The Tour of Homewood will be the world’s first mountain bike stage race to employ livestreaming throughout the event, which starts at Fancourt Golf Estate in George on Friday.
The inaugural Tour of Homewood in South Africa will make technological history by becoming the first mountain bike stage race to offer livestreaming coverage throughout all three stages.
All three days of the racing action will be covered via a livestreaming feed on the event’s website.
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“Livestreaming has become such a big part of the international sports event experience and we’re excited to be involved in establishing a world first,” said organiser Henco Rademeyer of Dryland Event Management.
The technological development is the result of months of testing by BigShot Live, a division of BigShot Media, the production company responsible for the coverage of events such as the Cape Epic, Cape Pioneer Trek, Tankwa Trek and Ironman.
“Stage racing, where riders travel greater distances through remote areas is a proper challenge,” said Mark le Roux of BigShot Live.
“As opposed to standard television technology, which involves the use of microlinks, dishes and satellites, we’ll be using cellular and wifi technology for the live broadcast.
“Of course we’re expecting some ‘black holes’ where the cellular signal may be weak or non-existent, but we should be able to manage the continuity with our planned strategy,” he added.
This strategy involves the use of three cameras – one in a helicopter and two on motorcycles.
At the Fancourt race village, there will be a studio set with a presenter and another two colleagues in the helicopter and on a quadbike.
