Moto2 racer to launch smartphone app for track days
To say that 31 year old Australian Moto2 racer Anthony West is resourceful would be a gross understatement. His latest exploit, apart from racing in what he describes as the hardest, most competitive and closest racing category in which he's ever competed – and that's in more than most riders who are still racing – is to develop a smartphone app aimed at fellow motorcycle enthusiasts entitled AntWest Race Sense.
We recently caught up with Ant to discuss the upcoming app and the extensive racing experience he brings to its development.
The Race Sense app utilizes the inbuilt sensors in your smart phone such as accelerometer, GPS tracking, inclinometer and time, to provide what is in essence a fully functional data acquisition system designed to mimic the advanced electronic telemetry systems of MotoGP and WSBK.
"With sponsorship's so hard to find and I need another way to survive," says Ant. "I spent some of my own money developing it with an Italian guy who also likes to ride himself, and who writes programs. He's actually writing one at the moment for Team Orange in Japan."
Team Orange, incidentally, is one of the top teams in the very popular sport of drifting in Japan, which is one of Ant's interests in the off season along with downhill mountain-biking and video making.
The app is designed to be a useful tool for someone who races for a living and a very fun toy for those who just like to brag to their mates about what lean angle they got at their ride day, and what top speed they reached down the main straight.
While not the first app to measure speed over ground, nor even the first location tracking and mapping app, Ant and his Italian partners at DATA RACING have designed Race Sense to fulfill the needs of a genuine MotoGP racer. It provides information such as acceleration and braking forces, lean angles and speed and position on the track – in other words, the sort of data a serious track day tragic dreams of having every time they watch the bikes in a premier class race with all their telemetry aids.
The app also plots all the info onto Google maps and links to Facebook and Twitter so you can share your track day triumphs (but probably not tragedies) with your friends. Ant, who is a bit of a video tragic himself as we mentioned, also requested a feature on the app that matches tracking data to video plus it will store your sessions in memory for comparison of multiple laps.
Race Sense will be available soon for iPhone, Android phones and windows phones. The accompanying desktop app will only be available for the PC platform initially, with a Mac version to follow soon after. And, as expected, it will also be available in Italian with more languages on the drawing board.
We'll be putting the app through its paces on release - stay tuned.
