Providing details regarding the landscapes, monuments and curiosities of the regions through which La Vuelta passes was the premise behind the project that, today, reaps the fruit of its labour. Eladio Jareño, Director of RTVE, ex-cyclist Pedro Delgado and Javier Guillén, General Director of Unipublic accepted the award and thanked Lorena Ortega Menor, Dean of Geological Sciences at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid and the university’s chancellor, Carlos Andradas, who presided over the act, for this recognition.
The project, directed by the professor Juan de Dios Centeno, from an academic point of view, was designed to make the most of the La Vuelta and RTVE showcase and to examine the geo-diversity of the locations where the peloton competes, as well as to encourage spectators to visit those locations before, during and after the race.
The course of the 21-stage race served to improve people’s knowledge regarding the geo-diversity stories and vocabulary and also about the geographic elements of stage highlights. Thanks to that we were able to learn, for example, how Ourense’s thermal baths, the departure point for La Vuelta’s 71st edition, were created. We also learned the secrets of the Mirador de Ézaro (third stage finish-line) and how the cliffs of San Andrés de Teixido, the tallest in Europe, were formed.
A specific section of the La Vuelta website and direct links to it underneath the maps and profiles of every stage gave spectators, internet users and La Vuelta followers something more than sports, sparking their interest and benefiting the touristic promotion of our rich geography. The La Vuelta website, which is interactive and is translated into three languages (Spanish, English and French), allowed for this outreach work and collective learning project to extend beyond our own borders. In 2017, the 72nd edition of La Vuelta will allow us to continue to discover our country’s secrets and geo-diversity.
