
F1 Indian GP in real time with Google Maps - lusob
http://labs.lusob.com/f1mapp/
======
lifeisstillgood
Ok, a while back, pg said he wanted to kill Hollywood - and I never got the
meaning. You would still need actors, cameramen, producers even, etc etc. And
netflix is hardly disruptive

Now I can glimpse it.

This is fantastic. Watching F1 is boring on the TV - mostly because you either
cannot get a feel for the real speed or you lose track of the race.

With gps in the cars, ability to stream from the cockpit mounted cameras - F1
could become the first mass audience sport to use different feeds really well.

~~~
bruceboughton
It depends which TV station you're watching. The BBC and Sky in the UK already
have circuit trackers from the car's GPS, ability to choose from 10 or so
different camera feeds (onboards, pits, etc.) and full feeds of all pit radio
released by the FIA.

I wouldn't count on the established players leaving this to new disrupters,
especially where there is adequate competition, i.e. in the UK.

~~~
lifeisstillgood
I've never noticed. I guess I should press the red button?

~~~
mibbitier
You may also need the Sky dedicated F1 channel (Which you get with the sports
package).

~~~
ashleyw
You don't actually need then sports package to watch Sky Sports F1, just the
HD pack.

~~~
bruceboughton
I _think_ you might be able to just download the Sky Sports companion iPad app
to get the other camera feeds. Or you may need a Sky Go login, I can't
remember.

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mambodog
This is basically what the official F1 iPad app is like, which I happened to
have with me at the Australian Grand Prix last year. It made a pretty big
difference to actually know when various drivers were about to come past, and
what was happening in the other parts of the track.

As things got more tense toward the end of the race other spectators were
crowding around for an overview which our eyes couldn't possibly provide,
considering our vantage point. It was definitely one of those "holy shit I'm
living in the future" kind of moments.

~~~
nettdata
Yep. I routinely watch a torrented/PVR'd race with the iPad App running the
'live' timing and scoring. It really does make a huge difference.

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balakk
Is there a curated list of such live real-time data sources? A directory if
you will; cutting across different sources like train/flight info, shopping,
finance, sports, politics/elections etc.

Guess most of them wont be free, but some of them could be.

~~~
Omnipresent
I'd also be interested in that sort of list

------
ensmotko
I wonder how they made this. My guess would be that they aren't using GPS data
but checkpoint times.

~~~
__alexs
That would explain all of the crazy rubber banding that always seems to start
and stop at exactly the same spots.

~~~
exDM69
Are you sure the "rubber banding" isn't just normal race behavior? In circuit
racing, the cars tend to follow each other at pretty stable intervals. In
other words, the time between two race cars stays constant. As the speed of
the cars ranges from 50mph to 200mph+, the distance between two cars changes a
lot as the time between the cars is relatively constant.

So in slow corners, the cars pack close to each other (feet or sometimes even
inches) and as they accelerate out of the corners at 2g+ the distance can
increase to tens or hundreds of feet.

~~~
alexkus
"Are you sure the "rubber banding" isn't just normal race behavior?"

Yes (I'm sure it isn't), zoom in on the bottom right hand corner of the track
(turn 4), in reality the cars go from 320kph to 100kph in the breaking zone of
this corner, on the page they're doing that almost instantly as they hit that
point.

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ck2
Now why can't they do this for UPS and FedEx trucks for consumers.

(they already do it for buses in some cities)

~~~
djhworld
I guess the company owners would argue against it based on security concerns,
especially if the courier is delivery packages that have high net worth

~~~
ck2
If it's security concerns you can see UPS and FedEx trucks every day on the
road, just follow one - or even just watch them leave the hub!

So that logic seems incorrect.

~~~
joezydeco
But you don't know what is in the trucks.

djhworld is talking about a scenario where someone at a company knows a
certain high-price shipment is coming in. He could talk to accomplices and
direct them to the exact truck and intercept/steal the item before it's
delivered. Who would know there was a connection between the theives and the
insiders?

On a more practical note, I can understand why UPS/FedEx wouldn't want
consumers to see this. They would be bugging the hell out of the customer
support reps asking why their truck wasn't stopping at their place first, etc.
Sure, if the driver is lost, that's another story, but I think the larger
companies already track their equipment in realtime. The signature pads are
always live now.

------
davidjohnstone
Neat. It's not perfect (i.e., the rubber banding effect that others have
mentioned here), but there's a lot of potential in this idea.

My main sport is cycling, and the UCI (the governing body) has banned the live
transmission of GPS data from bikes.

~~~
nswanberg
Have you heard why the transmission was banned? I've only come across some
speculation by someone who had implemented telemetry at a race
([http://blog.urremote.com/2012/05/uci-bans-race-tracking-
unti...](http://blog.urremote.com/2012/05/uci-bans-race-tracking-until-
further.html)), and someone who had thought the UCI banned it to allow only
one organization to provide it (bottom of the thread:
[http://weightweenies.starbike.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=14&#...</a>)

~~~
davidjohnstone
I don't think the UCI has ever fully explained their reasoning.

On page 10 of this PDF [1], they explain that they are responsible for
regulating technical innovation, and they talk about some of the advantages of
having live GPS data. On-rider cameras are also banned, and the issue of who
has rights to the footage is mentioned. Interesting, they say that other live
data — speed and heart rate and power etc. — isn't banned, but this only seems
to be because it hasn't been submitted to the UCI for approval, which means
it's banned anyway.

The first lot of comments on this post from The Inner Ring [2] discuss the
issue, and it seems most likely that the UCI doesn't want third parties
transmitting anything from races, although this doesn't explain why they're
not allowed to transmit data back to the team car. (Perhaps it's got something
to do with the ban on race radios?)

1\.
[http://www.uci.ch/Modules/BUILTIN/getObject.asp?MenuId=&...](http://www.uci.ch/Modules/BUILTIN/getObject.asp?MenuId=&ObjTypeCode=FILE&type=FILE&id=ODEyOTU&LangId=1)

2\. <http://inrng.com/2012/09/vuelta-power-analysis/>

------
TallGuyShort
On a similar note, I was hoping that the end of F1 coverage by SPEED in the US
will lead to more openly-available coverage. I was less hopeful when I learned
that NBC would be picking it up. Any ideas from the HN community about where
to find coverage online (I'm willing to pay, of course). Some of the comments
here have me hopeful that a VPN in the UK and a connection to BBC will do the
trick!

~~~
atonse
If you know any good way to get UK sports coverage in the US please let me
know. I was in London for two weeks this summer and I loved that their
coverage didn't pause for commercials every few minutes. I'd be willing to
pay. Considering this is the only remaining reason why I have cable, I'd be
willing to pay more than most for a high quality picture.

(Plus it would be awesome to have good cricket coverage in gone US)

~~~
sitharus
unblock-us.com will get you access to iPlayer, both recorded and streaming.
Not sure about other channels though, never watch them.

------
pycassa
can't wait for fia to block this..

on the other hand, although cool, this isn't a new thing.. slapping google
maps is a nice touch, i prefer just the circuit.. its much more clear.. i
don't have the link right now.. its a bookmarked in another computer.. but as
far as i know, it was blocked recently as he's getting the telemetry data
without the fia's permission..

~~~
bborud
FIA do not own the rights.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formula_One_Group>

------
sshagent
We just need this combined with a game, our own car/tag, micro-machine-esque
controls and we're sorted :)

------
lukeck
Very cool idea. I've been discussing different ways race data could be
visualized with a friend as we watch the race, checked HN during a commercial
break and found this. Thanks.

------
runlevel1
Here's the project on Github: <https://github.com/lusob/f1mapp>

------
jcfrei
it looks cool, but I would have to see it side by side of an actual formula
race (on tv) to see whether it's of any use. f1 is a sport where tenths of
seconds determine your position on the track and I'm not sure whether you can
accurately enough depict that on the map using only online timings.

------
sitharus
No matter what I try I only get the demo race. Guess something's playing silly
buggers on my network :/

