A look at our partner: Krono

Today, we invite you to take a look at an important aspect of the organization of BikingMan races, and especially for participants eager for performance: timing. And on a BikingMan, who says timekeeping, says Krono quite simply.
Axel explains everything to you!

• Who is Krono and how did you meet them?
• KRONO is the official timekeeper for all BikingMan events. It is also our partner who takes care of managing registrations for our races, but it is above all a team of event enthusiasts who find solutions to “almost” everything!
  In 2019, we were returning from Oman’s BikingMan and were preparing for the 2nd edition of BikingMan Corsica. At the time, Clémence (and Jean-Jacques Raffi, his father) were among the participants. Clémence living in Corsica and is now part of the Krono team. She was the one who made the presentations.
  And that’s how the adventure started!
• How long have you been working with Krono?
• Since April 2019 and since then on all races: Corsica, Laos, Peru, Portugal, Taiwan and Oman.

• What is Krono’s role with the BikingMan?
• -To time adventurers with cutting edge technology (this prevents manual pointing errors at checkpoints and at the finish line),
  -To display the classification of each BikingMan,
  -To manage our registrations on a single centralized platform to simplify the participant registration process,
  -To bring its know-how in the management of events with versatile women and men in the field. KRONO is also an important technical partner with whom we carry out technological tests to improve the monitoring of participants and the security of BikingMan events.
• How is the timing materialized on BikingMan?
• Each participant is equipped with a KRONO chip which makes it possible to record in real-time, at each passage (departure, checkpoint and arrival), their time on the dedicated KRONO timing site.
  In addition to the “live” GPS tracking that we implement on each race, the timing allows us as an organizer to get a more precise race tracking. The public also benefits from a live “status” on the progress of the participants followed, which is very useful in the event of drop-outs, for example.

• How did the equipment behave in the extreme conditions of Laos, Taiwan, or Oman…?
• The Laotian heat last year was very hard on the equipment (over 45°C!), but the chips, like the participants, survived! The humid climatic conditions of Taiwan and the drought of Oman did not overcome the gear or the KRONO staff! So it’s solid.
• Why did you decide to set up timekeeping in addition to GPS tracking?
• GPS tracking is a great but imprecise tool that will improve a lot over the coming years.
  KRONO timing technology has proven itself and it works in all conditions. This is one of the technical means of securing the BikingMan events and facilitating our small organization (scoring, monitoring, classification) which is in great demand during the races.
• How did you do before?
• With our own sweat, getting little sleep and making mistakes 😊.
  Everything was done manually and resulted in errors unnecessarily disturbing the course of our events.
• What does Krono bring you outside of BikingMan events?
• A sincere relationship between enthusiasts who are trying to make a difference in an ultra-risky, ultra-competitive sector: events.
• Do you have an anecdote to tell about Krono?
• The installation by KRONO of a checkpoint during the Oman 2020 race in order to record the time of the best climber on the Jebel Shams pass. I will not detail what solution KRONO implemented (top secret 😉), but it was risky and it worked!
• What do you plan to do with Krono for the rest of the events and after the COVID-19?
• Growing together and preparing for a framework of events on a “technical” level, no doubt different, according to COVID.
  I think that agility, trusting relationships and the will to fight to bring our events to life with our partners are all that will make the difference for after COVID.

Find all the events managed by Krono as well as all the information on their solutions on their site:

Krono website