'Continuity is vital'

Sun 5 October 2008 15:41:07

Syndicate heads and skippers have widely supported the timing of today’s announcement that a 10th edition of the race will start in 2011.

It is the first time in the history of the event that a future edition has been announced before the first leg of the current version, but the decision has been welcomed.

“It’s essential to make this type of announcement now,” said Michael Woods, Team Russia’s CEO. “If you want to develop the race and move it forward then this is the time to do it.”

He added: “Certainty in any financial business environment is vital. For us to bring potential sponsors into the ports without knowing there is going to be a next race is a risk. Now we know there is another race it is worth the investment that we can bring potential sponsors to visit us later on.”

Jamie Boag, the CEO of Green Dragon, also believes the continuity will make the event more appealing to sponsors.

“From the teams’ point of view I think this announcement is fantastic. I think it’s very clever by Volvo. I’m, relieved they have come forward and said there will be another race because it just makes everything easier for everybody.

“One of the biggest problems that we have is the continuity, saying to somebody that ‘you have to put all these millions in and oh, by the way, if you hang around you can maybe do it in three years time’. Being able to go now and say they will be definitely something in three years time, makes life a lot easier.”

Tom Touber, the project manager of Team Delta Lloyd, was the director of shore operations at Team ABN AMRO in the last race and recommended that an early announcement was critical.

He hopes today’s news will help Delta Lloyd commit to the next race. He said: “This was a very, very positive announcement. This proves that Volvo is in very good cooperation with the syndicates.

“I remember very well our discussions at the end of the previous race, where syndicates like ABN AMRO, Telefonica, Ericsson were strongly involved in getting continuity in the race and I’m very happy that Volvo has taken it seriously.

“Our vision at Delta Lloyd was aiming for the next race and, therefore, I am happy that the announcement was made today. We invite all companies to come and visit this race and see what it is about.”

During the announcement it was confirmed that Boston Consultancy Group will help evaluate the race format and structure.

Telefonica Blue skipper Bouwe Bekking hopes a new set-up will see extra assistance given in the search for sponsors. “We have been struggling always to find sponsors,” he said. “You have to get the right contacts so you need professional people in charge to find a sponsor for a sailing team.

“I’m not the right person to find a sponsor. I hope they can put the right people in place and then they can just hire a team manager or a complete team to race the boats.”

Discussions will continue in coming weeks over the future use of the Volvo Open 70s between events. Boag said: “There is a desire to do something in those intervening years. I for one have spoken to a couple of other syndicate heads and am keen to get some kind of class association.

“These are expensive boats and to race them for nine months and just leave them in a boat park somewhere is not ideal.”

As an illustration of the appeal of the current race, the local authorities have released some impressive crowd numbers.

The headline figure is the number of visitors to the race village to date from the opening of day of Friday 19th September which has reached 500,000.

The highest daily total was yesterday for the in-port race when 62,000 people went through the turnstiles.