SOL RALLY BARBADOS 2009 PROMOTION STEPPED UP

Five months ahead of the 20th running of its premier event, the Barbados Rally Club (BRC) has stepped up its European promotion of Sol Rally Barbados 2009, coinciding with the broadcast this week of British production company Acceleration TV’s coverage of the 2008 action on the popular Europe-wide satellite station Motors TV.
Following the distribution of more than 50 promotional DVDs to prospective competitors and the motor sport media at two major British rallies in September, today marks the publication of the first edition of the Club’s Overseas Competitor Information document.
Now available as a pdf download from the recently-revamped event web site, www.rallybarbados.bb, the document provides details of the event entry and shipping package and lists the Club’s Official Airline, Hotel, Shipping and Vehicle Rental Partners, and the deals each has on offer; it will be updated as further details are confirmed.
The document also includes background information on Sol Rally Barbados 2009 and the key events surrounding it, which will be of particular interest to potential first-time visitors; to get an even better feel for the event, they will also be able to download the short promotional DVD, which can be found on the web site’s home page.
New for 2009 is an arrangement with Divi Southwinds Beach Resort in St Lawrence Gap, Christ Church, which will become ‘Rally Headquarters’, as explained by BRC Chairman Mark Hamilton: "Following some favourable reports from experienced long-term visitors Kevin Procter and Martin Stockdale, who stayed there last year, the Club has entered into a partnership with the hotel. It will not just be somewhere for weary competitors to lay their heads at night, but will provide a ‘one-stop shop’ for all their needs . . . basically, it will be Rally Headquarters.
“A Rally Office will be open for the two weeks before Sol Rally Barbados and for a further week after; we are also making plans for the Briefing Meeting and Welcome Party to be staged there. The management have been very open to our suggestions, and we welcome their input, in terms of both generous concessions and organisational skills.”
Sol Rally Barbados is scheduled for May 30/31, with Shell V-Power King of the Hill, which proved popular with competitors and spectators alike when introduced this year, to be staged on Saturday, May 23. As in 2008, this HillSprint will double as a points-scoring round for local drivers and a ‘shakedown’ for those from overseas.
From small beginnings in 1990 as a one-day rally for around 30 local competitors, Rally Barbados – it was renamed in 2003 - has grown into the Caribbean’s biggest annual international motor sport event, attracting as many as 90 crews, one-third of them from overseas. It is one of the strongest sporting brand names in the region, particularly for visitors from Europe, and a major contributor to the island’s tourism product and foreign exchange earnings.
Over the past eight years, 200 competitors have journeyed to Barbados, some of them many times over; these have included nearly 50 from Jamaica, St Vincent & The Grenadines and Trinidad & Tobago and more than 150 from outside the Caribbean. Fourteen countries have been represented, including England - with 89 competitors, it boasts the strongest representation – Finland, New Zealand, Spain and Turkey.
In the event’s 19-year history, overseas drivers have won only five times although, with two of those victories achieved in the past three years, it appears that the winds of change may be blowing. In 2008, Northern Ireland’s Kris Meeke headed the first lock-out of the podium by overseas crews since his fellow-countryman Kenny McKinstry led home Jamaicans Jeffrey Panton and Doug Gore in 1996. This year, England’s Paul Bird finished second, ahead of Jamaican Gary Gregg (the winner 2006), while European competitors won six of the event’s 13 classifications.
Meeke, who has recently signed to contest the Intercontinental Rally Challenge with Peugeot UK/Kronos Racing, described his Barbados experience as: “the best 10 days of my life. Its awesome, very, very good. They do it properly out here, they create a proper atmosphere – just look at the thousands of spectators. It’s so much fun and completely unique to anywhere else in the world.”
This year, motor sport fans across Europe have been able to share Meeke’s enjoyment with record coverage of more than 24 hours of terrestrial and satellite programming, including Motors TV and Sky Sports, which broadcast to more than 30 countries.

Sol Rally Barbados 2009 (May 30/31) and Shell V-Power King of the Hill (May 23) are organised by the Barbados Rally Club, which celebrated its 50th Anniversary in 2007; title sponsor is the Sol Group, the Caribbean’s largest independent oil company, and both events are rounds of the Virgin Atlantic BRC RallySport Championship.

For further information:
e-mail – robin@bradfax.com