PETRONAS was announced today as the Title Sponsor for the 27th edition of Le Tour de Langkawi 2023 (LTdL), where they will now have the leading rider in the General Classification in the Green Jersey for the ProSeries tour that will start from 23 to 30 September 2023.
Minister of Youth and Sports YB Hannah Yeoh said at the ceremony to unveil the sponsorship that the presence of the petroleum giant was a welcomed addition to the LTdL family given the constant challenges to organise the annual cycling race.
“KBS is proud of this partnership and would like to extend a million thanks to PETRONAS for being the main sponsor of LTdL 2023.
“And what has made this partnership even better is that PETRONAS has also agreed to be the Title Sponsor for three consecutive years – 2023, 2024 and 2025,” said Hannah.
Also present at the ceremony were PETRONAS Group Senior General Manager of Strategic Communications, Datin Anita Azrina Abd Aziz; Chief Secretary of KBS, Dr Nagulendran Kangayatkarasu; Director General of the National Sports Council (MSN), Dato’ Ahmad Shapawi Ismail; and Vice President 1 of PKBM, Dato’ Amarjit Singh.
Hannah explained that the amount allocated to KBS to organise the race at the initial stage was only RM8 million and as an organiser, MSN needed a much bigger budget of around at least RM15 million to make the ProSeries tour event with a ‘world class’ standard a success.
She said that the situation faced by MSN was a huge challenge in these four months as they have to ensure that the organisation of the race remained at the highest level while at the same look for ways to garner more sponsorships.
Hannah also praised MSN for providing the right sponsorship package to the management of PETRONAS, enough for them to agree to come on board as the Title Sponsor in a bid to make the LTdL 2023 a resounding success.
“I am sure that the MSN team led by Dato’ Ahmad Shapawi will put in place the best strategy in ensuring that all the sponsorship packages will be fulfilled and implemented,” he said.
As the Title Sponsor, PETRONAS has also been given ‘naming rights’ to the event with the official logo now changed to PETRONAS LE TOUR DE LANGKAWI 2023, which carries the PETRONAS logo on all LTdL event branding.
PETRONAS has also been given the right to the overall leader’s jersey – which is now in the PETRONAS green synonymous with the corporate colour of the petroleum giant.
“Yellow has been in use for the overall leader‘s jersey for the past 26 years, so we are changing it for the for the first time to the PETRONAS green. This is a shift in ensuring that LTdL has a unique colour for its leader like the yellow ‘mailot jeune’ jersey for the Tour de France and the pink ‘maglia rosa’ jersey for the Giro d’Italia.
“I’m sure this decision will give considerable added value to the PETRONAS sponsorship,” she added.
KBS is confident that through ‘live’ broadcast via sports broadcaster Eurosports and hundreds of millions of viewers on local and foreign television, social media platforms Youtube and TikTok, this will give multiple returns on the amount of sponsorship that has been extended.
Additionally, promotional programmes such as the Calvacade parade and side events will also ensure that the PETRONAS brand and products remain close to the Malaysian populace.
“As an organiser, KBS is also proud at being able to be a partner and ‘have a relationship’ with a world brand name like PETRONAS that has great popularity and credibility, especially in motorsports through their sponsorships of Formula 1 and MotoGP,” added Hannah.
LTdL 2023 is organised by the Ministry of Youth and Sports (KBS) through MSN in collaboration with the National Cycling Federation of Malaysia (PKBM) is a ProSeries race that starts in Kerteh, this September 23 and will go through 11 of the 12 states in the Peninsula, to end in front of the Twin Towers PETRONAS (KLCC) on September 30, involving a race distance of 1,277.1km.
A total of 22 teams consisting of two (2) WorldTeam, eight (8) ProTeams, 10 UCI Continental teams, and 2 Continental teams including the Malaysian national squad will participate.
NO. | TEAM | CATEGORY | REGISTERED COUNTRY |
---|---|---|---|
1 | ASTANA QAZAQSTAN TEAM | UCI WORLD TEAM | KAZAKHSTAN |
2 | EF EDUCATION-EASYPOST | UCI WORLD TEAM | USA |
3 | CAJA RURAL-SEGUROS RGA | UCI PROTEAM | SEPANYOL |
4 | EQUIPO KERN PHARMA | UCI PROTEAM | SEPANYOL |
5 | EUSKALTEL – EUSKADI | UCI PROTEAM | SEPANYOL |
6 | GREEN PROJECT – BARDIANI CSF – FAIZANE | UCI PROTEAM | ITALI |
7 | TEAM CORRATEC – SELLE ITALIA | UCI PROTEAM | ITALI |
8 | HUMAN POWERED HEALTH | UCI PROTEAM | USA |
9 | TUDOR PRO CYCLING TEAM | UCI PROTEAM | SWITZERLAND |
10 | BOLTON EQUITIES BLACK SPOKE PRO CYCLING | UCI PROTEAM | NEW ZEALAND |
11 | TERENGGANU POLYGON CYCLING TEAM | UCI CONTINENTAL | MALAYSIA |
12 | 7ELEVEN CLIQQ – AIR21 BY ROADBIKE PHILIPPINES | UCI CONTINENTAL | FILIPINA |
13 | NUSANTARA CYCLING TEAM | UCI CONTINENTAL | INDONESIA |
14 | HENGXIANG CYCLING TEAM | UCI CONTINENTAL | CHINA |
15 | LI NING STAR | UCI CONTINENTAL | CHINA |
16 | GIANT CYCLING TEAM | UCI CONTINENTAL | CHINA |
17 | ST GEORGE CONTINENTAL CYCLING TEAM | UCI CONTINENTAL | AUSTRALIA |
18 | KSPO PROFESSIONAL | UCI CONTINENTAL | KOREA SELATAN |
19 | JCL TEAM UKYO | UCI CONTINENTAL | JEPUN |
20 | ROOJAI ONLINE INSURANCE | UCI CONTINENTAL | THAILAND |
21 | THAILAND CONTINENTAL CYCLING TEAM | UCI CONTINENTAL | THAILAND |
22 | MALAYSIA NATIONAL TEAM | CONTINENTAL | KEBANGSAAN |