17 July 2008

VOLVO OCEAN RACE: WHAT’S YOUR VIEW?

The dust is beginning to settle on the 2008-09 race but the debate over the shape of the future of the event continues – both internally and externally.

The race organisation is sifting through the findings of a rigorous evaluation of every element of the race and has sought opinion from a large number of stakeholders in a series of round table discussion in Rio, Boston, Galway and Stockholm.

CEO Knut Frostad and a team including technical consultants Ken McAlpine and Bill Edgerton, and working in partnership with Boston Consulting Group, have focused on cost-containment while safeguarding the competitive element of the event.

There are some solid foundations in place for the future of the race including the establishment of a new race headquarters in the Spanish port of Alicante.

In a recent Q&A on the official race website, Frostad confirmed that momentum was building towards the next edition of the race. "We have had a huge response from ports around the world wanting to become part of the event. We have undertaken a thorough review of the race and sought feedback from a number of stakeholders," he said.

During the live blogs run on www.volvooceanrace.org over the final legs of the race, a lot of feedback was received from the web audience. Areas such as the time gap between the position reports and whether we should continue with StealthPlays, plus, what the criteria should be for stopover ports were hot topics of discussion.

We welcome your thoughts on what you enjoyed most about the 2008-09 race, what didn't work for you and how you think the race could be improved. Send your views to opinions@volvooceanrace.org .

We will publish comment and opinion on our website and provide responses to any specific questions.

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