UK Athletics has today announced a new sponsorship commitment from Norwich Union worth £20 million pounds over the next five years. The deal is one of the largest ever for any British sporting governing body and for the first time puts athletics well into the premier league of sport sponsorship.
The new package runs to the end of 2006 and will impact on every level of the sport in the UK. It also represents the biggest ever investment in the sport by a commercial partner and will secure the financial future of track and field athletics in the run up to the Athens Olympics and beyond.
Norwich Union will continue to provide headline sponsorship of the major domestic televised meetings, now recognised as amongst the best and most lucrative in the world. This summer’s Norwich Union British Grand Prix at Crystal Palace was widely regarded by athletes, coaches, BBC Television and spectators alike as the finest meeting to be held in the UK.
Over the past three years, the British televised meetings have consistently attracted the finest athletes in the world such as Olympic 100m champions Maurice Greene and Marion Jones, World 1500m champion Hicham El Guerrouj plus Britain’s top stars including Olympic triple jump champion Jonathan Edwards. Offering the highest prize money structure anywhere on the Grand Prix circuit, the future success of the major televised meetings looks assured.
However, the Norwich Union sponsorship of UK Athletics is not focussed purely on the elite echelons of the sport. Over 20% of the sponsorship will be invested in four grassroot and development initiatives.
The following schemes form the cornerstones of UK Athletics Development strategy:
In addition, Norwich Union will have title sponsorship of the GB Senior Team and title sponsorship of the GB Junior and Under 23 Teams, relay teams plus the UK junior competition programme.
Announcing the renewal of the sponsorship, Patrick Snowball, Chief Executive, Norwich Union Insurance said, ‘Our sponsorship of UK Athletics over the past three years has been a highly successful partnership. For Norwich Union it works at many levels, providing an excellent platform for the marketing programmes supporting our brand, as well as giving us the opportunity to invest back in communities through the nationwide grassroots schemes.’
Philip Scott, Chief Executive, Norwich Union Life said, ‘This sponsorship deal is one of the most all-encompassing in UK sport. The level of commitment given by Norwich Union is representative of how highly we value our partnership with UK Athletics. We are delighted to be renewing our sponsorship and are looking forward to an exciting and successful further five years spanning the next European and World Championships, the Commonwealth Games and the next Olympics in Athens – three of which will be hosted in the UK.’
David Moorcroft, Chief Executive, UK Athletics said, ‘We are delighted that Norwich Union has decided to extend their commitment to the sport until 2006. We appreciated the trust the company had in us when UK Athletics was created in 1999 and we are delighted that Norwich Union wish to develop the relationship further over the next five years. Norwich Union has been pivotal in helping us establish UK Athletics and through the outstanding support of their ‘ Grassroots to Glory ‘ programme athletes of all levels have received enormous benefit. The past three years have been tremendous, the next five promise to be even more successful.’
Alan Pascoe, Chairman of Fast Track said, ‘This new £20 million sponsorship reflects Norwich Union’s enormous confidence in the future of British Athletics at every level. This sponsorship represents the largest commercial investment into any traditional Olympic sport ever and will allow UK Athletics to continue to develop the sport in all areas.’
For further information contact:
Alastair Marks
Norwich Union
Tel: 020 7662 3616
Mobile: 07790 487308
Jon Ridgeon or Tim Stemp
Fast Track
Tel: 020 7932 1700
Mobiles: 07798 927001, 07931 764 668