Last week, users across Reddit raised alarms about a significant shift in how Strava was pulling workout data from your Garmin, Runna, or TrainingPeaks entries. What once appeared as generic activity titles like “Morning Run” were showing detailed workout descriptions, pacing notes, and even personal coach comments that users never intended to share publicly. If you wanted your Garmin and Strava titles to be in sync, that’s great. But if you’ve been on Strava for a minute, you know it can be a pretty competitive place. It’s social media, after all.
This was a “short-lived test to surface workout titles and descriptions,” a Strava representative told me through email on Friday. “After listening to our community, we ended the test on Wednesday. We appreciate the feedback and have no plans to revisit this.”
Still, users are entitled to feeling alarmed at this short-lived test. For those of us who would prefer to keep our easy days or workout flubs private, here’s what to know about your data being shared for all your Strava friends to see.
The perfect storm of acquisitions and integration
Strava has made two major acquisitions in recent months—first purchasing running training app Runna in April, followed by cycling app The Breakaway in May. And the integration of these apps appears to be happening rapidly and without clear user notification. Runna recently began pushing through workout images and detailed training data to Strava, while Garmin users are seeing their custom workout titles and descriptions automatically imported into their Strava activities.
“Definitely feels like a violation of privacy and also intellectual property as a coach,” wrote one TrainingPeaks user on Reddit. “Pulling through the descriptions of the workouts, where sometimes I write personal notes for athletes, and now it’s showing on Strava for the world to see. I’m going to have to change how I set workouts up in TrainingPeaks.”
Sadly, this sort of privacy concern is nothing new for Strava users. The company has been at the center of several data privacy controversies, including the famous heatmap incident that exposed the location of numerous secret military facilities. The network’s global heatmap showed the locations of sensitive military bases because personnel at those facilities did not switch on privacy settings.
Beyond the military base controversy, users have always called out the app’s “creepy” privacy settings, which can automatically add other runners’ data onto your phone unless changed. As a longtime fan of Strava, I’ve personally watched the company face ongoing criticism about how users can track each other and the default visibility of personal fitness data.
And now, the Runna integration reveals how these acquisitions are creating unexpected data flows. Runna users can now access routes saved in Strava—even all those little nonsense routes created for planning purposes that were never intended for actual use or sharing.
What information was shared
If you use a Garmin device, you may have found that workouts with specific pacing instructions, training notes from coaches, and personalized workout descriptions were appearing in your public Strava feeds. This included:
-
Custom workout titles from Garmin devices
-
Detailed training descriptions from TrainingPeaks
-
Coach notes and pacing guidance
-
Personal performance targets and training phases
The change affected data that was technically always present in activity files but was previously filtered out by Strava’s display logic. During this test, that data was surfaced automatically, catching users off guard.
The bottom line
The frustrating aspect of this situation is that enhanced workout data integration could be genuinely valuable. Seeing detailed training information, coach notes, and structured workout data in Strava could help athletes better track their progress and share meaningful training details with their community.
“This is a very cool feature that I think we would all love if it weren’t implemented by surprise,” one user said. The technology exists to make fitness data more useful and connected—but only when users understand and consent to what’s being shared.
Plus, for coaches and trainers, this represented a professional concern. Training plans and workout descriptions often contain proprietary methodologies and personalized guidance that coaches consider intellectual property. When these details suddenly become public without warning, it affects how they can do their work.
As a loyal Strava user, the core issue isn’t just about privacy settings or data visibility—it’s about trust and communication. When platforms make significant changes to data-sharing without clear notification, they erode the trust that users need to feel comfortable sharing their fitness activities.
This post was originally published on June 6, 2025, when the status of this feature was uncertain; it was updated on June 9, 2025 when it was confirmed to be a short-lived test.
