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| Kim Fournais, Bjarne Riis and Lars Seier Christensen: delivering results |
The value of advertising or sponsorship is not easy to quantify but if it is measured purely by how many column inches it generates, Saxo Bank’s decision to take over the main sponsorship of the CSC cycling team from 2009 is likely to prove a masterful decision. The bank announced in June that it would become the team’s immediate co-sponsor, a move that will mean its name will be in focus prominently throughout the whole of July as a result of the Tour de France. Although portrayed in some media outlets as a parochial event competed for by a load of drug-fuelled cheats, the Tour de France is the world’s largest annual sporting event. Therefore, it attracts huge coverage, importantly in many of the countries – such as France, Switzerland and Australia – where Saxo has recently started to make a commercial push.
Cynics will argue that Saxo risks having its name tainted by a drugs scandal, something for which professional cycling is well known. Team CSC Saxo Bank is owned and managed by Bjarne Riis, the only Danish cyclist to have triumphed in the Tour de France, which he won in 1996.