For the past couple of years, uploading my running training has been a bit of a faff. I like to use a desktop app (SportTracks) so that, whatever the changing fads online, I still have all of my data in one place. (It goes back to 2006 when I first got my Forerunner 305. Some day I may even important my old Polar Training Software data.) The desktop app also has some interesting plugins. One of these I used to push my training to dailymile for comparison with a few friends and colleagues and for the widget on this site. However, I’m also partial to a bit of segment stealing on Strava. Sadly no simple SportTracks plugin for Strava so that was a separate upload.
After a bit of search and experimentation, my new workflow is to upload to the SportTracks website which then syncs seamlessly (in both directions) to the desktop app. Then I’m using the excellent online tool Tapiriik to automatically synchronise the data from SportTracks to Strava.
On the plus side, this means I’m now only downloading once and it doesn’t have to be on the machine with SportTracks installed. Also, without really thinking about it, it means I know have 8 years worth of data synced back to Strava!
On the negative side, Tapiriik doesn’t support dailymile so that will have to go by the wayside, at least for now. That means you’ll see a slightly squished Strava widget in the sidebar of this site. The other major downside is cost. The SportTracks site has an annual subscription of $35. Whilst the site is nice and they are continually adding good features, if it weren’t for the sync with the desktop app I wouldn’t be forking out that money. We’ll see how things are going come renewal time. Automatic sync on Tapiriik also comes at a cost but a mere $2 pa for what is a very slick site and available as open source if you really wanted to host it yourself.
Now I just need to decide whether to add Garmin Uploader to my shopping list so that I don’t even need to turn on the Mac! (Works with my Nexus 7 but not my S2 unfortunately.)