Willbird

They said earlier that if you had $40 credit you need only spend 10 to hit 50 for free shipping,

hokie cycler

I rode 1:22 (moving time) on Thursday after work, uploaded to Strava from my Garmin, signed up for the program and today I have $1.50 credit on my account. I'm on board, 3 hour Saturday ride in the morning!

LesterOfPuppets

Nice! They rounded up for me on yesterday's ride.

• 1:24:52 moving time.

You earned $1.50 on "Afternoon Ride".

Drew Eckhardt 

Got my $2 for 2:02 moving time on Thursday not resetting between my morning training ride and commute.

Got $4 for my 4:02 Tierra Bella 100k wrapping up my rest week. Good thing I had to ride to get my wrist band before proceeding to ride.

redtires

This program is NOT going to be good for family time.... But at least you'll save some money to buy flowers for your spouse because you've been riding so damn much!

diphthong

i think it's a brilliant move by competitive cyclist. strava has a huge potential customer base. even if only 5% of strava users sign up,
competitive cyclist will be the first cycling shop website many of us hit. familiarity/loyalty with their website will bring repeat business plus
trigger impulse buying purchases. dunno about you but if i've got a $20 credit from cc and there's a pair of identical bibs or a jersey or a few websites,
pretty sure i'll end up applying the credit and buying it from cc vs performance or a multitude of other websites. short term pain, long term gain.
if it plays out like competitive cyclist perhaps envisions it, they'll garner more market share and put a bunch of competitors out of business.
it's essentially a rewards program for strava users ensuring loyalty for both strava and cc. brilliant.

prathmann

Yes, that appears to be the case. My grocery store rides that are a little over 30 minutes riding time each are not getting any store credit. Shouldn't matter since I'll hit the $40/month limit anyway, but I'll stop uploading those short utility rides to Strava.

goenrdoug

Indeed. People describe Strava to non-cyclists as "Facebook for Cyclists" but, the problem is, it's NOT. The inability to direct-message other users, the inability to share stuff other than activities, etc. all make Strava not-quite-there as far as a social media platform.

From the looks of it, CC is trying to fill that gap. I didn't explore it too much (yet?) but when I setup an account, they provided a spot to make a profile with a very Facebook/Instagram/etc. -ish page with a profile image, details about me, etc.

If this little free-money program can boost their sales by getting potential customers 'in the front door' AND get a bunch of new user registrations into their fledgling social media platform for people who would rather share their stories of, "Hey, look at me! I did something exercise-related" in a dedicated like-minded arena (as opposed to on Facebook where they might have business associates, relatives, etc. for whom lycra-clad photos might be mocked/unappreciated) then hey, CC may have a huge WIN on its hands.

rpecot

The jig is up:

tekhna

Lol. Guess the accountants were wrong. Or they think they can bleed this promotion for longer by making it "exclusive"

I've already basically given up on it, my short rides don't get counted so there's no real way to hit the 40 hours.

Seattle Forrest

Bummer. I was thinking I should sign up for strava to take advantage of this. I could get some free GP4000s.

justin1138

I'm up to $11.50 so far! woot!!!

Leinster

GP4Ks are $55, and the maximum you can accumulate is $80 over 2 months. You'd have to buy them 1 at a time.

I'm down to 1 ride/week at the moment with other things taking priority, so I hope them closing out signups doesn't mean the scheme is going to be shortlived.

prathmann

Or they're being sensibly cautious. I'm sure they've been seeing lots of people signing up and the potential credit $$ keep growing. Someone at the company is sure to question how much this might cost them if most of the people joining the program just end up getting $80 worth of free stuff every couple months and don't buy anything else. Makes sense for them to limit signups until they can get an indication of the buying habits of the customers in this program. Great if they get lots of new customers who are enticed by getting a bit of a discount on substantial purchases, but not so good if the new customers just opt for what they can get free.

Drew Eckhardt 

Unless you don't reset your bike computer between rides.

Moving time 2:01:53
Elapsed Time 12:00:40

tekhna

Yeah, I'm sure they are. I'm just mildly amused because the business minds of the 41 were adamant this was Business 101 with no possible downside.

I've been wondering about that--is there a big battery hit to leaving Strava active in the background?

Drew Eckhardt 

It's probably OK if you turn off your GPS - that drinks battery.

I use a Garmin Edge 500 for cycling and Samsung Galaxy S5 sport for other things so that's just an educated guess.

Dunbar

It does sort of remind me of the 5% cash back credit cards for gas, groceries and restaurants that went away when the housing market crashed. It was like free money. Of course, that was back when you could earn a 4-5% interest rate in a money market account.

redtires

A big thanks to the OP then.....glad I got in when I did. Up to $14 btw.

velociraptor

Seems to be a bit of sour grapes in this thread with a few members poised and ready to proclaim "failure!" for CC.

I guess it may be difficult for some to understand how a program like this would work...

But closing the signups isn't an indication that the bean counters were suddenly "scared" of some unforeseen runaway cost.

No, in my conversations with sales, the company is extremely excited about the program.

They view it as incredible success. Every cycling/sports-related blog and forum is talking about it. Posters are bragging about how much they've earned so far. Even r e d d i t has several threads about it!

My understanding is that the sheer volume of participants has revealed some bugs in their ride-parsing algorithm.

Fixes to affected accounts require manual edits - substantial man-hours – so they're temporarily limiting access until they get it sorted out.

But I say, who cares? If you are lucky enough to be enrolled, just relax and rack up the credits!

CC & Strava will sort out their business... Our business is to just ride!

Oh, and to keep talking about it – because that is the point

Stravacyclist79

"ENTRY IS CURRENTLY CLOSED"

​Sucks to be me right now.

DXchulo

+1 on that. I hope they keep the program going for more than 1 month.

Leinster

I'm sure they will. It'd be a ferocious climbdown after saying "your points expire on May 31st" to turn around and say "and that's when all of them expire 'cos we're not doing it any more."

kevmk81

So I ride at *least* an hour a day. I've started since this thread was started. Even have had a 3 hour day, 2 hour day, 1 1/2 hour day, etc.. but my credit is only at 9.50. That doesn't make sense. Anyone else noticing their credits not being true to how much you are riding?

tekhna

FWIW it least on Android hitting stop in Strava after your morning commute and then hitting start 8 hours later doesn't seem to wear down your battery overly.