Speakers of the World Yacht Racing Forum highlighted the great potential and assets of the sport of sailing.

The industry offers great opportunities to partners, viagra ed venues, athletes or events. However it needs more creativity. And a special care must be given to the return provided to the sport’s partners.

The fifth edition of the World Yacht Racing Forum started this morning, Tuesday December 11, in Gothenburg, Sweden. Over 250 delegates from all over the world attended the presentations, collected precious information and met the industry’s key actors during the networking breaks.

Most of today’s sessions focused on sponsorship, and were aimed at bettering the relationship between sailors, events or teams and their commercial backers.

How can sponsors ensure brand activation? What are the best ways to promote the sport of sailing? How can our sport generate an income? What should a sponsorship proposal contain? Those were some of the questions debated by today’s panellists.

“Sailing sponsorship, and sponsorship in general, should be envisioned in a long term perspective”, said Sven Österberg, General Manager, Volvo Event Management Sweden. “And it is essential to plan a long time ahead; at least 1 – 2 years.”

Leslie Greenhalgh, Marketing Director, Open Sports Management, spoke about her personal experience with Skandia Team GBR, and disclosed some of the key elements of a successful partnership: “It was really important to get immersed alongside the partner in order to understand their needs and objectives. To summarise, it was important to allocate time!”

Greenhalgh, on the other hand, said she has witnessed several projects which don’t provide enough return to their partners. “This is one reason why some brands have left the sport of sailing. In fact, the hard work begins the day when you sign your contract.”

“The market is changing”, insisted Mark Turner, Executive Chairman, OC Sport. “Today’s potential is in the so called emerging countries; India, China, Brasil… In fact we should rather call them fast growing countries; we are the ones stagnating. In order to guarantee the success of projects in those new markets, we must ensure that new talent emerges. Today’s crewmembers will be tomorrow’s stars. It will take time but it is essential to develop tomorrow’s talents.”

Some interesting sessions focused on the revenue streams that can be generated through the sport of sailing. Media visibility, public participation and brand activation are amongst the obvious answers, whilst TV doesn’t seem to be. “All sports struggle to sell TV rights, and sailing is virtually impossible to sell”, commented Dominique Curchod (Curchod Communications). “The revenue therefore lies in a free distribution, and the visibility associated to it.”

“The sailing industry has an obsession with television”, added Richard Moore, CEO, Capitalize. “Does sailing have a strong appeal to a wide audience on TV? The answer is no.”

Many of today’s speakers highlighted the fact that the sport needs more creativity to appeal to a wider audience. New media and social networks are at the heart of the sports development; they will be discussed during tomorrow’s sessions.

Richard Brisius, CEO, Atlant Ocean Racing, concluded day one by saying: “Sometimes, we don’t believe enough in the sport of sailing. But the fact is, it’s a wonderful sport, with great values, that can provide a lot to its partners.”

The National Hockey League announced today the cancellation of the remainder of the 2012 preseason schedule.

The League and the NHL Players’ Association failed to reach an agreement for a new collective bargaining agreement. 

The NHL already had called off all the preseason games scheduled in September. The regular season is supposed to begin Oct. 11.

The two sides have scheduled talks on Friday in New York, although they are on secondary economic issues as opposed to the core of the dispute — how to split more than $3 billion in annual revenue.

“I’ll reserve judgment on my sense of ‘optimism’ (or not) until we see how our meetings unfold,” NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly said in an email to The Associated Press. “Ultimately, we have to meet and talk to make a deal. But until we make progress and see some compromise from the Union of their economic position, we won’t be going anywhere fast.

“We will see.”

The NHL and the union last met for formal negotiations Sept. 12, three days before the labor pact that ended the previous lockout — back in 2005 — ran out.

Former Indian Premier League chairman Lalit Modi has settled his libel case against England and Wales Cricket Board chairman Giles Clarke out of court, abortion an ECB statement said on Wednesday.

Modi had filed a libel case against Clarke in an English court for alleging that the former IPL chairman had held talks with some English counties to form a rebel Twenty20 league.

In an e-mail sent to the then BCCI President in May 2001, Clarke had accused Modi of indulging in activities which were “detrimental to Indian cricket, English cricket and world cricket at large”. That led Modi to start legal proceedings against Clarke.

But a statement from the ECB said that matters have been settled on confidential terms.

“In May 2010 Giles Clarke CBE, Chairman of the England and Wales Cricket Board, sent an email to the President of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, the contents of which were subsequently widely reported in the British and international media which resulted in libel proceedings being issued by Lalit Modi,” the statement said.

“This statement confirms that the parties have agreed to settle the litigation on confidential terms,” it said.

In February, Clarke had also reached an out-of-court settlement with IMG over the same issue.

IMG, a sports marketing company, also reportedly took part in the meeting of Modi with the English county sides

Survival Straps has announced its role in the upcoming London 2012 Olympic Games as an official licensee of the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Teams.

Survival Straps will support Team USA athletes as they prepare to go for the gold in London by providing all London 2012 U.S. athletes officially licensed Team USA Survival Straps bracelets as well as gear tags for their equipment bags.

Survival Straps, treatment founder and CEO Kurt Walchle, order said: “It is an incredible honor for us to be able to create Team USA Survival Straps gear. The Olympic and Paralympic Games generate an amazing sense of camaraderie, ampoule patriotism and love for our country, and we are thrilled to help raise support for U.S. athletes by designing Survival Straps gear that recognizes their achievements.”

“The unique and trendy products designed by Survival Straps will allow Americans to proudly show their support for Team USA both during and beyond the London 2012 Games,” said U.S. Olympic Committee Managing Director of Consumer Products and Licensing Peter Zeytoonjian. “We’re proud to partner with this U.S.-based organization and look forward to seeing our supporters sport these red, white and blue products.”

“U.S. Olympic and Paralympic athletes represent both patriotism and prestige at the highest level, and adding Team USA to our licensing portfolio is a defining moment for Survival Straps,” said Daryl Walls, Vice President. “This symbolizes both the substantial growth of our licensing portfolio and our extensive dedication to honoring America’s heroes.”

Major League Baseball (MLB) on Friday expanded its playoff format to 10 teams, adding a second wild-card in each league.

The decision establishes a new one-game, wild-card round in each league between the teams with the best records who are not division winners, meaning a third-place team could win the World Series.

This is the only change in baseball’s playoff structure since the 1995 season, when wild-card teams were first added.

“This change increases the rewards of a division championship and allows two additional markets to experience playoff baseball each year,” Commissioner Bud Selig said in a statement.

Had there been additional wild-card teams last season, the Braves would have made the playoffs in the NL, while the Boston Red Sox would have qualified in the AL. Instead, each missed the postseason by a game, both going down with historic September swoons.

For the 2012 postseason, the five-game Division Series will begin with two home games for lower seeds, followed by home games for the higher seed. After that, it will return to the 2-2-1 format previously used.

“The players are eager to begin playing under this new format in 2012, and they look forward to moving to full realignment in 2013,” MLBPA executive director Michael Weiner said.

As part of baseball’s labor deal, the Houston Astros will switch to the American League for 2013, creating two 15-team leagues with three divisions each. Players wanted the change to equalize the chances for making the playoffs for every division.

Each season, eight of 30 major league teams have made the playoffs under the format that began in 1995, a year later than intended because of a strike that wiped out the end of the ’94 season. The postseason included just the league winners from 1903-68, then increased to four teams in 1969 after the leagues split into divisions.

In the NFL, 12 of 32 teams make the playoffs. In both the NBA and NHL, 16 of 30 teams advance to the postseason.

Adding two more playoffs teams this year has been complicated because the regular-season schedule was drafted last spring and summer, and the extra game has to be put in place in a manner that doesn’t disrupt the World Series schedule. In a further complication, both sides reached a consensus that ties for division titles would be broken on the field with a tiebreaker game under the new format, and not by head-to-head record.

Head-to-head record has been used since 1995 to determine first place if both teams are going to the postseason. But the sides decided that with the start of a one-game, winner-take-all wild-card round, the difference between first place and a wild-card berth is too important to decide with a formula and that a tiebreaker game should be played.

by Ismail Uddin

Roger Burden, acting Football Association (FA) chairman, has withdrawn his intent to apply for the permanent position following England’s 2018 World Cup bid failings. After being appointed in May, Burden had applied for the full post but has rescinded this, stating that he could no longer trust FIFA members following the recent host decision.

Burden sent out a scathing attack on FIFA, commenting: “I recognise that an important part of the role is liaison with Fifa, our global governing body. I’m not prepared to deal with people whom I cannot trust and I’ve withdrawn my candidacy.”

England received just two votes after it was revealed by many of England’s 2018 officials that they had been promised 6 to 8 votes from the 22 members of the FIFA executive committee.

“We were equal top of Fifa’s own technical assessment of the four bids,” continued Burden. “We were top of an independent assessment of the best commercial bids and our presentation on Thursday [December 2] was widely acclaimed as the best of the 2018 and 2022 bids. 

“Against this background, I am struggling to understand how we only achieved two votes. It is difficult to believe that the voting was an objective process.

“On top of that, Prince William, the Prime Minister and other members of our delegation were promised votes that did not materialise.” 

After stating that he was no longer willing to work with FIFA, Burden did confirm that he would remain as a member of the board at the FA. “I’m absolutely determined that I don’t want to do business with these people personally,” he added. 

“There may be people who have got different experiences to my own who feel they can make a difference and they can speak to Fifa and they are willing to do that, but it’s not within my experience. 

“I usually deal with people who I can trust and who are honourable people – it’s just something I’m not going to do.” 

Despite his own personal feelings on working alongside FIFA, Burden urged the FA not to sever its ties with the governing body.

“They are our governing body and it’s up to us now to find ways of dealing with them and getting some sense into the organisation and I’ll certainly be looking to do that. Walking away from Fifa I don’t think is the answer – they are our governing body and we must look for ways of working with them.” 

Burden, who had previously changed his mind on applying for the permanent position, has now reverted to his original stance in not putting himself forward. Burden became acting chairman following the departure of Lord Triesman earlier in the year and will remain as acting chairman until a successor can be found, with the FA due to name a permanent chairman early next year.

In an interview with a group of journalists at the Global Sports Industry Congress in London, here Munich 2018 chairman Katarina Witt  said Munich has been able to overcome local opposition to its bid to host the 2018 Winter Games.

The city is competing with Annecy, France, and Pyeongchang, South Korea and the International Olympic Committee will vote July 6 on the next host in Durban, South Africa.

Witt said a dispute with landowners in Garmisch- Partenkirchen, where the alpine events will be held, was “mostly solved.” The neighbors had been reluctant to give up some of their land for use in the 2018 Games.

“They were right because there wasn’t the right discussion going on at the right level,” Witt said. “It wasn’t a bad intention. In general, it was sort of like, ‘We got the Olympics, and now everybody will do it.’ You didn’t think about, ‘Well wait, you’ve got to secure some people who own the land.’”

Witt, a gold medalist at the 1984 Games in Sarajevo and Calgary in 1988, said Munich isn’t at a disadvantage with members of the IOC because the 2014 Sochi Winter Games and the 2012 London Summer Olympics will also be held in the European region.

Munich, which also organized the 1972 Summer Games, is seeking to become the first city to host both summer and winter editions. Pyeongchang failed to win during two previous bids.

“You have to keep your tradition, and you have to nurture your heartland, where the sport has been for many, many years,” Witt said

“We’re pretty confident we will be able to deliver magic.”

Spreadex, the financial and sports spread betting firm, has recorded its highest ever monthly volume of sports bets thanks to the FIFA World Cup in South Africa.

Spreadex said that sports bets increased by 16 per cent compared to its previous highest levels set in March this year. The company has also seen its highest ever number of unique bettors and new registered accounts.

A Spreadex spokesman said: “The World Cup is the biggest betting event on the globe and it always helps when matches are shown on terrestrial television rather than satellite TV, but we’ve been surprised in the upturn in business.

“England’s early exit doesn’t seem to have had a negative impact. In fact we’ve had higher number of bets placed on many matches featuring other countries rather than the games involving the Three Lions.”

Spreadex launched its online sports betting service in May 2006, and launched its fixed odds sports division in May 2010.