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F1: Huge Crowd for McLaren Street Demo
Written by: Adam Cooper
RACER Magazine   http://www.racer.com/speedtv
01/14/2007 - 07:00 PM
Valencia, Spain
 


Spaniards lined up the streets to see Hamilton (above) and compatriot Alonso blast by. (LAT Photo) ยป More Photos

An estimated 100,000 people lined the streets of the Spanish city of Valencia on Monday night to see national hero Fernando Alonso drive a McLaren around a downtown street course.

Alonso and new teammate Lewis Hamilton each drove examples of last year's MP4-21 in the new 2007 Vodafone livery, prior to the unveiling of the new MP4-22. It's said that closing the roads has cost the new sponsor $1.5m. The spectacular track crossed two bridges and ran past the city's modern museum and cultural complex.

The city government has cooperated fully with McLaren in organizing the event, which is seen as a short of taster for a possible street race in the city. The permanent Valencia venue outside the city is not deemed suitable for an F1 race, although it is used for testing. Valencia is the host of the next America's Cup, and the city is determined to get out of the shadow of Madrid and Barcelona by attracting other major events.

The McLaren demo was carried live on Spanish TV as McLaren and its new sponsor seek to tell the nation that Alonso's colors are no longer blue and yellow. A lucky spectator won a Mercedes road car via a phone call
from the double World Champion! Launch entertainment was provided by Cirque du Soleil and violinist Vanessa Mae.

Ron Dennis says that the launch is part of a new marketing emphasis within the team.

"This isn't just a glitzy thing," said the team CEO. "This is global penetration, this is packaged showmanship, how we can expand the F1 brand as well as our own. We are going to facilitate people realizing their dreams, not just in motorsport, in all sorts of other disciplines. We've got some very innovative marketing and advertising concepts.

"Don't misread it as some kind of glib thing. This is us trying to put something back into F1 and present F1 in a different way. In complete cooperation with the local government and all our sponsors we're trying to bring it here for the masses. We're expecting it will be at least 100,000, but we believe it could be significantly more, and we've got a mechanism for evaluating that. We think it's going to be a very big number."

BMW will launch its new contender in a rather more modest event in downtown Valencia on Tuesday morning, and the car will be shaken down at the circuit in the afternoon.