OC Technology and Yellowbrick Partner Up in Tracking Deal.

The ability to track boats in real time has been one of the key enablers of making the sport of sailing more accessible to a wider audience. The technology also has increasing importance for training, race management and safty. For inshore racing, the ability to send your GPS position via your mobile phone to the internet is challenging companies who have developed more proprietary solutions, but for offshore racing, the barriers to entry are more substantial.

OC Technology, part of OC Group, has signed a new strategic partnership with Yellowbrick Tracking. This is a significant consolidation in the tracking business which establishes Yellowbrick as the leading company in the offshore yacht tracking market with the largest fleet of Iridium-based tracking units available.

Clémentine d’Oiron, OC Technology Manager said:

“Our products have made a significant contribution since 2006 to making tracking a normal part of every offshore race, and we have held a large market share. The partnership with Yellowbrick will provide race organisers and sailing teams all over the world the best possible service and allow for continued investment in product development”

The new partnership will see all operational delivery of tracking services carried out by Yellowbrick, including the provision of the hardware and the online management system, whilst OC Technology will continue to market their integrated communication systems that have been developed over the last decade to such great effect for professional sailing projects, such as, Dame Ellen MacArthur’s solo round the world record and the inaugural Barcelona World Race.

The standard OCTracker unit will be renamed YellowbrickMAX and Yellowbrick will now manage all the tracking operations of the combined business. The Yellowbrick units are self-contained, battery-powered, lightweight, tracking devices capable of reporting a boat’s position, speed and course at pre-determined intervals, and are programmable remotely. In addition, Yellowbrick will also manage the OCTracker+ units, to be renamed YellowbrickMAX+, which allow for a hard-wired installation and extended data transfer capabilities, such as, true wind speed and other data.

Yellowbrick Managing Director, Nick Farrell, commented:

“We are very excited to see this new partnership go through. Yellowbrick now has the largest Iridium-based tracker hire stock in the world, and the most comprehensive back-office system. The experience and depth of knowledge of our combined teams means that we will be able to deliver our first-class service to many more race organisers who wish to track their events. Using Iridium-based trackers means that our units work anywhere on earth, without areas of marginal or no coverage, unlike other operators. Both the Yellowbrick and YellowbrickMAX units and web viewing solutions are tried and tested products.”

The OCTracker unit was launched in July 2006 and in 2007 the entire fleet in the bi-annual Rolex Fastnet Race were fitted with the units in association with the RORC. Since then the tracking units have been used by many race organisers and race campaigns including Thomas Coville’s S’Odebo record programme, the double-handed non-stop Barcelona World Race and the solo transatlantic The Artemis Transat. The units will also be used again in the next edition of the 2011 Barcelona World Race and other prestigious round the world races.

Since 2006, Yellowbrick have provided tracking and information display solutions for events including the double-handed Shetland Round Britain & Ireland Race, the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers and other events in Australia, Italy, Belgium, the Caribbean. Their technology has been selected for the VELUX 5 OCEANS Race starting in 2010. In addition, the lightweight, self-contained trackers have proved popular in a diverse range of applications including expedition tracking and airsports such the World Gliding Championships and Grand Prix gliding events.

‘SailStream’ Will Allow Spectators to Be the Producer of Sailing Coverage.

Sailing continues to push the boundaries of the way the sport is delivered to its audience. While Russell Coutts and the folk behind the next America’s Cup think about TV, the RS:X World Windsurfing Championships are planning to present a new integrated media platform combining tracking with live video images that can be controlled by the watcher.

The City of Kerteminde in Denmark will stage the 2010 RS:X World Windsurfing Championships from 27 August – 5 September and the event will feature a new platform created by Zenitel and TracTrac.

‘Sailstream – You are the producer’ will allow spectators in Kerteminde to watch the racing on giant screens ashore and give a global audience the opportunity to watch live action on their computer screens. The idea behind the concept is a combination of GPS-tracking, live streaming and course commentary, which should make the spectator experience exceptionally exciting.

Jacob Møhl from Sail Event Kerteminde says:

“This game changing technology lets the spectator choose which video stream he or she wishes to watch, hence the tag line ‘You Are The Producer’. Both the tracking technology and live video images will be seen on the same web page.”

The core of the concept is that three or more video cameras can move independently from point to point on the race track, transmitting directly from the water to the Internet. This will allow key points of the course to be moniored including the start, mark roundings and slalom sections of the course as well as the finish.

Spectators can choose the prefferred camera angle and the GPS tracking adds an extra data stream to make following the competitors more easy. Live commentary will add yet another layer of coverage to explain the images to a wider audience.

Mike Dempsey, RS:X Class President said:

“It’s fantastic for the RS:X Class to be so closely involved in this cutting edge development which will bring Olympic sailing closer to a global audience than ever before. We have been working hard to develop our online media presence for three years. Now with ‘Sailstream’, we’re moving on to cloud servers to handle the expected traffic.”

The city of Kerteminde, anxious to brand itself as the world’s most cozy Lilliputian sailing city will be dressed for the RS:X World Championships. It has officially named the week ‘World Water Week’ and will stage a lot of water related side-activities.

More Streaming and Tracking News…

Round the Island Race Innovates Live Consumption of Sport.

The SportBusiness New Media conference in Manchester yesterday, like many sports events in the UK, was heavily biassed towards ball sports. The problem with ball-sports is that they don’t have the same challenges experienced by other sports – the kind of challenges that lead to innovation.

There is probably not a lot of point using GPS for a game of football. The stadium is a confined space and there are a limited number of players on the pitch. Coverage of mass participation sports is quite a different matter – take the J.P. Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race for example.

An estimated 1700 or so boats compete in this event every year. With an average crew size of 5, that’s around 8,000 competitors, making the race one of the UK’s biggest participatory events. There are not two teams in this race, but 1700, so how do you manage to cater for the spectators who are following one boat or another?

The Island Sailing Club and title sponsor J.P. Morgan Asset Management have announced that they will be introducing live GPS tracking for all boats taking part in the 2010 Round the Island Race on Saturday 19th June. Many GPS enabled phones have the ability to provide real-time tracking to the internet via downloadable applications. Several boats competing in the 2009 race set up their own live feeds but in 2010, the Round the Island project will attempt to collect all the boat tracking feeds into a single place, viewable on the internet.

Competitors with compatible equipment will be able to download a small piece of software that will allow their mobile phone or laptop to become a real-time GPS tracking device. The device’s position will be periodically transmitted to the official Race website, where a simple, easy-to-use race viewer will allow visitors to monitor the progress of individual boats throughout the race.

The tracking solution has been developed by the Race Technology Partner, Next Generation Results and funded by J.P. Morgan Asset Management. It will be one of the largest GPS event tracking initiatives ever undertaken with mobile phone technology.

The cost of GPS tracking has tumbled in recent years. Once only available to the most well-funded teams, now anyone can provide live tracking information live to the internet with readily available mobile phone handsets. Unlimited mobile data plans have also helped reduce the cost of tracking via this method, though it relies on having a mobile phone signal.

The challenge for race organisers will be getting all the signals into one place and providing the information in a way that spectators online can find the boat they are looking for. Website spectators will be able to search and select up to 10 boats that they want to follow at any one time through the Race Viewer. Boats will be searchable via their name and class. Each boat tracked will show its elapsed time from the race start and current GPS co-ordinates.

The competitors also benefit from this tracking technology as they will be able to replay their race and compare their performance with their rivals to see where they got it right – or wrong!

The technology has application for many sports including Rally, Mountain Biking, Triathlon etc. It’s a great example of how sailing is at the cutting edge of media technology and live sport content delivery.

More details of supported equipment and how to register for the service will be available on the race website at http://www.roundtheisland.org.uk

Sponsoring a Racing Mark – Worth a (Vodka) Shot.

Here’s a sailing sponsorship story with a bit of a difference. If you want to get your message out to the yacht racing community, sponsoring a boat is not the only way. Occasionally the opportunity to name a racing mark in the Solent comes up giving companies the ability to be programmed into GPS devices of pro-sailors as well as being talked about by sailors racing towards and around the ‘cans’.

Wight Vodka has snapped up one of the central Solent racing marks in a long-term agreement with Cowes Week Ltd.

The Wight Vodka racing buoy is located at 50° 48.63′N, 01° 16.66′W and will be used throughout the coming years’ regatta seasons in potentially hundreds of races.

Ritu Manocha, Director at 50° North, the creators of Wight Vodka, anticipates that the buoy to be in constant use.

“We always had our eyes on sponsoring one of the premium racing marks in the Solent. We wanted a mark that is used by the yacht and sailing clubs both on the Isle of Wight and the south coast. When 50° 48.63′N, 01° 16.66′W opened up, we knew immediately that it was perfect for the Wight Vodka brand.”

Stuart Quarrie, Chief Executive of Cowes Week Ltd and the Cowes Combined Clubs, is pleased to have the support of 50° North.

“Cowes Week Ltd believes in building strong relationships with our partners, harbour and racing authorities and of course the yachtsmen and women who enjoy the Solent waters. Having the Wight Vodka racing mark firmly established for future years shows great long-term commitment.”

Manocha continued

“Now that we have the mark, we can definitely have some fun with it. For example, I can see yacht clubs creating a ‘First to the WV Mark’ contest with the more prestigious races, whereby the skipper who rounds WV ahead of the rest may get special recognition. A signed bottle of Wight perhaps?”

Wight Vodka’s spirit and enthusiasm for the ocean, coupled with the centuries old regatta traditions of the Isle of Wight.

E-Spectators to Follow Pineapple Race via iBoat Track

The rise of the yachting e-spectator continues with SORC, the organisers of the Pineapple Cup announcing an agreement with Horizon Marine to track all of the competitors in this year’s race from Fort Lauderdale to Montego Bay, Jamaica.

Using its proprietary iBoat Track software, hourly GPS signals will track all competing boats and display real-time positions on Horizon’s online graphic display, providing position, speed, fleet and class positions during the entire length of the course. The race starts this Friday, February 6th at 1400 off Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, and the live reports will be available at that time on www.montegobayrace.com.

Ken Batzer, Race Chairman.

“This is the first time tracking will be used for the Pineapple Cup for the benefit of all those e-spectators, families and friends who want to follow the race daily,”

“Each boat will have an iBoat Track GPS transponder mounted on the deck, and course positions will be updated every hour.”

Horizon Marine iBoattrack is a web service that offers tracking and mapping of offshore yacht races, cruising boats, and fleets of offshore commercial assets.  iBoattrack’s Race Tracking system not only offers end-users the comfort of watching a race from their home or office PCs, but gives them a different perspective on the race in general. For each race, iBoattrack offers a Google Map-based interactive map, a low bandwidth map, both with weather overlays, an unofficial “progress board”, a photo page of each vessel labeled “fleet view”, a discussion board, and a help page offering aid to the end-user who wants to learn how to navigate through the site.

The 810-mile race offers navigators, tacticians, and crews a challenging all-points-of-sail blast to a fabled destination. Immediately after the start the racers cross the Gulf Stream for the Northwest Providence Channel. The middle of the race usually offers a fetch down the eastern side of the Bahamas Island Chain towards the tip of Cuba. The final stretch is a sailor’s dream: a 240 mile downwind sleigh ride from Cuba’s eastern tip known as Windward Passage to the finish at Montego Bay.

The race is sponsored by the Lauderdale Yacht Club (Fort Lauderdale, FL), the Montego Bay Yacht Club (Montego Bay, Jamaica), and the Jamaican Yachting Association (Kingston, Jamaica), the Storm Trysail Club (Larchmont, N.Y.), and administered by the SORC Race Management team.

The Pineapple Cup has long been an ocean racing classic. The race started in 1961 and has run either annually or biannually ever since. Past winners are a Who’s Who of ocean skippers and yacht names. Ted Turner won three times in Vamoose (’67), Lightnin (’73) and Tenacious (’79); the Johnson family won in Ticonderoga (’65); John Kilroy won twice in Kialoa (’75 & ’77); and Jack King won in Merrythought (’91).

Fore more information go to www.montegobayrace.com

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