Join Nigel Mansell as he cycles 1200 miles in 13 days
To support the Nigel Mansell Cycle Challenge around Britain Map My Tracks has launched the first live first-person tracking system that allows online viewers to experience the ride as Nigel is seeing it. The ex-Formula 1 champion has embarked on an epic 1200 miles ride around Britain over 13 days in aid of UK Youth and with Map My Tracks' virtual tracking system spectators can follow Nigel's progress in real-time and see the roads as he see them.
The Nigel Mansell Cycle Challenge takes place from July 22 through to August 3 and each day’s ride will be tracked live so that spectators can watch Nigel at any stage to see where and what he is seeing.
By overlaying the Map My Tracks live tracking platform with Google Street View spectators get, for the first time, a view of the road as if they were cycling it themselves. The first-person viewer updates and travels down the roads as new data is received live from the Map My Tracks tracker that Nigel and his group have with them. Updates can be set as frequently as every two seconds but for this challenge new updates are taken every one minute.
Ride with Nigel as if sitting on his saddle or view the full route with statistics of their performance.
Please support Nigel and his team of riders in their challenge to ride 1200 in 13 days.
Tweet when you start. Tweet when you stop with OutFront 1.4
The latest version of OutFront for iPhone now includes easier ways to share your activities with your followers on Twitter. Version 1.4 is the first one that lets you automatically tweet when you start or stop an activity. Once set up it posts a tweet to invite your followers to watch your progress live.
As part of this latest update OutFront 1.4 now includes support for iPhone 4 and IOS4 users. A few other small improvements have also been added to the GPS accuracy to make it even easier to use. These changes, coupled with seamless integration with mapmytracks.com make this version the best yet and is the result of all the user feedback we get.
Setting up auto tweets
To use the latest auto tweet functionality first open the app then tap ‘Settings’.
Scroll down to the Sharing options then tap ‘Sharing settings’. Here you can set up how you want Twitter to work for you.
First add your Twitter username and password. If you don’t want auto tweets but still would like to share your activities manually then this is all you need to do. Tap ‘Back’ to setting then ‘Save’ the new settings and you are done.
To use auto tweets choose whether you want to post a tweet when you start your activity, when you stop your activity or both.
Once set up tap ‘Back’ to setting then ‘Save’ the new settings.
It’s that simple.
We hope you enjoy using the latest version of OutFront. Don’t forget to update to the latest version to get these new features. OutFront can be downloaded from the App Store.
Real-time tracking for the London-Paris 2010
Riders in The London-Paris 2010 will have real time GPS tracking for the first time this year via sports event tracking specialists Map My Tracks.
Map My Tracks, named by the Daily Mail as the best app for fitness freaks, will provide GPS tracking of all five groups riding The L2P.
The L2P website will have an online dashboard displaying the statistics, locations and mileage of the riders along the 550km route to Paris.
Nick Tatt, of Map My Tracks, said: “For the first time L2P riders will be tracked across the entire route to Paris. Cycling fans, riders’ families and sponsorship partners will be able to follow the action live as-it-happens.
“Map My Tracks is all about showcasing sporting achievement and following an event live adds a real sense of excitement. We’ll be updating information on riders and the route second by second throughout the ride online. We’ll also be providing photos and Twitter updates from start to finish.”
Sven Thiele, of HotChillee, the global media, marketing and events company staging The L2P, said: “We first worked with Map My Tracks on HotChillee’s James Cracknell End To End Relay Challenge and the live tracking of the event was enormously popular with our web community.
“We are delighted to have real-time tracking of The L2P. It means that families will be able to follow dads or mums on the ride. Cycling fans from all over the world will be able to watch the progress of the peloton online and The L2P will have comprehensive web coverage for all three days of the ride.”
The London-Paris 2010, (June 24 – 26) is the UK’s premier cyclosportive. It is recognised as the closest the amateur rider can get to the Tour de France experience.
The ride covers 550km in three days with a rest day in Paris. The Daily Telegraph recently ranked The L2P as one of the world’s top 25 events, alongside the London and New York marathons. The event has also been named in the top ten of adventure events for women.
Riders this year include Tour winner Stephen Roche, Olympian Rebecca Romero, ex-pro Magnus Backstedt, leading cycling coach Scott Sunderland, former Formula 1 world champion Nigel Mansell, ex-England rugby captain Will Carling and former footballers Geoff Thomas and John Salako.
This year’s L2P partners are adidas, Science in Sport, Specialized, Cyclevox, Sigma Sport, Mavic, Ambrosia, Map My Tracks, DHL, C37 and Sportique.
New feature: Weekly summaries made easy for distance, duration, calories and activities
Understanding what training you have done and how you are getting on is vital for improving your performance. That's why we have added a weekly summary of all the key stats to the user's profiles.
The statistics bar provides a summary of the total distance, duration, calories burned and number of activities for any given week. It makes it super simple to better understand the extent of activities that have been done this week or any previous week.
Each total is supported by a full breakdown for each day’s activities. Say, for example, you have done two rides on Monday the total milage for that day gets displayed on the bar chart. You can also check the duration and see how many calories you burned for each day. It makes it easy to see the effort that has been made and better judge your training.
This new feature, coupled with the weekly summary email, means that you get an at-a-glance picture of your activities. We hope you like the new addition. Please let us know if you’d like to see other additions to the site. We are always happy to hear what you would find useful.
Bol d’Or Mirabaud extends GPS tracking to the whole fleet courtesy of Map My Tracks
Map My Tracks announces partnership to provide live GPS tracking at this year’s Bol d’Or Mirabaud. For the first time in the 72 year history of the Bol d'Or Mirabaud, all of the 500 or more boats participating will be able to use live GPS tracking courtesy of Map My Tracks. Map My Tracks will be providing live GPS tracking via its range of mobile phone sports apps in conjunction with the organisers of this prestigious sailing event sailed on Lake Geneva on June 12.
In previous years the Cercle de la Voile de la Société Nautique de Genève has invested in GPS tracking for up to 100 boats. By taking advantage of Map My Tracks’ comprehensive range of compatible mobile phones they are, for the first time, able to offer live GPS tracking to the whole fleet.
Competitors with compatible mobile phones will be able to download a Map My Tracks mobile app that will update and broadcast their live location during the race so that spectators can follow the racing action on the event website via the organiser’s online race viewer. With such an extensive range of compatible mobile phone apps, that are compatible with iPhone, Nokia, Blackberry, Sony Ericsson phones, the organisers expect a large proportion of the fleet to be tracking live for spectators to follow around the world.
In Map My Tracks the event organisers have found a practical and cost effective alternative to the expensive proprietary GPS tracking solutions that have previously limited the number participants that can be tracked live. By taking advantage of the explosion of mobile phones that have GPS capabilities, event organisers of mass participation sports are now able to offer GPS tracking to all competitors via the Map My Tracks event platform which broadcasts live action online for spectators around the world to follow.
Each competitor that uses Map My Tracks at this year’s Bol d’Or Mirabaud will be able to replay and compare their performance after the event to analyse their strategy and find out where the race was won or lost.
Speaking about today’s fantastic news Map My Tracks’ Nick Tatt says “We are delighted to be involved with such a prestigious sailing event as the Bol d’Or Mirabaud. The event has a long track record of pushing the boundaries and the addition of GPS tracking from Map My Tracks means that for the first time in its history the whole fleet can be tracked live for spectators to follow.”
Racing starts on June 12 and spectators will be able to follow the racing action live on the event website at http://www.boldormirabaud.com.
New feature: take-away embeddable columns
We have recently added a new widget or two and today we are pleased to announce the addition of embeddable activity wall columns to the set. In short, you can now take any column you create away with you to use on your own website or blog.
The public activity wall is a great way to explore activities on your doorstep or around the world. It lets you create columns that display the latest activities by activity type, user, country, place, favourites or by keyword search. Using columns can help you keep tabs on activities around you or by any activity type that you participant in. Into cycling? Create a cycling column to follow. Live in the UK? Create a column for all UK activities. Now you can take any one of these columns away with you to use on a blog or website.
Embedding a column is simple
To take a column away with you simply grab the code to use on your website. Each column has it’s own button to grab the code needed.
Click on the embed button and copy the code to your own blog or website. It’s that simple.
Customising your columns couldn’t be easier
To add a new column to your personalised activity wall click on ‘Add column’ then select the column to add or enter a keyword search term.
Once you have added a column you can grab the embed code to use on your own blog.
To give you an idea of how it looks, we have embedded the latest activities column in the sidebar of this blog page.
Handy uses of embeddable columns
Here are a few ideas for using embeddable columns.
- It sounds obvious but you can embed a column of your own activities on your blog to share with friends.
- Fitness/sports website publishers can embed a column of favourite activities showcasing special workouts or rides to readers.
- Sports clubs can embed a column of all nearby activities created by club members.
- People participating in charity rides or runs can embed a column on their own website.
We’re sure that you can think of many more. If you do take a column away with you do tell us how you are using it. We’d love to hear about it.
More widget goodness for displaying your latest activity
You asked for it so here it is. You can now embed an image-based widget that shows details of your latest activity. As suggested by the Map My Tracks community this is a handy widget that lets you embed details of your latest activity in forum signatures or simply on your blog or website.
To use the widget you will need to enable it via your profile. Once activated the widget will automatically be embedded in your Map My Tracks forum signature and you can copy and paste the code snippet to use on other websites or forums.
By way of an example, here’s mine.
We hope you enjoy using the new widget. As ever, keep the suggestions and comments coming in.
Latest activities widget added to sharing options
One of the more frequent requests is a way to embed the latest activity done on people's own websites or blogs. In response to popular demand we have added a new widget that makes it super simple to embed details of your latest activity on your blog or website. What's more it will highlight when you are live so that your friends or family can easily follow your progress.
How to use the widget?
As with all our widgets you are in complete control over your privacy. The widget will only ever display the latest public activity that you have done.
To use it you will first need to enable the ‘Latest activity’ widget within your profile.
Once enabled you can set the width of the widget to match the column width of your blog or website.
Simply enter the width then copy and paste the code to your site. It’s that simple.
By way of an example, my own latest activity together with weekly and total distances is below.
We hope you enjoy using the new widget. As ever, keep the suggestions and comments coming in.
Free goodies giveaway for fans of Map My Tracks on Facebook
To continue celebrating our partnership with Team Sky we have some more goodies to give away. This time fans of the Map My Tracks Facebook page will be in with a chance to win a weatherproof iPhone bike mount plus a copy of OutFront, our iPhone app.
To enter
It’s simple, become a fan of Map My Tracks on Facebook by 09:00 GMT Wednesday 28 April, 2010 and be in the draw. That’s it.
The first two fans drawn at random will receive a bike mount plus a copy of OutFront. The next ten drawn at random will receive free copies of OutFront.
A random draw of the eligible fans will take place on Wednesday 28 April and we’ll announce the winner here on Map My Tracks and on Facebook.
Start by becoming a fan.
Best of luck.
Retweet competition - Win an iPhone bike mount worth over £40
To celebrate our new partnership with Team Sky we are giving away a weather-proof iPhone bike mount to use together with our iPhone app Outfront. The bike mount, from Dahon, is great for using with our app OutFront while you're out on your ride and we like it a lot.
To stand a chance of winning one of the bike mounts simply follow us on Twitter, retweet our competition announcement and carry out a bike ride tagged ‘comp’ from our iPhone app OutFront or other mobile apps. It’s that simple.
To enter
1. Follow us and Retweet our competition announcement on Twitter.
2. Carry out a public activity tagged ‘comp’ from our iPhone app OutFront or other mobile apps and upload it to Map My Tracks.
All activities tagged ‘comp’ will be online to view.
There are a few simple rules
- Live or synced activities created on or between April 7th and April 14th and tagged ‘comp’ will be eligible.
- Only one activity per person tagged ‘comp’ will be eligible for each draw but feel free to retweet as often as you like.
- You must follow @mapmytracks on Twitter so that we can inform you if you win.
- You must retweet the competition tweet.
A random draw of the eligible activities will take place and we’ll announce the winner here on Map My Tracks and on Twitter. The winner will be sent a DM so be sure to follow us on Twitter. The bike mount sent shortly after the draw by standard post.
Best of luck.
UPDATE: The competition is now closed and the winner, chosen with the help of random.org, is mwd. Well done and we hope you enjoy using the bike mount along with Outfront.
