph. We asked the folks at Strava to pull the average speed of its entire, massive rider database to get a real-world idea of how fast we’re really going. As it turns out, male cyclists ride at just 15.6mph on average; for women, it’s 13.4mph. Even if you assume that the typical aero road helmet buyer moves faster than that – say, in a racing situation – we decided to evaluate these helmets for all-around use since that’s how they’re more likely to be ridden."

So the 15.6mph legal limit on the pedelec's makes even more sense, as it essentially allows riders to get up to speed more quickly, and maintain that average speed on hills.

I was surprised to see the 2 numbers being so similar.

 

[Deleted member 4366]

That's not a representative sample of all cyclists. It's mainly very fit trained cyclists that are always trying to beat their records. I reckon that I'm a lot fitter than Mr average, and able to pedal a lot harder, but my average speed on a non-electric road bike is 12.6 mph.

 

[KirstinS]

I would add to that and say "most" occasional cyclists ride mountain bikes on the road with cheap non locking front suspension and huge knobby tires. Very inefficient basically

You'd be lucky to get more than 13mph out of those types

 

[Artstu]

Just because the maximum assist speed happens to be equal to the average Strava users average speed doesn't really mean much.
For that 15,6 mph average their on the flat average speed will be above 20 mph for a lot of the time.
Now if you could pull the data from the average e-bike rider I'd be amazed to see an average speed of any more than 12 mph.

 

[KTM Bike Industries UK]

I think it actually means quite a bit... all the legislation is set to that speed because its whats seen to be necessary for a bike to be classed as a bicycle.

So the fact that even the "serious" bicycle users who populate strava average this speed to me shows that the speed set by the law seems logical.

Certainly when I've used my eBike on a commute I know well and compared it to my road racing bikes. The top speed is lower, but lots of the time I'd normally be below 15mph on my road bike, I wasn't on the eBike, so my average is higher on the eBike, and I arrive at work faster having used less energy, even though I was on an eMTB, with bigger tyres.

So I suppose my point was that the Strava data looks to support the law makers, setting that speed as the maximum assist speed, based on it being classed as a bicycle. I was just shocked to see the numbers were so close.

 

[anotherkiwi]

Now if you could pull the data from the average e-bike rider I'd be amazed to see an average speed of any more than 12 mph.

I have been doing a lot of pottering around town in holiday season traffic (stationary lines of cars) and my average speed is now reading 20.7 kph (12.86 mph).

I have yet to compare my speedo with speed from my tablets GPS, a speed trap radar told me I was doing 48 kph the other day (downhill) while the speedo was reading 44 kph...

 

[Artstu]

I crunched some of my stats, a double assist speed upped my average speed by a bit under 4 mph. So now I'm on normal assist speed my average speed has dropped from 16.3 mph to 12.4 mph.

So an assist speed of around 30 mph (roughly) would see me matching that 15.6 mph average. So much for this pointless comparison of the legal assist speed and the average Strave users speed.

Another consequence of the reduction in assist speed has been a 300% reduction in how many miles I now ride an e-bike.

 

[JamesW]

what you shouldn't forget is that children as young as 14 can ride an ebike - would you want a 14year old going at 30mph under their own power on the flat?

 

[Artstu]

what you shouldn't forget is that children as young as 14 can ride an ebike - would you want a 14year old going at 30mph under their own power on the flat?

I was in no way suggesting a 30 mph assist speed, merely making an observation about the speed I'd need to hit that magic 15.6 mph speed.

Oh and I do ride with two kids who are well under 14 years old, who both hit over 30 mph on their bikes. Those two were part of the team that won the area finals on Tuesday, beating a potential 400 other Derbyshire schools.

 

[JamesW]

Hitting a speed and staying at a speed are 2 different things entirely. Everyone likes to go fast down hill then apply the brakes to stop getting out of control, going too fast along the flat when you haven't had enough experience on a bike could be really dangerous / fatal for someone. We all know what teenagers can be like.

I'm more concerned with people too young to drive having the ability to go faster than / as fast as cars through villages and town centres and become a menace causing the ebike to be banned. 15mph is a good speed. I try to make it my minimum speed on my journey as it shows me the benefit of having the bike by flattening the hills and reducing the time that way! Average was about 14.6 I think on my old undongled bike.

 

[Gubbins]

I wonder what percentage of bicycle users actually use strava? Mist riders I stop to chat with have never heard of it.

 

[Gubbins]

I have just tried the electric bike tab on a previous strava ride. It removed all my segment times from the leader board, but still leaves the ride in my stats which now shows no segments because I haven't yet made any and no other e-biker has been this way....

 

[Artstu]

I have just tried the electric bike tab on a previous strava ride. It removed all my segment times from the leader board, but still leaves the ride in my stats which now shows no segments because I haven't yet made any and no other e-biker has been this way....

ooh well spotted Phill, I wonder how long that's been there? Flipping heck I'm going to be busy creating some new e-bike segments now. ...

 

[Gubbins]

Actually it was someone else on another board. But for some reason you can only do this eddit on a pc, It is missing from the Android app. So, in areas where there are a lot of e bikes we can get a better idea if how the bikes stack up without any bleating from the sheep.

 

[Artstu]

I asked them for an e-bike category when I first started using Strava, they did say it was something they'd consider. Hopefully they'll tell me how slow I was to realise they'd created the category.

 

[anotherkiwi]

Did some out of town riding et voila! my average shot up to the legal limit -> 25 kph. Which is plenty for me for now. And this latest battery charge (the fourth?) is heading for over 90 km!!! Ciclotek are only claiming 75 km per charge for the 10.4 Amp Samsung battery - I think that this must be proof that I am still supplying serious rider Watts to the pedals...