Sunshine Matters

The VISITFLORIDA.com Racing Team made its debut at the season-opening 53rd annual Rolex 24 at Daytona this past weekend.  The 2015 race season marks year two of VISIT FLORIDA’s partnership with Jim France’s International Speedway Corporation (ISC), the newly-named VISITFLORIDA.com Racing Team (formerly Spirit of Daytona Racing), the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship and Mazda USA.  Together, these four well-known entities make up the largest motorsports partnership of its kind aimed at aggressively driving tourism to Florida.

The No. 90 VISITFLORIDA.com Racing Corvette DP, driven by Richard Westbrook and Michael Valiante, finished third in Daytona after overcoming challenges on the track (and the announcement today of the reclassification to last of one of the cars who crossed the finish line ahead of us).

“We had our share of issues for sure,” said driver Michael Valiante. “The team worked hard making changes and the car continued to get better throughout the event.  I think getting through Daytona and seeing what our challenges were, we will be in excellent shape when we unload in Sebring.  I’m confident we can deliver more great results for VISIT FLORIDA this year and compete for the championship.”

Read the full follow-up story at Motorsport.com.

With Florida as the home of iconic racing venues and motorsports events attracting millions of visitors each year, VISIT FLORIDA’s racing partnership offers Florida’s tourism industry an unprecedented opportunity to influence race fans and motorsports enthusiasts around the world.  The goal of VISIT FLORIDA’s involvement is to increase VISITFLORIDA.com’s reach to domestic and international audiences at a fraction of the cost that it would take otherwise – the partnership is a highly leveraged, efficient and productive media buy that garners a better than 2:1 return on investment.

While VISIT FLORIDA has had a presence in racing for many years now, we focused on progressively stepping up into the more popular Tudor Racing series which attracts a world-wide audience of international fans who are predisposed to travel.  The program is centered around the VISITFLORIDA.com paint scheme and in-venue signage, which guarantee constant impressions even if our car is not in the lead and allows us to actively engage with fans during the races.  In addition, VISIT FLORIDA also has commercial mentions in the presence of tags at the end of partner commercials.

At each race, VISIT FLORIDA will leverage the media in attendance, creating photo and media opportunities through special events such as meet-and-greets.  New this year, we will premiere a VISITFLORIDA.com show car, a duplicate of the race car that the media can interact with, take pictures of and even ride in.  The show car will have two seats so the drivers can take media on test laps and give them an experience worth writing about.

VISIT FLORIDA will also leverage race days to host Business-to-Business (B2B) Facilitation Opportunities that get, for example, meeting planners from around the country and hotel property representatives from Florida talking to one another.  With a luxury suite at the track and racing entertainment, VISIT FLORIDA will use the opportunity to help mix business with pleasure.

In 2015, the VISITFLORIDA.com Racing team will be participating in the full 12-race TUDOR Series season, which includes another race in Florida at the famed Sebring International Raceway, as well as other iconic tracks around the U.S. including Laguna Seca, Watkins Glen, Road America and the new Circuit of the Americas in Austin.  With a racing season that extends from January to October, VISIT FLORIDA will have advertising and promotional programs in key markets all year round.

Look for the No. 90 VISITFLORIDA.com race car at the next event on the schedule – the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Fueled by Fresh From Florida, March 18-21, 2015.   Also, follow our team year-round on the official VISITFLORIDA.com Racing Facebook and Twitter pages.