If you have been a Strava user for some time then you likely have a small mountain of useful workout data locked up on the platform. While Strava does a good job of displaying this data, and Strava Premium Subscription extends this, there are still some ways to display data that simply do not make sense to build into the base product. This may be because the product and development team for Strava is relatively small, given that the app services 100M users. It might also mean that the 100M users of Strava are so diverse that it is hard to build something for everyone without risking overloading users with too many options.
If you want to dive into your workout stats then add ons like StatsHunters, which we review below, are a solid option. The list of Strava extensions is long, with each one having a unique spin on how to display and aggregate workout data. StatsHunter is one of the more simplistic yet powerful tools.
Statshunter does not have its own tracking potential. This means that if you want to use it you need to be able to record your activities using a secondary device. Once recorded and on Strava though the linking it fairly simple. There is no need for a StatsHunter account, it simply uses the Strava login and linking once you grant permissions to share the data. From there the syncing of activities should happen in the background. Personally we have that it takes a couple of attempts to get all data synced, but this is going back 8+ years and more than 1300 total activities.
There are two primary uses or features embedded within StatsHunter that are worth talking about.
StatsHunter Summary Tables
A primary use of StatsHunter is simply to build a series of useful tables that show how your activities data has aggregated over time. While some of this is available via Strava itself, and more via Strava Subscription. Because StatsHunter is free and easy to setup the best thing to do is just open up the tool and see what charts may be useful.
For us, one of the best ones is different ways to sort activities. While it is easy to look at just running or just cycling, that more interesting ones are when you are able to drill down by other criterion. With this you can find out which day of the week you log the most activity. This can be which down you have the most individual activities, but you can also sort by which day you are the fastest, and which day you have run the most elevation.
Folks who have followed a similar training structure over a long period of time (for example, long runs on Sundays and interval work on Tuesdays) can start to see how these trends add up. Similar options for sorting speed exist for the time of day the activity was logged.
On an even more simplistic level, it is possible to see how often you run or log activities of a specific distance. Again since this can be done over specific time periods you can import only a specific training cycle and output the overall results in a unique way. Unfortunately by default the tool imports all activity types into the same charts. This is a major limitation, as you can see in the above chart. Somehow the average speed looks to be negatively correlated to the length of an activity, this is because there are many longer efforts done on a bike, compared to shorter ones which skew toward running. It is important to remember these types of limitations when trying to draw conclusions from StatsHunters data. If you are careful about what and how you import there are tons of fun display options that can provide encouragement from past results.
StatsHunter Badges
Badges within StatsHunter are similar to other online badge types in that they are not specifically worth anything. At the same time, whatever helps motivate you to get out and be active, or to strive for improving, can be beneficial. The badges available will be automatically assigned, there is no need to start a challenge for one or activate it.
There are some interesting badges, but it takes a while to dive into what most of them actually mean. A unique one is the tracking of an Eddington Number. This is defined as a number or days where you have cycled more kilometers than that number. So an Eddington number of 15 would mean that you have cycled 15 days each with 15 or more kilometers. If you are into streaks this can be turned into a streak as well.