Skoda Auto - main partner for Tour de France for sixth consecutive year

The Tour de France is probably the toughest bicycling race in the world, covering over 3500km of competitive stages through scenic French countryside as well as some surrounding countries. This historic race was first started way back in 1903 and this year, on its 96th outing, the race started from Monaco on the 4th of July and will end at the world-famous Champs-Elysees in Paris on the 26th. With that, Skoda Auto, the popular Czech automobile manufacturer, celebrates its 6th consecutive year of being the main partner for this legendary race.

At the race this year Skoda Auto is having a French market premiere of the its latest model, the Yeti, and has a total of ten Yetis as part of the Tour de France advertising convoy, an integral part of each stage of the event. In total, the Tour de France will see about 350 Skoda vehicles in action this year, most of which (about 250) are being used by the competition organisers as the official vehicles of the race. Apart from that, Skoda has provided its vehicles to eight professional teams - Silence-Lotto, Saxo Bank - IT Factory, Rabobank, Euskaltel-Euskadi, Cofidis, Francaise des JEUX, Cervelo and Milram, along with two neutral teams (Shimano and Mavic) to provide technical support.

Skoda's Head of Corporate Communications, Martin Lauer was on-hand to explain the auto maker's partnership with the Tour de France. "Basically, there are two pillars on which Skoda builds its international corporate sponsorship communication strategies - ice-hockey and cycling, two sports that efficiently complement each other in terms of covering the respective European markets and are seen as very powerful tools employed to enhance brand awareness, the product image, as well as brand and product visibility.", he comment. He also said that Skoda believes that cycling offers great opportunities for presenting their cars in the very heart of the competition where they are in close contact with racers, fans and potential buyers.