Kingfisher plc, a leading international retailer for the home, announced today at the London Boat Show that it would be continuing its sponsorship of Ellen MacArthur MBE with a new five-year title sponsorship deal.
Key objectives of the sponsorship for Kingfisher are to build familiarity of the Kingfisher brand with its international audiences and to create an association between the Kingfisher corporate brand and its operating companies which include B&Q and Comet in the UK. Andrew Mills, Director of Corporate Affairs, explained the compelling reasons for continuing this relationship:
‘Ellen’s remarkable achievements over the last three years have exceeded all our expectations. We strongly believe that Ellen represents the qualities we value highly as a company – determination, skill and professionalism, combined with the ambition and ability to succeed. She is a constant inspiration to our 90,000+ employees around the globe and we see parallels between her international ambition and our own. We are delighted to continue to support Ellen through the highs-and-lows of racing across the oceans.’
Well-known for her success as a single-handed yachtswoman, Ellen’s achievements were recently celebrated at the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award; however despite being sandwiched between two celebrity goal-scorers, Beckham and Owen, Ellen remains committed to her own personal sailing goals!
Ellen has enjoyed a winning association with Kingfisher plc since November 1998, and is delighted that the international home retail group will continue to back her for the next five years.
Ellen believes that she still has much to learn and is looking forward to the challenges ahead: ‘I intend to use the next few years to expand my knowledge and experience, both technically, personally and as part of the team. As my objectives remain focused on the multihull circuit, I do not plan to compete in the 2004 Vendée Globe, it’s a tough race to do twice in a row. However that does not mean that I have ruled it out for the future!’
Many people had assumed that Ellen would launch straight in to a new 60ft trimaran project, but she has set out a more measured approach to building her experience and confidence in this new discipline – albeit one that with Alain Gautier this year she has taken to very quickly; ‘I don’t want to rush in. I still have so much to learn. These boats are Formula 1 in every sense.’
Before her shift to multihulls, Ellen will race her beloved monohull Kingfisher in possibly the boat’s last serious solo race with Ellen at the helm – the 2002 Route du Rhum. This is a 2800 mile transatlantic race against the world’s best sailors and is France’s biggest sailing event outside of the Vendée Globe, the solo round-the-world race that put Ellen and Kingfisher on the map.
The Southern Ocean will follow next Winter – this time as part of a team – with Ellen and a 12-strong crew bidding for the Jules Verne Trophy for the fastest boat around the globe, in any sailing vessel with an unspecified number of crew members. The current record is 71 days and 14 hours.
‘Taking on the Jules Verne record attempt next winter after the Route du Rhum will be another big learning curve, that really excites me. The 110 foot giant mega-catamarans are something else. Its going to be an challenging year!’
The programme will then build towards the ultimate trophy of success in the trimaran division of the 2006 solo transatlantic Route du Rhum with a new 3-hulled ‘Kingfisher’ designed in 2004 and launched during 2005.
MacArthur proved last year that whilst racing alone was possibly her forte, she certainly could be a team player and leader when she wanted – winning the Challenge Mondial with Alain Gautier in May, and then as co-skipper with Nick Moloney taking victory in the gruelling 8000 mile EDS Atlantic Challenge in the summer.
Despite the images of a lone girl on deck in the Vendée Globe, MacArthur’s challenges have always been about teamwork. Her Offshore Challenges Sailing Team launched today, is a key ingredient to her future success. The aim is to build a strong set of professional sailors – capable of working together in something like the Jules Verne, but equally capable of taking on their own solo challenges.
OC’s Managing Director Mark Turner explained the philosophy; ‘We want to develop a strong team of sponsors, shore crew and top professional sailors across various disciplines. Nick Moloney is a good example, he has been a real asset to the team this year, and has enabled us to achieve more race successes without requiring Ellen onboard at all times. His dream is to follow Ellen in to Vendée 2004, and we’ll be working together to realise this – we’d like to have at least 2 boats in the next race.
‘We’ll also not be ignoring some of the other less known solo events like the Mini Transat and the Figaro – short of the expensive F1 60 footers the latter is the top level professional racing circuit in Europe. In 2003 they move to a new class of specially designed 36 foot boats, and we plan to have OC Sailing Team presence, hopefully with the support of the UK’s sailing governing body, the RYA. Professional solo yacht racing deserves central support now, its done a great deal for the sport of sailing in general in th UK this year…’
Its been an extraordinary year for MacArthur and her team. New Year 2001 she was deep Southern Ocean lying in 3rd place in the Vendée Globe. 12 months on, MacArthur is still totally motivated to be at sea, racing, hard core, pushing herself to new limits – but in between she has become almost as well known (and almost as popular if the BBC are to be believed) as football’s biggest star David Beckham, has been honoured and dined by the Queen, and has a cult following in several European countries in particular France. But even as the youngest every World Champion in the FICO skippers offshore championships – this is just the beginning for MacArthur and her team….
Offshore Challenges will make further announcements of secondary and supporting sponsors over the coming months.
For further information please contact:
Offshore Challenges
e: info@offshorechallenges.com
w: http://www.kingfisherchallenges.com