Tourism Australia teams up with GoPro to showcase the Gold Coast

Up to one hundred of the world's top extreme sports athletes will converge on the Gold Coast in May to film three days of adrenalin-fuelled activity and share their content with millions of people around the world.

The enormous content sharing initiative will form part of the 2016 GoPro Athlete Summit on the Gold Coast, brought to Australia in a new partnership between GoPro, Tourism Australia, Tourism and Events Queensland and Gold Coast Tourism.

The line-up of world famous international sporting stars includes Olympians, endurance and adventure athletes, skydivers, swimmers, surfers, snowboarders, wakeboarders, skateboarders, BMX riders, motorcyclists and rally drivers.

Outfitted with multiple GoPro cameras to capture the adventure and landscape from every angle, athletes will enjoy three days of activities in the water, on the beaches and the surrounds of the Gold Coast, taking photographs, editing their own short videos and sharing their content with millions of fans and followers around the world.

Tourism Australia Managing Director John O’Sullivan, said the project would build further momentum and produce compelling content for its recently launched global campaign focusing on Australia’s world-class aquatic and coastal experiences.

O’Sullivan stated “(this will) create compelling content for our new aquatic and coastal campaign than by hosting 100 of the world’s top action sports athletes at one of Australia’s most iconic coastal destinations and for them to then share their adventures and experiences with their fans around the world.”

Between them, the athletes boast tens of millions of social media fans and followers. Their content will also be shared by GoPro and Tourism Australia through their own popular social media platforms.

Also travelling to Australia with the GoPro team will be international media from the United States, Europe and China.

Todd Ballard, Vice President, Global Sports Entertainment Marketing commented “our athlete summits are an enormous and exciting undertaking, created to celebrate the relationship between GoPro and our family of athletes.

“We always want to raise the bar from the prior event and find a venue that everyone will be excited about, and we can’t think of a better place for our first summit outside the US than the Gold Coast of Australia.”

Gold Coast Tourism Chief Executive Martin Winter added “we’ve actively partnered in this fantastic event because it reflects our city’s healthy, active lifestyle and we are really looking forward to turning it on for the participants.

“The Gold Coast has a strong and diverse offering of impressive locations for serious adventure seekers and this is a welcome opportunity to showcase our City globally.”

Queensland is the first location outside of the US to host the GoPro Athlete Summit.

Footage will also be shown at Tourism Australia’s flagship annual trade event, The Australian Tourism Exchange (ATE16), which is taking place on the Gold Coast the week following the Summit.

O’Sullivan said the opportunity for Australia to host the annual summit came about following a project Tourism Australia did with GoPro for New Year’s Eve, when a series of aquatic-themed short films - also filmed on GoPro cameras - were projected on to the pillars of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

The 2016 GoPro Athlete Summit will take place on the Gold Coast between 10th and 14th May 2016.

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