ASO and AEG extend media partnership

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As momentum for this year's Amgen Tour of California builds, Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO) and AEG, owners of the Tour de France and the Amgen Tour of California respectively, yesterday announced an expansion in their media partnership to provide unprecedented coverage.

Beginning with this year's Amgen Tour of California, May 16-23, ASO will assume responsibility for overseeing all aspects of the race's television production. ASO will bring its award-winning Tour de France television production team to California, including Jean-Maurice Ooghe, who has directed the television broadcast of many Tour editions.

The event will be shown on Eurosport in Europe and the Versus network in the United States, and in addition to production of the broadcast, ASO will continue to assist AEG with the international distribution of the Amgen Tour of California television and digital media rights, including the development, production and distribution of a portfolio of programming formats, including a daily highlights and recap package.

In 2009, the race was distributed to more than 200 countries and territories and was seen live in more than 90 countries on some of the main cycling channels worldwide, including the aforementioned Eurosport and Versus, plus J Sports (Japan), SBS (Australia), Dubai Sports Channel (Middle East) and HiTV (Africa).

"We are pleased to be entering the third year of this partnership with AEG and the Amgen Tour of California and are looking forward to expanding the services that we will be providing to this year’s race," said ASO's deputy managing director, Yann Le Moenner.

"AEG is delighted to grow our partnership with the Amaury Sport Organisation, which is the world's best organiser of bicycle races," said AEG Sports President, Andrew Messick. "We expect that ASO will provide viewers around the world with both an extraordinary documentation of the race and a showcase of the incredible beauty and diversity of the state of California."