January 25, 2016
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Swiss watchmaker Tissot announced that it will be sponsoring the 2016 Tour de France, whileImage may be NSFW.
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at the same time, Adidas is apparently dropping its sponsorship of the International Association of Athletics Federation due to doping scandals.
Pro-cyclists and their teams are likely watching with a certain amount of “I told you so,” as other sports and events like soccer, the Olympics and world championships are catching up–and just barely–to ridding their events of cheaters. Cycling will begin to reap the rewards as more scandals come to light, and cycling continues to clean up its act (crossing fingers).
A subsidiary of the Swatch Group, Swiss-based Tissot was the official timekeeper for the grand Tour from 1988 to 1992, and will now be backing all of the time trials run by the Amaury Sports Organization (ASO), the Tour organizer, for a five-year period.
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That means Tissot will be the official timekeeper for Paris-Nice, Paris-Tours, La Flèche Wallone, the Tour de France and the Vuelta a Espana.
“For the next five years, we will be able to count on Tissot so that every second of effort counts and I am delighted to see this major watchmaker get involved in the season’s best cycling events,” said Christian Prudhomme, TDF director.
No one can forget the Festina affair, when in 1998 French Customs arrested Willy Voet
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Richard Virenque finally admitted to doping in 1998–he was sponsored by watchmaker Festina.
a soigneur for the Festina team for possession of illegal drugs. Festina manufacturer of watches, was a very visible sponsor of cycling. Richard Virenque a top Festina rider finally confessed, and in a 2000 trial it became clear that management and health officials of the team had organized the illegal drug-taking.
The Tissot sponsorship is once more a statement of how far cycling as come in cleaning up its act, while other professional (mostly ball) sports are just beginning to show the cracks and fissures of years of monumental doping and cheating that has gone on, and is still mostly uncovered.
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A portion of the video from the BBC explaining the extent of the IAAF doping scandal.
In big news, German sports company Adidas announced that it will be terminating its sponsorship of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) four years early.
The sportswear giant informed the IAAF of its decision – understood to be a direct result of the doping scandal sweeping the sport – last week, according to a report by the BBC.
Sources say the move will cost the IAAF and its commercial partner Dentsu tens of millions of dollars in revenue.
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A portion of the video from the BBC explaining the doping scandal that has unfolded at the IAAF.
Neither Adidas nor the IAAF confirmed the split but both issued short statements, referencing the “reform process” under way as the IAAF attempts to come to terms with a number of damaging revelations.
The sports shoe, clothing and accessory manufacturer Adidas, has also expressed its displeasure at the corruption scandal that continues to engulf Fifa, the governing body of football, futsal and beach soccer.
However, the German firm, which signed a £750m kit sponsorship deal with British football giants Manchester United in 2014, remains the oldest commercial partner of world football’s governing body.
The 11-year sponsorship deal with Adidas was due to run until 2019 and was reportedly worth $33 M.
However, sources have told the BBC the figure is much higher – as much, in terms of cash and product, as about $8 M per year.
This means the projected lost revenue for the IAAF and its agency Dentsu over the next four years will be more than $30 M.
Earlier this month, the World Anti Doping Agency’s commission chairman, Dick Pound, delivered a second, damning report that said “corruption was embedded” within the IAAF under former president Lamine Diack.
Within days, a decision at the highest level in Adidas was taken to terminate its deal with the IAAF and Dentsu.
The BBC reported termination letters were sent from Adidas to the IAAF and Dentsu last week.
In 2015, a whistleblower leaked IAAF’s blood test records from major competitions. The records revealed that, between 2001 and 2012, athletes with suspicious drug test results won a third of the medals in endurance events at the Olympics and World Championships—a total of 146 medals including 55 golds—but the IAAF caught none of them, writes Wikipedia.
After reviewing the results, Robin Parisotto, a scientist and leading “anti-doping” expert, said, “Never have I seen such an alarmingly abnormal set of blood values. So many athletes appear to have doped with impunity, and it is damning that the IAAF appears to have idly sat by and let this happen.