Strava for Sustainability: Step Outdoors & Save the Planet

“Girl, you haven’t joined Strava yet?”

“What’s that? A gym membership?”

“No, even better- it’s the new trick to staying fit.”

That’s how a conversation with my chronically online bestie went the other day. And I’m sure many of y’all had the same conversation. And for those that haven’t had the conversation yet, let me be your bestie and fill you in. 

Strava is a fitness tracking app and social network. Its main strength is tracking outdoor activities—running, cycling, walking, hiking, swimming, skiing, and more—using GPS. While it can track indoor workouts like treadmill runs or stationary biking if logged manually, the app is built around outdoor fitness—its maps, leaderboards, and route-sharing are designed for outside movement (Strava).

In laymen terms, it’s the perfect Instagram for a fitness enthusiast, where they can share the route they took for their half-marathon, the number of times they conquered the hill or the number of laps they swam across the swimming pool they call an ocean. 

Well, since it was a recommendation from my bestie, I had to try it out—and to my surprise, I conquered over 3 kilometers on my first run using the app. But that’s not all! Strava even created a personalized schedule for me based on my free time, strengths, weaknesses, and the areas I wanted to improve—complete with a clear goal to work toward. All this for free and without even going to a gym? Perfect.

Image Source

Looking at it from an environmentalist perspective, this is a great way to not just save your body but also the Earth.

Imagine if more of us swapped the gym for outdoor workouts. A single treadmill uses about 600 to 700 watts per hour (EnergySage). If you run on it three times a week for a year, that’s about 101 kWh—enough electricity to power your fridge for a month or charge your smartphone over 13,000 times.

Now, picture 10 million people worldwide making the switch to outdoor running instead of using treadmills. Together, we’d save over 1 billion kWh of electricity a year—enough to power a small city of 90,000 homes for an entire year. And gyms themselves gobble up a ton of energy too: one medium-sized gym can use the same electricity as 15–20 homes every month (UtilityBidder). If 5,000 gyms had 20% fewer visitors because people exercised outside, that would save another 360–600 million kWh annually, roughly the energy needed to bake 5 billion loaves of bread.

Image Source

All combined, switching to outdoor workouts could save enough electricity to run over 140,000 homes for a year, while also reducing the carbon emissions that contribute to climate change. In simpler terms: choosing outdoor activity over gym-based workouts isn’t just great for your health—but also a boost for the health of planet Earth.

So how about you take my advice as your bestie and we add each other on Strava?