Categories
Previous Articles
Latest Views
- TOMMY HILL UP FOR A THREE RACE WEEKEND AT OULTON PARK
Tommy Hill heads to Oulton Park with the Swan Yamaha team this Bank Holiday weekend, with a busy race three race schedule for the third round of the 2012 MCE Insurance British Superbike Championship.
- Ollie Hynd and Charlotte Henshaw named on GB lists for London 2012 Paralympic Swimming Team
Nova Centurion swimmers Ollie Hynd and Charlotte Henshaw were this week named on the lists put forward for the Great Britain Paralympic Swimming Team at London 2012 after putting in world class performances at Paralympic swimming trials.
Congrats to @ZacPurchase (with @MarkHunterGB) & @TommyHill33 for 2 great race wins today. Zac led from the start but Tommy won from 5th row!
The latest news from @karinabryantgb - help get Karina on the road to #london2012 http://t.co/DJiM0jVu
The debacle begins
Business | Sponsorship | Sport
If the weather settles down in Valencia today the 33rd running of the America’s Cup should get underway at 1300 CET despite yet more outstanding legal manoeuvres. But frankly does anyone really care? From the excitement and build up of the last series, also held in Valencia, this challenge had degenerated into a sordid and expensive playground wrangle of billionaire egos and lawyers. We are not here to take sides between Larry Ellison’s BMW Oracle as the challenger and Ernesto Bertarelli’s Alinghi as the holder, simply to point out that while they the argue about the rules of the game the world has moved on. Together they have turned a sporting contest of global interest into an irrelevant battle of legal semantics. It makes F1 look like a church tea party.
The 32nd event was a huge economic driver for Valencia which hosted the Louis Vuitton World Series races over several months as a precursor to the America’s Cup itself. These races identified the challenger for the Cup. They also brought floods of visitors, TV coverage and sponsors to the area and to the sport of sailing. It was an alternative to the glamour and spectacle of the F1 Grand Prix in Monaco. Sponsors of the 12 teams that competed in the Louis Vuitton got good visibility all round and new or stronger relationships from the extended hospitality opportunity. It is estimated that overall economic impact of the last event was in the order of €5 billion of which Valencia benefited to the tune of €3.9 billion. Importantly the event itself also made a profit of €66 million.
Just as sailing, in all its forms from solo Olympic lasers to Extreme 40’s, was getting firmly established on the sporting map, the event that aims to be its flagship goes into self imposed meltdown. So the question is will any lessons be learnt? If we consign this event to a soon to be forgotten chapter in the Cup’s history, will those that have the power and influence be ready, willing and able to resurrect the event to its former sporting glory for the next challenge.
Trackback URL for this post:
Trackbacks are disabled for this entry
Comments
There are no comments on this article yet.
Comment on this Article >