The Stopwatch Problem
Ask two coaches to time the same rep and you’ll likely get two different results. That’s stopwatch timing in a nutshell.
Even the sharpest thumb can’t start and stop with the precision athletes deserve. And when athletes are chasing hundredths of a second, that margin of error is bigger than the improvement they’re working for.
Why Accuracy Matters
In sprinting and agility drills, gains show up in tiny increments. A 0.05-second drop over 30 metres is huge — but only if your timing method is consistent enough to catch it.
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Stopwatches → human error of ±0.2–0.3 seconds. Two different timers can produce results that don’t even look like the same run.
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Laser gate systems (Brower, Dashr) → often promoted as “very accurate,” but coaches know the catch: a hand, knee, or arm can trip the beam early, stopping the clock before the athlete’s body has crossed. Numbers may look precise, but they don’t always reflect true performance or repeatability — and don’t get me started on trying to time multiple athletes at once.
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Photo-finish systems (FinishLynx, Olympic-level) → the gold standard. Millisecond accurate and fully certified. But with price tags in the tens of thousands, completely fixed setups, and dedicated staff required, they’re simply not a daily training tool.
That leaves most of us needing something else: a way to capture repeatable, comparable times that actually reflect what the athlete did on the track or field.
A Different Approach: Timing at the Center of Mass
Freelap solves this by shifting the measurement point. Instead of a thumb or a beam, it uses a chip clipped at the waist — the athlete’s center of mass.
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The chip is always in the same place, every rep.
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Portable transmitters mark start, splits, and finish.
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Each crossing is logged to ±0.02s and sent instantly to the app.
The result is simple: every rep is measured the same way. Whether it’s a group of athletes in a session or an individual working alone, the data is consistent and fair.
Why That Consistency Matters
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For coaches, it means accurate feedback across groups without losing time to setup or second-guessing the numbers.
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For athletes training alone, it means you don’t need a partner with a stopwatch or someone to manage equipment — your runs are captured automatically, the same way every time.
Different situations, same principle: consistency makes comparisons meaningful.
The Luxury vs The Rest of Us
If you’ve got the luxury of a $20,000 Olympic photo-finish system and a full staff running it at every workout — fantastic. But let’s be real: for the rest of us, that’s not reality.
Daily training doesn’t need Olympic infrastructure. What matters is a system that’s consistent, repeatable, and affordable. That’s what Freelap delivers: results athletes and coaches can depend on, session after session.
Real Applications
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Track & Field: flying 30m, 10m splits, block starts, relay exchanges.
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Football: 40-yard dash, 5-10-5 shuttle, 3-cone drill.
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Soccer: repeat sprint tests, 20m acceleration, agility drills.
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Gyms: objective speed testing and athlete monitoring.
Wherever speed and repeatability matter, the setup is the same — and the data holds up.
Final Thoughts
Stopwatches are inconsistent. Lasers have their quirks. Photo-finish is the gold standard, but not realistic for everyday use.
For coaches and athletes in Canada, Freelap offers the balance that makes sense: accurate, consistent timing that works the same way whether you’re running a team session or training alone.
👉 Freelap packs are available in Canada, priced in CAD
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Ways to Train Smarter (and Save Time) with Better Timing