Dakar 2009: the Mendoza’s Tourism Office carried out the first briefing with Travel Agencies
Before more than 60 businessmen of the area, the operative and infrastructure advantages of the province were presented to face the competitors and to generate businesses. Mendoza will be the epicenter of the rally.
The Tourism Secretary of the Government of Mendoza, Luis Böhm, the Director of Tourism Promotion, Federico Vázquez de Novoa, and Orlando Terranova, a Mendoza’s driver of the BMW team participating in the Dakar series met with Mendoza’s businessmen of the area on Monday, in order to offer the details of the event and thus, define possible vacation packages that will complement the Dakar experience.
In the Plumerillo Room of the Conferences and Exhibitions Center, videos of previous Dakar editions were shown to transmit to the businessmen the magnitude of the rally-raid race that will go past Mendoza in January 2009. It has been estimated the presence of around 5 thousand people among drivers, teams, reporters and spectators. “It is necessary to make it clear that, after soccer, the motor racing is the second sport as regards popularity in Argentina, and that during the competence period, there won’t be any other sport events, international or summer soccer”, explained Luis Böhm.
“Due to the number of competitors, the starts last for 6 hours and the winning post waits up to 11 hours for the competitors to finish the stage; therefore, during these periods, it is possible to advertise different products such as wineries, the Aconcagua, adventure, gastronomy, etc,” added the Secretary.
The tourism promotion is inestimable since there are more than 550 reporters from 35 countries, and 300 Argentineans in the contingent, 580 hours of live broadcast, and 23 million people who follow the event via internet. “The Dakar experience will be the summer main feature because of its magnitude, its characteristics that cannot be compared with other events, not even motor racings, and also because of the landscape Dakar will offer to spectators and to the entire world. Likewise, it will complement the wide current offer of strong products – the Aconcagua, the wine routes, adventure, among others – and growing products,” explained the director of Tourism Promotion, Federico Vazquez de Novoa.
The Mendoza’s driver Orlando Terranova, one of the Dakar series’ competitors whose participation has already been confirmed for the 2009 edition, talked about the experience of competing in the most adverse conditions. “Because of the characteristics of the competition, the spectators, as well as the teams’ members and drivers are used to getting over the worst conditions in Africa, to the extent of paying up to €100 for a shower, or €200 and even €300 for a bed to sleep,” Terranova explained.
Same adventure, new place
The competence will begin on January 3, in Argentinas’ Capital City with a symbolic start in the Obelisco. Then, it will travel through the province of Buenos Aires, La Pampa, Río Negro, Chubut, Neuquen, and it will enter Mendoza through the south. On January 7, the competitors will camp in Las Paredes circuit in San Rafael and, on the following day, they will run up to Mendoza City, where they will stay in the Estadio Mundialista surrounding area.
“Mendoza is the temporal and geographic epicenter of the race, and also the only place where the drivers and teams will stay for two nights; that’s why offering service excellence that helps them to recover will be vital for them to face the final stage of the race,” Böhm explained.
On January 9, the competitors will move on to Chile and will return to Argentina, racing through Catamarca, La Rioja, Córdoba, and Santa Fe to finish in Buenos Aires.
It’s necessary to make it clear that one of the competition features is that the roadmap is delivered to the drivers before the start, that’s why they do not know the routes till the day the competition is launched. Due to operative matters, the stages will be reported in November.
