Speediance Strap update targets some of its biggest early flaws

Speediance has pushed out firmware 1.0.7 for the Strap and Strap Pro. The new software targets heart-rate response, workout detection, sleep timing and Bluetooth reliability, including several things that stood out during my own testing.

This is the kind of update I like seeing after a review goes live. Instead of adding another shiny metric and calling it a day, Speediance is going back to some of the basic stuff that was not quite right when I tested the Strap Pro.

Heart rate was already good, but it should now react faster

The headline change is an updated heart-rate algorithm. Speediance says it should respond faster when a workout starts and during intervals, while also improving accuracy in different scenarios.

That is interesting because heart rate was already one of the better parts of the Strap Pro for me. I did not come away thinking the sensor was unreliable, but there were still situations where faster response would help, especially when effort changes quickly.

Intervals are the obvious example. If you go from easy running to a hard effort, a delayed optical reading can make the first chunk of that interval look flatter than it really was. Speediance is clearly trying to tighten that up here.

Workout auto-detection has also been reworked. The company says start and end detection should now be more accurate, which matters quite a bit on a screenless tracker because you are relying heavily on the device getting those boundaries right.

If a workout starts several minutes late or keeps running after you stop, you can end up with a session that looks wrong even when the underlying heart-rate data is decent. Better auto-detection should make the whole experience feel less hands-on.

Wear detection has been tweaked too. Speediance says the Strap should now do a better job of knowing when it is actually on your arm, which should help cut down on odd readings and unnecessary sensor activity.

Sleep is the bit I care about most

The change I am most interested in is sleep latency detection. Speediance specifically says firmware 1.0.7 should reduce inaccurate sleep onset times.

That goes straight at one of the problems I found in my review. On some nights, the Strap Pro could get sleep duration wrong by one or two hours, and naps were not always picked up either.

That is important because recovery scores are only as good as the data underneath them. If the tracker thinks you fell asleep at the wrong time, every recovery number built on top of that starts from a shaky base.

Speediance is not saying nap detection has been fixed, so I would not assume that issue has disappeared. But the wording around sleep onset is specific enough to suggest the company has identified one of the reasons those nightly totals could drift.

Also on my Wishlist is the ability to edit sleep times. Unfortunately, that still stays on my Wishlist for future updates. No device is perfect at detecting sleep. Having the ability to manually edit is something many devices offer.

Bluetooth and syncing also get a cleanup

Firmware 1.0.7 also includes Bluetooth work, which is another area where I had some complaints. Speediance says transmission has been optimized for more stable data synchronization, and there are additional fixes related to Bluetooth advertising.

Syncing was not broken during my testing, but it could feel slow. That becomes more noticeable when you are waiting for sleep or workout data to appear in the app, so any improvement here should make the device feel more polished in daily use.

This update follows the earlier firmware that added EDA-based stress monitoring to the Strap Pro. So Speediance is moving fairly quickly, first adding functionality and now cleaning up some of the rougher edges.