Strava launched in 2009 targeting a very specific user: the serious cyclist who trained with a GPS device and wanted to analyse their rides in detail. Not the casual weekend rider. Not the beginner. The serious athlete who cared about segment times, elevation, power data, and comparing performance against their past self and peers.
This specificity was a deliberate product decision, not a limitation of ambition. The Strava team understood that building for the serious athlete first would create the density of activity data needed to make the social features compelling. A "kudos" on Strava means something because the person giving it understands what it took to complete that ride or run. The social context was earned through a shared level of commitment.
The "Segments" feature — user-defined stretches of road where athletes compete for KOM (King of the Mountain) — was the product breakthrough. Segments created local social competition without requiring friends to exist on the platform. You could be new to Strava and immediately compete against the history of everyone who had ever ridden your local hill. This solved the cold-start problem elegantly: the social layer worked even with zero friends.