The Race Tour 2005/2006 launched

LAUNCHING OF THE GIANT CLASS INTERNATIONAL CIRCUIT AND THE FIRST ROUND THE WORLD RACE WITH STOPOVERS : "THE RACE TOUR 2005/2006"

After consulting with most of the interested principal parties since the arrival of The Race 2000/2001, and in furtherance of the major objectives previously discussed in Southampton in September 2001, the organizational committee of The Race Event have decided to launch the "Giant Class International Circuit" and create the first Round The World Race with 'stopovers' for multihulls : The Race Tour 2005/2006

The new Round the World Race, "THE RACE TOUR", especially formatted to further both the philosophy of The Race and the marketing objectives of participating syndicates' partners, will take place around the world over 4 separate legs including each of the major strategic markets: Europe, North America, Asia, and South Pacific.

THE RACE TOUR will take place every 4 years beginning in 2006 (2010 ...).

OBJECTIVES:

1. Respect and further the fundamental values of The Race's philosophy (Innovation, human adventure, expanding global cultural contacts);
2. Creation of a long term program specifically formatted for the benefit of major international sponsors in order to better amortize their investment on a long term basis;
3. Creation of an international circuit that is easily understandable by the general public, with a strong coherence among the official events;
4. Facilitate and encourage the entry of any syndicate on this new international circuit whenever they are ready to join, without being obliged to wait 4 years for the next major event;
5. Build an exiting and innovative sailing program specifically formatted to satisfy partners¹ objectives: Media values, Conceptual values, Commercial values (Public Relations, Corporate hospitality ...), Internal Values

Creation of an "annual international championship" based on results from officially sanctioned races and records selected by the organizational committee of The Race Event, utilizing different coefficients based on the various events¹ relative importance and difficulty.

Each yearly championship will take results from at least:

• 1 major event (such as THE RACE, THE RACE TOUR, JULES VERNE ...) and
• 4 to 6 officially sanctioned races or records from either the European circuit or the Pacific circuit.

Official presentation of the detailed program will be made at the next Paris Boat show in December 2002.