Mille Miglia was also very successful on the web, with important results on new media and social networks.
The thirtysecond revival of the Red Arrow was faithful to its successful tradition and got an enthusiastic reaction from the public. This was due to the extraordinary “travelling museum” created by the 435 historic cars, as well as the new route, the additional day, and the presence of many celebrities.
Mille Miglia was also very successful on the web, with important results on new media and social networks.
Looking at the result of the Mille Miglia 2014, the first important consideration concerns the public’s participation: also thanks to four days of glorious weather and the new route passing through a few towns which had not seen the Mille Miglia for years, participants coming from all over the world have been surprised by the great number of enthusiasts enjoying the view along the whole route.
The additional day decided this year by the organizers allowed the Bolognese crowds to see the stage arrival on the Saturday night, and the very numerous Brescians to cheer the arriving teams on the Sunday morning: for the first time many families and children, who in the previous years were not able to witness the night arrivals, could experience the emotional end of the race in Viale Venezia and in the whole Brescia town centre.
With great satisfaction for the outcome of the 2014 Mille Miglia, and well aware that some aspects still need to be enhanced in the future, the organizers left to others the public judgment of this year’s edition. The Mayor of Brescia, Emilio Del Bono, declared: «For Brescia, the additional Mille Miglia day has been a great success; I believe that this has been the best edition for many years, thanks to the group of organizers led by Chairman Roberto Gaburri».
THE REAL STARS: THE 435 RACING CARS
The most numerous starters of the 2014 Mille Miglia have been Mercedes-Benz and Alfa Romeo, incidentally both sponsors of this edition. Of the 435 cars taking the start, 45 had the Stuttgart Star, while 43 the Milan coat of arms; after them were Fiat with 35, Jaguar/SS with 32, Porsche with 24, Lancia with 23, Bugatti with 22, Ferrari with 19, Aston Martin with 18 and Bmw with 12, plus cars from 54 other brands. Some of the Companies with the most successful tradition, having won at least one of the original speed races, sent teams from their Heritage Museums, like Alfa Romeo, BMW and Mercedes-Benz.
Glorious brands like Bugatti and Bentley were also present with works teams. Jaguar were there too with an important works team with celebrity drivers and co-drivers, like Jay Leno, Jeremy Irons, Brian Johnson, Martin Brundle and Bruno Senna.
Mercedes-Benz, as Automotive Presenting Sponsor, gave more than 90 cars for the organization. Most of them were brand spanking new C Classes finished in a very much admired shade of metallic red used for route control, 7 “pace cars“, 6 “medical cars“, 4 for guest relations, 4 for the press office and 14 for route management. These cars also carried and distributed 200.000 Mille Miglia flags, very welcome by all and especially the kids.
CAST OF CARACTERS: a Mille miglia WORTHY OF THE SILVER SCREEN.
Oscar laureates, pop stars, business men and famous ladies; the 2014 Mille Miglia starting grid was full of exceptional protagonists: thanks to great actors like Adrien Brody and Jeremy Irons someone called it the Race of Oscars. For sure, the Mille Miglia 2014 will star in a motion picture. As a matter of fact, during this year’s race, a number of scenes have been shot by Lucere Film, a production company tasked by 1000 Miglia Srl to make a movie which will be produced during the summer months and that will be launched in May 2015, at Cannes Cinema Festival as well as in the Italian Pavilion of Expo Milano 2015.
The Welshman Luke Evans was among the actors driving in the race. Also from the world of Show Business we had Jay Leno, American TV personality, and David Blakeley, British model and writer, with his model and actress partner Jodie Kidd. Many musicians were also there: Example, British singer and rapper, Scottish singer Amy Macdonald and Belgian singer Milow. The loudest cheers from the public were for Brian Johnson, AC/DC frontman. Many racing drivers took the start, first and foremost Eros Crivellari, the only one with an original Mille Miglia to his credit, Andy Wallace, Jochen Mass, Teo Fabi, Bernd Schneider, Jacky Ickx, Martin Brundle e Bruno Senna, with the very evocative helmet of his late uncle Ayrton. Among the many celebrities, a special place was held by French stylist and Pablo Picasso’s daughter, Paloma.
As always in such a big event, many small but significant curiosities took place. For example, having known that one of the ‘works’ Porsches was driven by Wolfgang and Ferdinand Porsche, Marco Makaus, joint Managing Director of 1000 Miglia srl, decided to modify the starting list, granting their Speedster the race number 356. Thanks are due to the Dutch Houtkamp team who sportingly accepted the change. Among the 435 teams who brought their car to Piazza della Vittoria on the morning of Thursday May the 15th, a particularly elegant young couple stood out: Christian Henrich Stove e Manuela Berloni, who got married on the previous Saturday. As a wedding gift, they had asked Roberto Gaburri and Valerio Marinelli, Chairman and Vice Chairman of 1000 Miglia Srl, to be allowed to spend their honeymoon at the Mille Miglia. And so they did, driving their Porsche 356 1500 Speedster.
Mille Miglia 2014: FACTS AND FIGURES
One of the facts behind the organization of the Mille Miglia has been explained by Andrea Dalledonne, joint Managing Director of 1000 Miglia Srl: «From the first to the last car, counting also those of Mercedes-Benz Tribute and Ferrari Tribute, the organization and the media cars, we have a convoy lasting almost four hours, with around 4000 hotel rooms booked and 9000 meals served“.
Here follow some additional data.
- Registrations: 2.570 initial requests (counting also those done in 2013 for this year), 624 completed with payment.
- Accepted cars: 435.
- Additional cars starting vs. previous years: 15 (vs. 2013), 60 (vs. 2012).
- Italian crews: 113.
- Foreign crews: 322.
- Represented Countries: 34.
- More numerous foreign Country: Germany (93).
- Number of Automotive brands of the accepted cars: 64.
- Participants with support and following crews: 2.000.
- Number of people involved in the organization: 3.000.
- Registered journalists and media professionals: 1.500.
- Towns on the Route: 227.
- Regions on the Route: 7, plus San Marino.
MILLE MIGLIA ON THE NEW MEDIA
Results of the new media coverage of the 2014 edition confirm a very positive trend. Strong growth for website visits as well as social network contacts.
WWW.1000MIGLIA.IT
The 2014 data cover a period from September 1st 2013 to May 31st 2014. We had 740.000 visits, with more than 4 million pages visualized.
These results consolidate a trend of strong growth.
An exceptional volume of contacts took place in May 2014, during the race, when a peak of interest has been reached: more than 440.000 users visited the site, with more than 2,2 million page views.
Site accesses come from over 150 countries worldwide, which further underlines the Red Arrow international appeal.
Comparing the data of the 2013 race – with 400.000 visitors and more than 2 million page views – with those of 2014, the site www.1000miglia.it has doubled the number of contacts and views, with an extraordinary growth of 85% more visits.
1.262.374 people followed the activity of the FB page of Mille Miglia during the week of the 2014 race.
As we got closer to the race, the total “Likes” grew very quickly: in the months of April and May we passed from 6.118 to 11.473 fans; in June 2014 the number of “Likes” trebled, up to 17.110.
The post announcing the winners of Mille Miglia 2014, on May 18th, reached 18.032 people, with 850 “Likes”, 57 comments and 182 sharings.
The top number of accesses has been reached on May 15th 2014, during the race’s start, when more than 31.000 people visited the page.
During the month of the Mille Miglia, every post had an average volume of 8.000 people.
The internationality of the fans has been confirmed. 40% of contacts live out of Italy, mainly in Germany, Netherlands, USA and Japan. As a consequence, all interactions take place in many different languages.
21% of fans are women, while 78% men.
Compared with the 2013 race, the growth of the visualization varied from 10.000 units in early April to 80.000 on the week before the race. During the event itself, a total of 210.000 people has been reached.
In 2014, compared with the previous year, the Facebook account has therefore experienced a growth of 6 times the 2013 result (+ 600%).
The Twitter profile doubled, in less than two months, from 1.243 to 2.615 followers.
The hashtags #lacorsapiubelladelmondo, #millemiglia2014, #1000miglia2014 have been followed with tens of thousands posts from enthusiasts, professionals and participants, among which were many VIPs.
YOUTUBE
The MilleMiglia Channel reached 379 registrations and 50.154 total visualizations.
For Mille Miglia 2014, 40 videos have been uploaded on YouTube, which have been watched a total of 24.000 times.
A total of 11.989 visualizations have been reached during the month of May 2014. 2.507 of these have been registered on May 16th.
Access have come from Italy, USA, Germany, the Netherlands, Japan and UK .
YouTube has been the most international new media, as 62% of the visualizations came from abroad.
In 2013, MilleMiglia Channel reached 23.000 visualizations spread on 31 videos, among which the official ones (2 in Italian, 2 in English) with the archive footage of Istituto Luce.
A special mention is due to American TV star Jay Leno’s video, showing the story of his participation in the 2014 edition of the Mille Miglia. Loaded in his YouTube channel “Jay Leno’s garage” at the end of the race, in just a month the video has been seen by 110.000 users.
APPLICATION
1000 Miglia S.r.l. launched an App expressly for the 2014 race.
The App was provided by The Classic Car Trust, Mille Miglia Digital Partner, as an exclusive service for the teams in the race, a very useful digital platform for drivers and co-drivers, who enjoyed an immediate access to all relevant information regarding the race. In addition, the instant messaging allowed participants to communicate among themselves. The race experience has also been evolved and enhanced thanks to the following features:
- Programme
- Updates and race results
- Official information about the teams and their cars
- Digital Road-book
- Hotel information and addresses
- Local Weather forecasts and along the route
- Digital map
- Messaging service to communicate with other teams and for receiving push information from the Mille Miglia organization
