Strava confirms it: this is the most popular route among runners in 2025, and it’s in the United States

Strava, the fitness-tracking platform founded in 2009 by Michael Horvath and Mark Gainey in San Francisco, has grown into one of the world’s largest exercise communities, combining GPS-based workout tracking with social networking features and a freemium business model that operates on both mobile apps and the web. 

Users can record runs, rides, hikes, swims, and other activities via smartphone, smartwatch, or third-party devices, and share results, routes, and social engagement such as “kudos” with followers. 

With more than 180 million athletes in over 185 countries, Strava sees weekly uploads in the tens of millions and billions of total activities logged, making it a major platform for both casual and serious athletes alike. The service is free to join, with optional paid subscriptions unlocking advanced analytics and training tools.

Strava releases its 2025 Year in Sport report

Strava has just released its 2025 Year in Sport report, which looks at activities recorded on the platform from September 1, 2024 through August 30, 2025 and is packed with facts and figures about its global community. It offers a snapshot of how people are exercising today, with plenty of eye-catching data points and unexpected trends.

One fact really caught out attention though. According to Strava, the most attempted running route anywhere in the world is right here in the United States. The segment runs from CP East Drive Terrace to 86th Street in New York City, cutting straight through Central Park.

As of now, the route has logged nearly three million attempts by just under 350,000 runners.

It is not a long run, measuring just over two-thirds of a mile (1.17 km), with a modest elevation gain of 104 feet. The current record holders on Strava are Casper Verhoofstad (men and overall) at 2:28, and Amanda Asaro (women) at 3:09.

World Record pace in Central Park?

Keen runners and stat lovers may do a double take at Verhoofstad’s time. It is an eye-catching mark, and if taken at face value would make him the fastest human over that kind of distance ever. For context, the men’s 1 km world record is held by Kenya’s Noah Ngeny, who ran 2:11.96 in Rieti, Italy, in 1999.

At that pace, Ngeny would cover this Central Park segment in roughly 2:34, around six seconds slower than Verhoofstad’s Strava record.

If Verhoofstad had truly run the segment in 2:28, his pace would translate to approximately 2:06 for 1 km, shattering the world record by more than five seconds. Go Casper! 

The more likely explanation, however, lies with the technology rather than the runner. Central Park is notorious for GPS interference, with tall buildings, dense tree cover, and occasional straight-line “teleporting” in activity data all capable of distorting recorded times. North-south routes are especially vulnerable, as buildings along the park’s edges narrow satellite angles and reduce signal accuracy. We do not know exactly what happened on Verhoofstad’s run, and there is no suggestion of anything untoward. A momentary GPS anomaly is simply the most plausible explanation and one familiar to anyone who has chased Strava segments in urban environments. It also helps explain why, no matter how good your legs feel, getting anywhere near 2:28 on this stretch remains firmly out of reach.

All told, a genuinely world-class time on this segment would likely be somewhere around the 2:40 mark, once the slight climb is taken into account. Factor in everyday Central Park hazards such as couples strolling, distracted joggers, dense dog traffic, and tourist congestion, and breaking three minutes is still an outstanding effort.

The other favorite Strava segments

After CP East Drive Terrace to 86th Street, the next most popular running segment is the GBK Loop in Jakarta Selatan, Indonesia, followed by the Tiro 1 km in São Paulo, Brazil.

Other fun Strava US facts

There’s a whole ream of US data in Strava’s 2025 report. While running still leads overall, walking is now firmly the second-most recorded activity, confirming that everyday movement has become central to how Americans use the platform. More than half of Strava users logged multiple sports over the year, and those who recorded three or more different activities were four times more likely to maintain a year-long activity streak, underlining how variety keeps people consistent. Saturdays, meanwhile, reign supreme for long runs, with nearly 70 percent of scheduled long runs completed on Saturdays, far more than any weekday.

City-level quirks add even more colour. Salinas, California topped the country for longest walks, averaging 2.6 miles per walk, while Denver, Colorado emerged as the nation’s biggest yoga hub, with 13 percent of users recording yoga activities, ahead of Boulder and Chapel Hill. Late-night exercise had a distinctly Texan flavour: McAllen, Texas recorded the highest share of activities logged after 9pm, narrowly ahead of Bryan-College Station. And despite its reputation, the Pacific Northwest missed out on the soggiest workouts, with Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania claiming that title, as 39.2 percent of users recorded at least one activity in the rain.

There are social surprises too. Americans handed out a staggering 14 billion kudos on Strava in 2025, up 20 percent year on year, with trail runs attracting kudos at the highest rate of any activity. Gen Z continues to reshape fitness culture, being twice as likely as Gen X to say weight training is their primary sport, and 61 percent more likely to say they lift for aesthetics, not performance. Even inflation has not slowed them down: 30 percent of Gen Z say they plan to spend more on fitness in 2026, and more than half expect to use Strava even more next year, bucking the wider trend of screen fatigue. But then, when the screen is logging your physical fun, it hits different.

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