As the excitement builds ahead of the Tour de France, sponsors have detailed the technology which will be used to lift coverage to new levels.
Video from GoPro cameras is being expanded and handling expedited, and Dimension Data says it has completed a data analytics platform from which the company will deliver real-time information on individual riders for the first time in the history of professional cycling.
Data will be collected through the use of live trackers under the saddle of each rider, processed and analysed for the use of fans, commentators and the media. All 198 riders in 22 teams will be followed in real-time, with speeds and positions tracked.
Executive chairman Jeremy Ord says the company will roll out a range of new capabilities, including a beta live tracking website. Real time analytics will take data from third party geo-localisation, undertake data cleansing and analysis, and provide access as both a real time data stream and a historical archive.
The system was tested during the Critérium du Dauphiné race in June, where one cyclist was tracked at 104 kilometres an hour. "This type of data has not been available in the past," he says.
Fans will be able to monitor favourite riders on smartphones and tablets through a beta website, while they watch it live on TV. The live tracking website is built to support 17 million viewers and 2000 page requests a second.
Technology components include internet of things, real time big data analytics, elastic cloud infrastructure, contemporary digital platforms, advanced collaboration technologies and agile development practices.
Official supplier GoPro will equip a minimum of eight bikes with cameras, and initially pictures will be edited in the evening prior to delivery to broadcasters, although a test live broadcast of images from onboard cameras is planned during the neutralised start of stage 2 in Utrecht.
Sprinting scenes will caught by a 'super slow motion' camera and HF cameras on five motorbikes, two helicopters and ten fixed cameras will contribute to coverage of the eight stages to be broadcasted in their entirety this year.