As the great and the good of the sporting world descend on glittering Abu Dhabi for the World Sports Awards, where Danny MacAskill is in contention for Action Sportsperson of the Year, we crunch the Laureus Lucky Numbers...
42...
nominees chosen by leading sports editors, writers and broadcasters from over 120 countries votes to create a shortlist of six nominations in each category. This year’s nominees include such names as Usain Bolt, Lindsey Vonn and FC Barcelona. Laureus is also celebrating it's 10th birthday. The organisation is divided into three entities: the awards, the World Sports Academy and the Laureus Sport for Good Foundation. It was set up to celebrate sporting excellence and harness the power of sport to promote social change.
817...
cricket test wickets shared among the 46 members of the Laureus World Sports Academy who decide the award winners. The academy is nothing short of a galaxy of stars. There's Olympians like the chairman Ed Moses, Katerina Witt and Alberto Tomba, team players like Franz Beckenbauer, Ian Botham and Dan Marino and extreme sports stars like Tony Hawk, Robbie Naish and Mike Horn. Collectively they also share 426 touchdown passes, 57 boxing KOs, 49 Olympic gold medals, 43 tennis singles grand slam titles, 32 golfing major titles Major Golf Championships, 24 national football league records, 23 windsurfing titles, 15 motorcycling world championships, 12 skateboarding world championships, 11 horse racing Triple Crowns, 11 Paralympic Gold medals, 5 Tour de France titles, 4 World Judo championships, 4 World Figure Skating Titles, 4 football World Cup wins, 4 Formula One world championships and 2 rugby world cup wins.
3...
surfers nominated for the Action Sports Award – an unprecedented amount of recognition for the sport. They include ASP World Tour men’s champion Mick Fanning, the ASP women’s champion Stephanie Gilmore and big wave/freesurfer Greg Long. Also in the category are windsurfer Antoine Albeau, skateboarder Chris Cole and cyclist Danny MacAskill.
7...
award categories: five awards are decided by the Laureus Media Selection Panel: Laureus World Sportsman of the Year, Laureus World Sportswoman of the Year, Laureus World Team of the Year, Laureus World Breakthrough of the Year and Laureus World Comeback of the Year. The other two are chosen by specialist panels: the Action Sportsperson, which is chosen by a panel of the world’s leading action sports journalists, and World Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability, which is overseen by the Executive Committee of the International Paralympic Committee.
2...
Oscars for the show’s host Kevin Spacey, who took home Academy awards for The Usual Suspects and American Beauty. No stranger to sports, Kevin was Red Bull Racing’s special guest at the 2006 Formula One Monaco Grand Prix. Also from the acting world come special guests Hugh Grant, Clive Owen, Kyle MacLachlan and Michelle Rodriguez and other special guests are David Coulthard, Francois Pienaar and Andrew Flintoff.
2500...
each 30cm (12inch) tall statuette weighs 2500g including 670g of silver for the statuette itself and 650g of gold in the base. Speaking of gold, the Emirates Palace Hotel, the venue for the awards show, uses 5kg of edible gold every year to decorate the deserts.
10...
years of Laureus, which is made up of three entities: the awards themselves, the World Sports Academy and the Laureus Sport for Good Foundation. Collectively they celebrate sporting excellence and harness the power of sport to promote social change.
4...
World Sportsperson of the Year awards in Roger Federer’s trophy cabinet. The Swiss has dominated the awards in much the same way that he has ruled world tennis. He’s nominated again this year. Other multiple champions include Kelly Slater, Michael Schumacher, Peter Blake, Tiger Woods and Lance Armstrong (all two each). Of those, only two of those have ever won in different categories: Armstrong for Best Sportsman and Best Comeback and the late Sir Peter winning the Sport for Good and Lifetime Achievement Awards. If Sportsman of the Year nominee Valentino Rossi wins, it will be his second victory.
1,002...
Swarovski crystal chandeliers adorn the ceilings of the Emirates Palace Hotel. Built at a cost of about 2.2billion euros, it’s the world’s most expensive hotel. In its one kilometre site, the hotel includes 114 domes, 12 restaurants, 1.3km of prive beach and 3.9 million cubic feet of marble. Guests can either attend the ceremony in person or watch on one of the 619 televisions. They can choose from 302 Grand Rooms and 108 suites, costing from 258.511 for a room to 8,838.62 euros for a night in the Grand Palace Suite.
20 million...
euros raised by the Laureus Sport for Good Foundation to support almost 80 projects running worldwide and helping to improve the lives of more than one million young people. The foundation’s principles were defined by its patron Nelson Mandela, who said that “sport has the power to change the world” … and he should know.
Check out the official Laureus site.
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