NEW YORK — Fans will be able to catch up on the Beijing Olympics on their laptops during their commute this summer.

That's the idea behind the NBC Olympics on the Go service the network announced Monday. Fans select which sports they're interested in, and the program automatically downloads the coverage once it's available. Then they can watch the events without being online.

The service, provided by Wavexpress, is free.

Beijing is 12 hours ahead of Eastern Daylight Time, which means many events will take place while Americans are sleeping. Coverage is expected to generally be available through the service within 12 hours after an event ends.

Users must have Microsoft Windows Vista to use the service, which runs on the operating system's Media Center. According to Microsoft, about 100 million people have Vista.