How do you track mileage?

[Joe Mullins]

How is everyone keeping track of mileage on your bikes? I’m curious what methods people are using.

I’ve occasionally tracked with a GPS watch only to never look back at the data, let alone tally up a cumulative mileage count. I mostly ride without tracking as it makes it less about the stats and more about the ride. But it would be fun to know how much I rode in a year, over the course of owning a bike, etc. I wish I knew how many miles are on the first Brooks saddle that I bought 15 or so years ago.

I was inspired by Pam’s post about 63,000 miles on a bike and Rapid Rise RD. How did you come up with that number?! How does everyone else who keeps track keep track?

Joe M.
Los Angeles

[Richard Rose]

I am with you 100% regarding not really caring about the data. Still, I like to “look back” at my rides & yes, distance travelled. Speed does not matter to me but honestly, hours might matter more than distance. For all of these reasons I really like the Cyclemeter app on my I phone. The free version gets annoying but the $9.99 per year “premium” offers more info & no advertising. It’s the only thing I have used for as far back as I can remember.

Sent from my iPhone

> On Mar 1, 2022, at 4:13 PM, Joe Mullins <jmlmu...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> How is everyone keeping track of mileage on your bikes? I’m curious what methods people are using.

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[lconley]

In the late 60s/early 70s I had a Schwinn StingRay with a cable driven speedometer/odometer - did my 1st 50 miler on that bike. In the 70's and 80s, I used the Huret belt driven odometer with trip meter that mounted off the axle. I kept detailed records for a few years, graphed it on graph paper. That was back when doing a 75 mile ride was called Sunday. In the early 2000s I had a variety of electronic meters. I haven't had anything mounted on the bike for years until recently, when I put a RokForm mount (similar to quadlock) on the bike for the phone and use the free version of Strava, but I that is mostly to see what I did that day, haven't kept track of annual or total mileage since the 80s.

Laing

[Johnny Alien]

I do the same. Quadlock for the phone and run the free Strava app.  I think you can have different bike profiles so you can log how many miles per bike as well as total.

[rlti...@gmail.com]

I use a Garmin watch (Fenix 5+ currently) to record all of my rides. The data all goes up to Garmin’s cloud and I have it automatically sent to Strava as well. I don’t look at the data much but I can easily see it on the Garmin app on my phone. It includes ride data along with heart rate, calories burned, etc.

I like it because I can assign a bike to each ride as well so I know the mileage per bike which can be good for maintenance purposes. The watch starts recording by pushing a single button three times so there is very little for me to do to get it all recorded.

Robert Tilley
San Diego, CA

Sent from my iPhone

> On Mar 1, 2022, at 1:13 PM, Joe Mullins <jmlmu...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> How is everyone keeping track of mileage on your bikes? I’m curious what methods people are using.

[Patrick Moore]

I use Cyclemeter on my iPhone and then add date, miles ridden, and v brief route description into Excel sheet that tracks yearly and cumulative miles for each bike.

 

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Patrick Moore

Alburquerque, Nuevo Mexico, Etats Unis d'Amerique, Orbis Terrarum

[Richard Rose]

I recently figured out how to let Cyclemeter do that for you. No need for the spreadsheet.

Sent from my iPhone

On Mar 1, 2022, at 8:34 PM, Patrick Moore <bert...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Patrick Moore]

My spreadshheets goes back a decade at least, long before I used Cyclemeter. I use the free version.

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[Ed Carolipio]

I have a Garmin Edge 810 and quarter turn Garmin mounts for each of my bikes (about $6/ea). I move the Edge from bike to bike - it has an option to tag which bike you've mounted it on - and use it as an overpriced cycle computer while it's on the bike. It records the ride reliably with three button presses (one at start, one at end, one to say "yes, I want to save.") The Edge 810 has Bluetooth (which I usually leave off) so once in a while I turn that on and it automagically syncs data to my Garmin account via an app on my phone. I set up my Garmin account to mirror the data to my ridewithgps and Strava accounts, and use tools at those sites to analyze the rides.

--Ed C.

[Fullylugged]

I use a Lezyne GPS which can upload automatically to a service like Strava. I also upload mine to Ride With GPS which I like better, and log the data at www.Bikejournal.com  BikeJournal lets me set up tires and chains with reminders of service due based on mileage. it easily displays your data by bike.  I had a couple of Garmin GPS units, but they died quickly and Garmin service is not good. Lezyne is less expensive and is still going.  Bryton is another brand of value priced GPS.   A GPS unit will go longer on a battery charge than using a cell phone app. 

[ascpgh]

I still use a wired Catyeye Mity 2 on my previous highest mileage bike. I've never found myself drawn to the vanity of mileage because I can attest to both the really ugly miles I managed to crank through that have no comparison to those beautiful many that have passed beneath me by the tens like a dream. Most of my on-bike metrics are for navigation and timing purposes on current or future rides but only I know the quality of the units of my rides. Even if I did track climbing in data units, only I can attest to the subjective experiences' duration of effort and sense of accomplishment provided.

I've nominally been caught up in hindsight data lust in the past but never enough to spend on data collecting devices, apps or sites. I don't have so many bikes that maintenance needs are daunting and the conditions I ride through over the course of the seasons here dictate services or replacements way more so than mileage so I use my eyeballs and various TMDE to assess for maintenance needs or replacements. It would be grievous (I've proven it in the past) to rely on mileage for my bikes. 

I like riding my bike more than you do. Strava that.

Andy Cheatham 

On Tuesday, March 1, 2022 at 4:13:11 PM UTC-5 jmlmu...@gmail.com wrote:

[EricP]

Another vote for a basic wired Cateye. Started using them in college and never felt the need to change. Have a journal where I write down the mileage at the end of each year and to add any important notes.

Also, I don't ride enough to really justify anything more. And I enjoy not having my cell phone easily at hand while riding. It's kept in a pouch in a bag on the bike. Either handlebar bag or a kangaroo pouch on a Sackville.

All this reminds me that I need to swap out batteries for this year's riding season.

Eric Platt

St. Paul, MN 

[Marc Irwin]

Why bother?  I ride my bike, enjoy the ride, that's it.

Marc

On Tuesday, March 1, 2022 at 4:13:11 PM UTC-5 jmlmu...@gmail.com wrote:

[aeroperf]

I use a Sigma BC 12.12 Bike Computer, wired, and read it into a spreadsheet with the Sigma DataCenter program.

I bought a bunch of them years ago and calibrate them for each bike on the trail I ride.

[George Schick]

Reading through the blog post makes me wonder if anyone has ridden a bike with a carefully calibrated cycle odometer - maybe using the "roll out" method to determine accuracy - along with one of these GPS units to see how accurate the GPS really is.  Seems like riding through areas where the sky is blocked temporarily by tall buildings, underpasses, heavy forestation, etc. would have to have some effect on overall mileage tracked.  Plus, the run-of-the-mill GPS units that individuals can use, be it a specific device (Garmin) or a cell phone,  aren't as accurate to begin with as the high quality equipment that people like surveyors use.

Just curious.  I have a friend who will be riding in the Great Cycle Challenge, a fundraiser for the Children's Cancer Research Fund, again this year and I've carefully calibrated her cycle computer - which I'm not even sure she's used - so she can compare the results with the GPS info that the fundraiser uses to track participant's mileage.

[Philip Barrett]

GPS mapping software is smart enough to understand a brief break for tunnels. Bridges & underpasses are not a problem as there are multiple satellites feeding the data all the way across the horizon so you may lose a more overhead signal but not one coming at you from in front or behind. As for accuracy, I'm not sure how much closer you want than the typical 16' which the standard GPS receivers like your phone or Garmin deliver? Since you're traveling rather than static you are giving the mapping software flowing data points to extrapolate against for better accuracy than standing still too.

There's no way a cycle computer could be calibrated that accurately & the margin of error will increase with the mileage.

I use Strava combined with a Wahoo Tickr wrist strap as I like to be mix up my HR efforts & I tend to ride too hard. I don't slavishly follow the data but Strave lets you input which bike you rode that day which is a great way of keeping overall mileage records.

[MoVelo]

I use Ride with GPS on my iPhone. It keeps track of yearly mileage and all the other stats, pauses when I pause and can run it the background whilst I surf other apps. 

Also there is a pretty big library of rides from others who have shared with the app.

Remembering to turn it on at the beginning of a ride is my biggest challenge. 

JP

[Ben Adrian]

Hey Joe and all!

I just use a standard GPS bike computer and have it set to auto-load it
to both Strava and RIdeWithGPS.

I do al kinda of riding on all kinds of bikes; Rivendell cruising,
gravel rides, club road rides, commuting and utilitarian riding. My
carbon gravel/road bike has a power meter, speed sensor, and cadence
sensor. Plus, I will wear a heart rate monitor. I don't live and die by
these numbers, but the Garmin keeps track and lets me know how my
fitness is holding up. I don't need those sensors when I ride my other
bikes, though, and the Garmin just does fine on GPS alone. Plus, I'm a
map nerd and I love having everythign available without having to get my
phone out.

I know the Riv ethos and GPS computers are sometimes at odds. I've heard
of plenty of people who start the ride on their computer and just toss
it in their handlebar bag. It's just collecting the data for later use.

My Garmin has "profiles" I can customize like road, mountain, gravel,
rando, commuting, etc. The main screen of my commuting profile is just
map, speed, and distance. When I want to have a worry free ride, I don't
need to see any performance data. It's pretty nice. When I do a quick
pre-work, morning ride for exercise, I can see heart rate and power and
make sure I push myself the right about in the short time available.

Anyway, Joe, if you ever want to do a ride around our neighborhood, talk
music gear, bikes, and GPS computers, let me know. I think Ron Frazell
and Hugh Smitham? are close-ish too? L.A. Riv List meetup?

Ben

[Lynn Haas]

I've synched everything through Strava for years. I'm a big fan of the Strava Metro program and I like contributing to that dataset.

Lynn

[Joe Mullins]

It’s been great hearing about how people are keeping track of miles. From what I’ve gathered, some sort of journal or spreadsheet seems to be the way to keep track of long term data. As far as collecting data, there are many options and pros and cons to all.

My current method of tracking via GPS watch allows me to see the metrics of individual rides but since I’m not synced to Strava or another service, I’m not easily seeing the grand totals and at this point in my life, that’s all I’m curious about. I used to use a Garmin watch which sends the data to their own service as well as syncing to my Apple iPhone health app. I can look back and see data from individual rides but can’t see the grand totals. Maybe it’s hidden somewhere but I haven’t found it. I now use an Apple Watch which shows all the same data as the Garmin but has the added benefit of asking me if I’m on a bike ride and if I want to track if I forgot to start the watch. This is annoying when I don’t care about tracking. And its annoying when I want to track but forgot to hit start as I’m usually a mile or two in when it senses that I’m on a bike ride. I’d say I track 75% of rides because it’s so easy, why not. I look back at maybe 3% of those rides!

If I want to see an odometer reading which sounds like fun to me, I need to be diligent about starting and stopping the GPS. The same would go if I were to use a Garmin bike GPS with navigation, etc. These devices are all great but they require diligent starting in stopping which in my experience has always been some sort of failure. (I’ve tracked many a hike only to get in my car and drive halfway home with the watch still tracking.) And if I want to swap one between bikes and know the total mileage for a particular bike, I have to manually log that info which is way more work than what I currently want to put into it.

Using my iPhone to track with apps like Strava, Ride With GPS, or Cyclemeter (BTW there appears to be two versions of Cyclemeter in the Apple App Store and one is Russian and looks like a rip off of the original) might be the way to go to get tallies. As several folks mentioned they have used these apps to their success. I used to track with my phone and a DIY mount and it was great and not great. Super easy to navigate with maps and receive calls or texts. Not great because I was forced to receive all calls and texts! Most of the time I don’t want to be connected to the outside world when riding. But there are times when it’s inevitable and I guess that’s just the world we live in these days.

The biggest problem I faced with the phone was that it would overheat in the sun rendering it completely useless until it cooled down. Yes I can start it and toss it in a bag but then it’s chewing through battery. Yes I could use a battery brick but I don’t want to go to all that trouble! I have a beacon light on my Hillborne and I guess I could keep it plugged in to the built in USB charger but again…more effort than I wish to put into all this.

The simple bike computer is something I haven’t considered in 20 years. I remember how excited I was as a kid in the early 90’s to get one on my bike. I think I only used it to bomb the biggest hill in my neighborhood and see how fast I could go. It was really simple and sparkly blueish-purple to match my Mongoose.

With all the fancy metrics GPS apps and devices offer, the simple bike computer seems to offer nothing of useful value Tim this day and age. But alas, hearing everyone’s methods has helped me to realize some really strong points. The simple bike computer (which I’ll now call the SBC since I’m typing this on my phone) does something I love—it starts tracking the moment my wheel starts spinning regardless of whether I want it to or not. I can’t think of a better way to keep track of total mileage over the course of a bike. The batteries last for years and I can set the odometer after battery changes to pick up where it left off. Of course it needs to go on the bike when it’s new (or new to me) and I can’t swap it from bike to bike. I have to run a cable and put an ugly sensor on my fork or I can spend more and get a wireless one that’s 90% as ugly but more complicated. I don’t want a wire on my fork especially since I go to the trouble to internally route my dynamo cables so that’s a big con.

I can track individual rides with the tripometer or it will automatically track how long since I last cared about how long an individual trip was. I can’t see my GPS course or my elevation gain or loss but I can turn the phone or watch on if I want that data. For my desire to learn about how much I ride in a year or over the course of owning a bike, this might be the simplest and most reliable option given how little effort I want to put into tracking. Logging total mileage in a year in a little journal sounds like fun.

At the end of the day I want to get out and ride so that I’m driving my car less, staying active, and giving my mind a break from the go-go-go lifestyle I live in Los Angeles. I want to enjoy the (subtle) changing seasons, landscapes, and neighborhoods. I want to ride with friends and family and I want to ride just to ride. Riding is fun and for some, being able to look back at where one rode, for how long and how far, is part of that fun. And sometimes it’s fun to not know. Some days I like knowing, some days I don’t.

So I bought a $27 SBC. We’ll see if it earns itself a permanent fixture on one of my bikes! Maybe I’ll mount the sensor near the rack mount and run the cable and computer into a bag so it’s inconspicuous and I can see it only when I want to. I think it would be fun to glance at it every month or so and see how much I rode. Maybe I’ll attach it to a tiny Voille strap and throw it on the bars from time to time.

Ben—if you read this far I’m down to go on a group ride. I think Brian may have texted you to say that I met him this morning as we ran into each other on our commute and he yelled “Hey I have a Hillborne too!” Always fun running into other Riv folks on the road!

[Mike Godwin]

My riding buddy has his phone and a wireless computer on his bike. He tells me the mileage, I write on my calendar hanging on the fridge by a Riv superconducting magnet, by hand, with ink. Or trace it out on google map. 

Mike SLO CA

[rlti...@gmail.com]

My Garmin watch gives me data for the last year via the Garmin Connect app on my phone and they have totals for the last 7 days, 4 weeks and year. All older data I need to access from the cloud if I want to see it.

Robert Tilley
San Diego, CA

Sent from my iPhone

> On Mar 3, 2022, at 2:51 PM, Joe Mullins <jmlmu...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> It’s been great hearing about how people are keeping track of miles. From what I’ve gathered, some sort of journal or spreadsheet seems to be the way to keep track of long term data. As far as collecting data, there are many options and pros and cons to all.

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[mark etze]

I have one version or another of the Cateye's on all my bikes. The only thing I am concerned about is total mileage and average speed, sometimes I need reminded to pick up the pace so it's nice to have it on the handle bar. Transfer that data to the iPhone health app, total it up monthly and hand write it in a journal. I usually set a goal each year of how many miles I want to ride, so that keeps me motivated to get out more.

[Bruce Baker]

I have been using mapmyride for 12 years and love it...

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[Rick Harries]

I used a Cateye Velo 7 bike computer .  It has an odometer function and a trip distance function that tells me what I need to know for maintenance and for individual rides. I rotate it forward it on the handlebar so I don’t fixate on the display during rides. 

Rick Harries

Easton, Maryland

[David Hallerman]

Kinda like me, except my biggest challenge using Ride With GPS is turning it off at the end of a ride.

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[Steven Sweedler]

I also use Ride w/GPS to track my rides, and then transfer to paper. Often after a stop in my ride, the app pauses and does not restart. On yesterdays ride, you can see the second half of the ride is a straight line, which was not the actual ride. I don’t look at the app when I ride so I don’t realize the app is on pause  until I finish the ride. Steve

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Steven Sweedler
Plymouth, New Hampshire

[upyou...@yahoo.com]

I'm a fan of the wired Cateye cyclometer.  I'm only interested in distance per ride and total/year.  I've used it for 30 years.  I love how basic it is and needs a battery replacement now and then.  Trip mileage and total mileage always at fingertips.  Never have to think about anything else.  I bought a new one for my sparkly Mermaid Platy.

Kate in Trenton, NJ

[RichS]

I have wireless Cateyes on two bikes which provide maintenance log mileage. The third bike uses a Wahoo Element Bolt and Ride with GPS. Much more data capable than I require but I do appreciate a few of the features like connection to iphone and ft. of climbing. 

Steve, you did the ride displayed in Puglia? I'm envious. Spent some vacation time in not so touristy Monopoli. Enjoy your rides!

Best,

Rich in ATL