Strava Danger

Bethany Allbetter likes to run around the Pewsey Valley. She’s often out there on a Sunday morning taking in the beautiful hills on a long run. But one day last weekend she was met by an unwanted fellow jogger.

He said I gave him kudos for a run six weeks ago, which he’d called “Steaming along the disused railway”. I thought it was a funny name and I was impressed with the pace he got up that hill. Now he thinks I love him.

He gives me kudos for everything, even a run where I ran 500 metres before stopping in McDonald’s for a shit before getting the bus home. He’s like a combination of a teacher who gives praise for everything I do, because really he really thinks I’m a failure, and a creepy uncle constantly seeking new and inventive ways to walk in on me when I’m getting changed.

He said “I’d like to take you up the mothballs back door”, I know that is the name of a hilly segment near me, but still, ewwwwwww.”

Another female Pewsey runner, Rachel Collin, has also met with unwanted attention of “Strava Puppies”. I named a run “Wonderful run through the woodlands today, the bluebells look gorgeous”. Later that night I found a bunch of them left at my front door by some guy, with a note asking me to follow him and a Twitter name that still makes me mini-sick.

But local man Donald, who has been accused of being a Strava Puppy, said “I think we are the victims here. I mean if you choose the option to block out the 100-metre radius of your home, then essentially you are asking for me to come and run a heart-shaped segment around your house and name it after you, maybe alongside a photo of you sunbathing in your back garden. If it’s on the Internet then it’s fair game.