[Manic Monday] The Technology Behind the Running Competition

Lately, Indonesia seems to be invaded by the running trend. Running seems to be a 'new thing for cool' that is followed, although not a few are actually happy with this sport, and of course this trend has a much better impact on society in general than trends, for example, eating at fast food restaurants or spending time in a 24-hour one-stop franchise, because this trend advocates healthy living.

Various communities, programs and competitions in the past year have started to be held around running, and the existence of these various running competitions has become more of a public spotlight. Owners brand compete to interact with these runners, to promote the latest energy or isotonic drinks, the latest sports equipment, or seek to associate brandwith a healthy way of life.

The development of running competitions has also grown rapidly, and involves technology to support it. In the past, the time recording of the running race participants was done manually by hundreds of people marshall who have to monitor the movement of thousands of participants, now recording start, split and finish times can be assisted by RFID technology.

The RFID technology used for running competitions is quite simple in principle. An RFID chip is worn on the runner, usually on a chest number or on his shoes, which will be read by an RFID reader sensor which is usually placed at the start, mid-route, and finish points. One of the companies in Indonesia that provides this service is Run. ID.

According to RFID technology, each chip has a unique identification number so that the reader system can distinguish one chip from another (so that it can distinguish one runner from another), and uses the UHF (ultra-high frequency) RFID standard so that the RFID chip can be read with a distance of at least one meter. This is different from the standard RFID technology used for prepaid cards such as the BCA Flazz or Mandiri E-toll Card, which use the HF (high-frequency) standard and can only be read by touching the RFID card to the reader.

With the help of this RFID technology, running competitions can be made much more efficient, because time recording is done automatically by the system, and only needs to be supervised by a small number of people. marshall just. Even so, usually a good running competition will be assisted by video and photo documentation for reference to the winner of the competition, and there is still manual recording by marshall, usually at the finish line.

The existence of this RFID technology also makes it easier for runners to see the results of recording their time in the competitions they are participating in. And with the presence of RFID technology in running competitions, it actually opens up various possibilities of interaction as was done in the past 2010 New York City Marathon, and various other running competitions. Utilization of a digital-based technology for an event in the real world, can certainly be developed further.

Ario is the co-founder of Ohio, a music streaming service from Indonesia. Ario worked in the Indonesian music industry from 2003 to 2010, before working in the film and TV industry in Vietnam. You can follow his account on Twitter – @barijoe or read his blog at http://barijoe.wordpress.com.

[Photo illustration from Shutterstock]