Wrc.com a multiple winner at sports website awards

The FIA World Rally Championship’s official website, wrc.com, has today scooped a host of awards at the inaugural SportBusiness Ultimate Sports Websites Awards and has been rated one of the top three sports sites in the world.

Competing against some of the biggest names in the world of sport including Manchester United, the NBA, Sky Sports and the Super Bowl, wrc.com came away with the awards for 'best site content' and 'best site community' in the federation/league category.

After scores in four other categories were taken into account wrc.com was ranked third overall in the main 'Ultimate Sports Website' prize.

The site, which is provided in English, French, Spanish and Japanese, offers up to the minute news from the WRC, including live stage results, live radio during events, video content, exclusive interviews, pictures, competitions, interactive polls and behind the scenes insight.

It was commended not only for its production and delivery of content, but also for its commitment to developing a sense of community for the millions of fans that follow the WRC worldwide. The site is integrated to bespoke Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, YouTube and Joost platforms, providing the opportunity to communicate with fans, and providing them with access to a mix of exclusive WRC content via a variety of social networking formats.

Simon Long, CEO of WRC promoters ISC, said: “We’re proud to win these prestigious awards, which follows some tremendous good news stories for the World Rally Championship last week. We are committed to making the WRC accessible to our global fan base, and due to the unique challenges that the sport of rallying faces, technology and digital media are extremely important."

John Nolan, Head of N.One, the digital and commercial division of North One Television which runs WRC.com said: "Winning these awards, so early in the redevelopment of wrc.com is a surprise! It's really important to us that WRC fans can get access to WRC content for free, that's why youtube, twitter and facebook are a central part of our online community and linked to wrc.com.

"We've still got lots of plans to help improve wrc.com, and whilst our traffic is still increasing since we removed the subscription charges, once these new innovations launch we hope our fans will continue to come and share the excitement of WRC," he added.

Rachael Church-Sanders, author of ‘Ultimate Sports Websites’, added: “The FIA World Rally Championship is an excellent resource for all WRC fans, providing a full range of easily accessible and rich content in a format that is simple to navigate. The site fully deserves the accolade of best league or federation site for content, and also stands out for achieving top marks for 'community'.”

Here are final rakings in the Ultimate Sports Website Awards 2009, with scores in brackets:

1. Chelsea Football Club (108)
2. Manchester United Football Club (107)
3. WRC: (101)
4. NBA: (100)
5. Euro 2008 (99)
6. Cricinfo (97)
7. Sky Sports (96)
8. Super Bowl (96)
9. PGA TOUR (84)
10. Australian Grand Prix Event Site (82)