Pro Athletes to Follow on Strava

Strava is great to track your own activities and keep a record of all your training over days, months and even years. You can connect with friends and share various adventures. You can also race others on segments or find frequently used routes through their maps. Because of all this, there are also some pro athletes that use Strava so we’ve taken a quick look and found some pro’s that are worth a follow.

Desiree Lindon

A two-time Olympian in the Marathon after representing team USA at both the London and Rio Olympics with a best finish of 7th place. In the near 0ºC temperatures and howling rain, Des won the 2018 Boston Marathon to become the first American to win the race in 33 years. Not only has she ran a 2:22 marathon, she is the only woman to ever run a sub 3-hour 50km.

Back in October 2020 Des ran the same number of miles in a day as the day’s date. So on the 23rd of October she ran 23 miles. That means she ran a total of 196 miles within 7 days! And if that wasn’t enough, throw her self proclaimed love for Whiskey and Coffee into the mix and Des is definitely one to follow on Strava.

Molly Seidel

Olympic bronze medallist in the marathon with a title of “Full send in Sapporo.” Do we need to say anymore before you click the follow button? In the build up to the Olympic Marathon she averaged over 130 miles per week which was all posted Strava. This year alone she has run over 3,500 miles and has recorded over 13,500 miles on Strava in total.

Ellie Pashley

An Australian Olympian in the Marathon and World Championship representative in the 10,000m. In Tokyo she placed 23rd whilst her 10,000m performance in Doha meant she was the fourth fastest Australian of all time at the distance. As well as being on Strava, Ellie will tell you all about her big sessions on the Road to Knowhere podcast which is a subset of the Inside Running Podcast. She is relatively new to the sport as her coach will tell you which makes following her progress over the coming years even more exciting.

Jim Walmsley

Heading to the world of Ultra’s with our next athlete to check out on Strava. Walmsley is a three time Western States Champion (The World’s oldest 100-mile trail race) and course record holder in 14:09:28. At the beginning of 2021 Jim missed out on the 100k World Record by a mere 12 seconds after posting a bind blowing time of 6:09:26 which is an average pace of 5:57 per mile. And yes this was on Strava, so well worth a look and a follow.

Jake Smith

Jake Smith, otherwise known as the “Marathon Maverick” will treat you to many incredible workouts which are all posted to Strava. He gained his nickname after pacing the Cheshire Elite Marathon in the UK but then he decided to continue and run the Olympic Standard! He ran at the most recent half-marathon world championships in Gdynia, clocking 60:31. He ran as part of the lead group and later said he wanted to see how much TV coverage he could get. If that sort of behaviour doesn’t tempt you to follow him then I’m not sure what will.

Reed Fischer

Alongside Drew Hunter and Sam Parsons, Reed is one of the founding members of Tinman Elite, a professional running group in Boulder, Colorado; who’s motto is to ‘push the sport forward, on and off the track. Reed has a 28:12 10,000m personal best and has run 61:37 over the half-marathon in Houston, Texas which qualified him to run at the U.S Olympic trials one-month later. He ran 2:24:48 on debut but don’t let that fool you – He’s currently training for the Chicago Marathon which is due to be held on 10th of October. As well as checking out his Strava profile, Tinman have also posted some meaty videos on YouTube of Reed’s marathon build.

Brett Robinson

The Australian Record Holder over the Half-Marathon with a time of 59:57 and a 2:10 marathoner who competed at the Tokyo Olympics. He is part of the Melbourne Track Club which is also the home of Stewey McSwayn, the man who has been lighting up Diamond League races all season. Nearly every session seems to be completed with his team-mate, Jack Rayner and he seems to share pretty much all of his sessions and easy runs.

Other Notable Mentions

Joshua Cheptagi

There are only three runs uploaded onto the 5,000 and 10,000 metre world record holder’s Strava profile but one of those is his 5,000m world record run in Monaco. He even stopped his Garmin Forerunner 35 early, claiming a 12:34 and then thanked the Government of Uganda afterwards. Hero.

Tom Pidcock

Okay, he is a cyclist but he is an Olympic Champion in Mountain Biking. But that’s not why he is on the list. During lock-down he allegedly ran 5k in 13:25! We aren’t 100% sure that this is legitimate but we admire the claim!