Sports tourism seeks to distance itself from the mass tourism experienced by some cities and the coast in Spain and aspires to become a deseasonalizing and decentralizing element to bring the economy to less stressed provinces.
Football, basketball, tennis… they are “mature” sports in which Spain has become references in recent decadesbut in recent years sports tourism has also turned towards running, paddle tennis or cycling, sports on the rise and in which Spain enters fully to attract tourists.
This is explained by the president of Spain Is Sport, Andrés de la Dehesa, who in an interview with EFE in Fitur emphasizes that Spain “already has” the elite athlete and that now focuses on the amateurwhich in addition to arriving to compete or train, complements this sports offer with gastronomy and culture.
For this reason, De la Dehesa emphasizes that they work together with Turespaña “looking for the demographic challenge and an emptied Spain”with the aim that these other sports, such as cycling or triathlon, allow athletes to be taken to valleys and rivers, instead of going to big cities.
In that sense, aspires to produce a “hybridization”as in the case of Mallorca and its 312, the gran fondo converted into one of the largest cycling events and that has “put the island on the map” in sports, but also all the complementary experience it offers, with beaches and gastronomy.
“The tourist can use a crossed practice, such as ‘cycloenotourism’, in which tourists come to cycle but this is also supplemented with visits to wineries“emphasizes the president of this association, who comments that there are also potential tourists to work on, such as early retirees or those who telework.
For ‘Spain Is Sport’, until now work has been done in a too “tight” wayon the one hand the hotel part and on the other the sports part, but in recent times they have merged, and an example of this, he highlights, is the promotion of golf.
For this reason, it affects the transversality of services, since Spain “is unbeatable in terms of climate, but also in gastronomy, in the quality-price relationship, in having a very expanded cultural offer...”, acknowledges De la Dehesa.
The president points out that the key is to create memorable events because in this way the visitor not only wants to train or compete in an event, but “also wants to come with the family” and to do so he claims the importance of having events linked to the territory.
In this regard, it highlights that These sports avoid mass tourism and emphasizes that this sporting lockjaw is more linked to coexistence with the local person and sustainability, “a factor to take into account”, beyond the high impact it generates.
Doesn’t stop growing
Benito Mateos-Nevado, attached to the Management of A1 Padel, one of the great circuits of this sport, emphasizes that in recent years the cities “they have launched themselves and have opted for sports tourism.”
“Many destinations want this type of events because they are aware of the impact it has on the city, as is the case of the city of Seville, which has hosted the Seville Master and has left an impact of ten million euros in 2024.”
Something similar will happen with the Roig Arena, a reference multipurpose pavilion that will open in Valencia this September and which, with a total capacity of 20,000 spectators, aims to host an average of between 40 and 50 medium and high capacity events per year.
“Having this facility is giving one more asset – to the Community – so that things can happen. Our vocation is to have both national and international projection, which can have not only economic and musical implications, but also sports,” explained its general director, Víctor Sendra, during his visit to Fitur.
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