Bluetooth Reconnection Issues (on my Race S)

Theo Sudarja

Suunto please fix Bluetooth External Sensor reconnection issue.

Suunto has been known to refuse Bluetooth reconnection after connection fails.

I know it’s been criticizes many times in internet forum. And happened to me in the past. So I have the knowledge. I prepared myself if reconnection fails; I need to save activity and start a new one.

Yesterday it was really bad experience for me.

I was at 80km gravel event. And my Race S lost it’s connection to external HR on a Check Point stop.

I have my Race S strapped on handle bars. And put my Garmin HRM Pro connected to Race S. When they disconnected, Maybe that I move away too far. Maybe something else, bluetooth signal dropped, etc.

At first I didn’t notice the Bluetooth disconnected. till I rode for a km and I haven’t got any feedback on my HR.

Quick enough, on the road, as I had past experience; I put my activity saved, start a new one, reconnection perfectly. And after I just left with several separated activities that I need to merge in Strava. Which a bummer.

Please add auto reconection or option to manually reconnect.

elbee

@Theo-Sudarja

Suunto support told me not to expect a fix for the bluetooth problem by a new firmware version any time soon. And I think you can leave the soon away.

isazi

@Theo-Sudarja it is known, and very unfortunate (same happened to me in a 77km gravel event last year, and then again at Paris-Roubaix this year…). I asked (once again) for clarification from Suunto.

johann.fuehrer

@isazi … and the same happens on the Vertical 2 with powermeter connection as well…

elbee

The run 2 got a firmware update with explicit mention of a Bluetooth fix. So I asked Suunto support if that fix will also come to the race s. Here is the reply:

“ Regarding your other question about the Race S and the Bluetooth connection stability improvement mentioned in the latest Run 2 software update, we understand why this caught your attention. At the moment, however, we do not have any confirmed information or timeline regarding whether the same improvement will be introduced to the Race S in a future updateL

What I read: suunto is not working an a new firmware for the race s and the Bluetooth problems will never be fixed.

Gunnar

@elbee what I read: stupid chatbot answer. Times with human support have been better…

elbee

@Gunnar said:

@elbee what I read: stupid chatbot answer. Times with human support have been better…

No, it’s from a much longer email. I also have a problem with revoking 3rd party access to my suunto data.

But it is a “say as least as possible” support answer. That’s for sure. For me that has consequences in my judgment about suunto (support)

Egika

@elbee said:
What I read: suunto is not working an a new firmware for the race s and the Bluetooth problems will never be fixed.

I think you are interpreting too much into this answer. It is clearly not saying this.
I know that there is a testing firmware branch for Race S. So Suunto is definitely working on it.
At the same time I am also not sure if it solves your issue. (this is, what I read from that support answer)
At least the release notes have some BT in them:
Bugfix: Update the Renesas Bluetooth firmware to fix remaining BLE and BT issues.

elbee

@Egika

Suunto support is telling me there is no information on future firmwares and no information about bluetooth fixes.

And you claim there is. I think I’ve read you are one of the beta testers. Could you tell me how many beta versions suunto has provided since the release of the last official firmware and how long ago the latest beta was?

Egika

@elbee said:

@Egika

Suunto support is telling me there is no information on future firmwares and no information about bluetooth fixes.

And you claim there is. I think I’ve read you are one of the beta testers. Could you tell me how many beta versions suunto has provided since the release of the last official firmware and how long ago the latest beta was?

From your quote:
At the moment, however, we do not have any confirmed information or timeline regarding whether the same improvement will be introduced to the Race S in a future update

“In a future update” - this does not allow the conclusion there won’t be any.
“whether the same improvement will be introduced to the Race S” - this clearly limits the whole statement to your specific BT issue.

I am under NDA, so cannot share internals about dates and versions. But you can really rest assured that Race S is actively developed.

elbee

@Egika said:

I am under NDA, so cannot share internals about dates and versions. But you can really rest assured that Race S is actively developed.

Please also consider my side of the story. I hear for months now, on this forum, that I can rest assured, the race s is actively developed, but for over 10 months my watches is plagued by bluetooth problems. All I see, in real life, is zero development.

Mff73

@elbee
People under NDA could also never ever say anything, no hint, no comment, and you would really definitively stay in your side of the story.
“Be reassured” (and patient… (or not…))

Egika

@elbee understood. Now my statement is like it is.

Inge Nallsson

@elbee said:

All I see, in real life, is zero development.

Strongly agreed. And now there is a rumour that even Q3 will be skipped. To anyone from Suunto reading this, surely you are aware of the up and coming phrase “tipping point” (in other areas). I am slowly reaching a point where I might tip over to another company. Again. Came from Coros and before that Garmin.

The first indication of Bluetooth problems I could see already with the purchase of the Race S and the ‘Suunto Smart Heart Rate Belt’ in December 2024. There came a flatlining period of ca 1 to 2 minutes in the HR seen on watch (and later App graph) after about 30 minutes running. But it didn’t happen every run, only about every second or third session… Read some posts about it in this forum with the usual user speculation as to causes.

Memory of later developmens are hazy but they amount to irregularities developing in the HR values registered from the belt pod (I bought a new belt which didn’t improve the situation). Whether these irregularities came directly after a watch firmware update I can’t remember.

Then, which made me start to think “tipping point”, we had the protracted situation of several months with Bluetooth connection problems between watch and android App. Since I shut the watch down after every exercise, I had to kill (“Force stop”) the App before a connection could be made again upon watch boot up. And if the run took too long time with the phone left at home, I had to kill the App again for a sync to happen afterwards. This went on for two App versions after the version which introduced the problem! The third version was better, but connections still refused to happen automatically at irregular times. The latest App version I haven’t been able to test due to injuries.

We all know, from comments made by forum members connected to Suunto, that the Race 2 and Vertical 2 have gotten Bluetooth fixes in recent firmware upgrades. And now the Run 2. It really, really irks that the older (older… pshaw!) generation is neglected for such a long time.

2b2bff

@Inge-Nallsson I feel you. Wished Suunto would just release a bug fix release and then go on with new features. Instead, they try to bring both what takes a lot more time and introduces new bugs on the way.
There are so many easy fixable things that are very low on the priority list (German translations on iOS - my pet peeve) that would shrink the open issue list visible to the users…

SVBel

Hello Suunto community.

Is there anybody living in Belgium, and more specific in Limburg or nearby ? Or in Limburg in the Netherlands ? I want to check if my HR monitor has a steady connection with somebody else his Race S .

With kind regards,
S