Eugene Laverty launches first iPhone app

Fans of Eugene Laverty are being given an innovative opportunity to follow the progress of his first World Superbike Championship with the launch of his own 'app'.

The move sees Laverty become the first rider to launch his own personal application that will be made available on the Apple iPhone and iTouch.

Already an advocate of using social networking sites, such as Twitter, to keep fans up to date with his racing and personal exploits, the application - priced at ?1.19 and available in the iTunes store now - is the Irishman's latest move to remain 'interactive' with the public.

An extension of his personal website, the app will feature a news section with updates unique to him, as well as Yamaha press material and personal blogs. There will also be frequent videos uploaded to chart his year.

Fans can also get involved, with an interactive page where users will be encouraged to upload photographs of their current location. This gives race fans the opportunity to check-in at races, at home or on holiday and the images are instantly displayed on a world map.

A unique feature will also be the app's calendar, which features a guide and circuit map to all of the rounds on the 2011 calendar. It includes full circuit information as well as Eugene's thoughts on each track. This area will be updated regularly throughout race weekends to include qualifying and race results.

"I was really keen on the idea because I'm very big on the whole social media explosion and believe that the next step forward was my own app," he said.

"I've known the guys at Rockspin for a few years and we decided to create something together which we could use to break into a whole new market of tech users.

"The plan is that it will be updated at least three times over race weekends, so users can jump in at any time and see how we're doing on the track. It's an extension of my website, but something that you can access anytime, wherever you are in the world.

"The fan page has been created so users can take a snapshot of where they are and post it straight up. We hope that in a few years we will have a photograph from every country in the world. It's designed to be interactive and a bit of fun."

To download the app, simply log onto iTunes and put 'Eugene Laverty' into the search engine.