A guest column by Phil Dumontet, CEO of Laurel. This corrects our misunderstanding of the underlying technology being LoRa instead of the Bluetooth technology they actually use.  It also discusses the advancements Laurel has made since their debut in January, 2025 at the RunningUSA show, which was the basis of our original blog posts here and here.

We appreciate RunSignUp for giving us the opportunity to respond to their earlier posts here  and here. We have a lot of respect for RunSignup and the community they serve, which is exactly why we want to address those blogs – not to argue, but because it contains a foundational error that changes nearly every conclusion that follows.

Since the article was published, we want to address a fundamental misunderstanding regarding the technology we use, and also share the improvements we’ve made to our software since some of the challenges experienced at the RUSA morning run over a year ago when their original articles were posted.

First, an important correction: Laurel does not use LoRa technology. The article opens with this premise and builds its argument around it – but that premise is incorrect. Laurel has never used LoRa. We agree that LoRa would be a poor choice for precision race timing, which is exactly why we spent five years developing a fundamentally different approach.

Laurel is built on proprietary technology leveraging a Bluetooth (2.4GHz) foundation that is enhanced with innovations that go well beyond standard Bluetooth protocols.

On our progress since then: We have significantly advanced our software and the mechanisms that drive read-rate and accuracy. These improvements have reached the point where we are now delivering accurate results on par or better with RFID across more than 500 races in 2026 alone.

The progress has been substantial enough that we no longer use dual-tagging with RFID as a backup: we have been single-tagging across all Laurel events for over a year, including 250+ events and 350,000+ timed participants in 2025.

We are now partnering with some of the largest races in the country, all being timed exclusively on the Laurel platform, including:

• Bay to Breakers: 33,000+ participants
• 2XU Long Beach Marathon: 25,000+ participants 
• Surf City Marathon: 22,000+ participants
• Saucony Philly Love Run: 15,000+ participants 
• Boston 10K for Women 
• Every Woman’s Marathon
• St. George Marathon

The column cites GPS watches and Strava as evidence that Laurel’s splits are inaccurate. While we have not specifically investigated the discrepancy reported from Mesa 2025, we can confirm that Laurel’s on-course tracking points are now accurate to within one second and start/finish mats are accurate to 200ms. We acknowledge the system wasn’t perfect before, and we’ve worked to improve it.  

GPS watches are a lower-fidelity tool than the systems used to certify race courses – and that’s by design. USATF does not use GPS for course certification precisely because of well-documented variability in satellite signal, terrain, and tangent-running. I have never personally run a marathon that read exactly 26.2 miles on Strava, and GPS splits routinely diverge from official mile markers even on certified courses. Runners also don’t always run the tangents, which further compounds the discrepancy. GPS is simply the wrong benchmark for evaluating timing accuracy.

We’ve included a comparison of our readers (tracking) performance against our mats (finish times). We stand behind every qualifying time we’ve submitted – particularly as we’ve continued to roll out software and hardware improvements over the past year. 

Summary of Results

On read-rates and accuracy. Laurel’s read-rates outperformed a leading RFID solution at the finish line – the checkpoint where it matters most.

In our latest testing, we measured a 202ms standard deviation across 1,228 crossings on a single redundant Laurel line – validated against three video cameras at a live marathon finish line. That’s on par with industry-standard RFID, and in our testing, better. Our Gen-2 mats are expected to improve it further still.

Laurel’s real unlock, however, is on the tracking and storytelling – telling the full story of every race.

If you’re anything like me, the moment you cross a finish line you’re pulling up your GPS watch and scrolling through Strava – because the official results only tell part of the story. A handful of splits. A finish time. But not how you raced.

With Laurel, we’re changing that. Official timing data, captured every tenth of a mile – granularity that has never existed in race timing until now.

That unlocks an entirely new layer of the race experience: training insights, real-time coaching, races-within-races, segments, sponsorable moments, and more. The full story of every race, finally told.

On cost. The column estimated our chip costs at $2.50-$3.50 each. That figure doesn’t reflect our actual production costs. Our tag costs are competitive, and we are not losing money on our bids. We’re a company committed to long-term sustainable growth, not a race-to-the-bottom pricing strategy.

On environmental impact. Laurel is actively addressing the environmental footprint of race timing. We use fully recyclable CR1216 batteries and are establishing partnerships with certified e-waste recyclers. We are also pioneering end-of-race chute recycling programs alongside Tina Muir and other leaders in sustainability.

On ChronoTrack. We did not mention ChronoTrack by name in our press release. We shared Laurel’s objective read rates.

On the Houston Half Marathon. They are a valued partner. We stand fully behind the results we delivered there.

The Running Paradox – And Why It Matters

I call this the running paradox: running is the most popular participatory sport in the world, and yet the least spectated. That’s not a sport problem. It’s an infrastructure and data problem.

Golf, an $84 billion ecosystem with $15 billion in TV market value, has real-time ball tracking, predictive modeling, and rich broadcast visualization. Running, a $40 billion+ ecosystem, has broadcast rights under $1 billion. The difference is data density and storytelling. Traditional timing captures splits every 5KM, leaving spectators waiting 45 minutes between updates. The surges, the comebacks, the drama, all of it invisible.

The Paradigm Shift Laurel Is Driving

The shift Laurel is bringing to this industry isn’t just a technology upgrade. It’s a fundamentally different philosophy about what a race experience should be.

Traditional timing tells you a runner crossed a mat. Laurel tells you the whole story – every tenth of a mile, from start to finish, for every single participant. Not just the leaders. Not just at the 10K mark and the finish line. Every runner. Every moment. The surge at mile 8. The slowdown at mile 11. The comeback in the final stretch. For the first time, that full narrative is visible; to fans, to commentators, to race directors, and to the athletes themselves.

It’s also about safety in a way the industry hasn’t seen before. Near real-time tracking updates mean race directors know precisely where every runner is on course. Not-moving alerts identify athletes who have stopped. Back-of-pack visibility tells law enforcement exactly when roads can safely reopen. These aren’t nice-to-haves, they’re meaningful operational improvements that protect runners and simplify race management.

And it’s about what that data unlocks beyond race day: personalized race recaps for every finisher, new sponsorable moments throughout the course, broadcast-ready intelligence for commentators, and post-race analytics that make every subsequent event better.

This is the paradigm shift. Not a faster chip. Not a cheaper mat. A complete reimagining of what timing data can do – for the runner, the fan, the director, and the sport itself.

Laurel now powers over 500 events nationwide in 2026, including races with 30,000+ participants, some of the largest in the country. At the 2026 Saucony Philly Love Run, our platform reached over 43,000 people across nearly 15,000 runners, roughly 3 fans engaged per participant. That’s what this technology unlocks.

“Laurel has turned timing into a differentiated part of our event experience,” said Crystian Kumnick, Managing Director of Motiv Sports. “For our team, our city partners, our sponsors, and the running community.”

Timing has always been necessary. Now it can be genuinely exciting. We welcome any questions about our technology, methodology, or results; our door is open.

Phil Dumontet is the CEO of Laurel Innovations. He can be reached at phil@laurelt.com.