COX RADIO NAMED NEW THUNDER RADIO PARTNER

2008-01-15T06:48:29

The Kentucky Derby Festival is pleased to announce that Cox Radio Louisville is the new Official Radio Partner for the Derby Festival's Opening Ceremonies - Thunder Over Louisville, which will be held this year on April 12. Cox Radio, which includes four stations in the Louisville market - WRKA, WSFR, WVEZ and WPTI - signed a two-year agreement to broadcast the Thunder Over Louisville Air Show and fireworks musical choreography.

"Thunder Over Louisville is the most listened-to day in Louisville radio," said Todd Schumacher, Vice President/Market Manager for Cox Radio Louisville. "We are ecstatic to bring this day to WRKA, and we plan to bring unprecedented Thunder coverage. We're still in the planning stages, but I'm sure we'll bring in extra part-time staff and will have all four stations involved. We've been working on this for a couple of months and we're very excited about the opportunity."

Said Kentucky Derby Festival President and CEO Mike Berry: "Cox Radio has been a longtime media partner of the Derby Festival and we're very pleased to have them on board as the Official Radio Partner of Thunder Over Louisville for the next two years.  We're confident that they will do an outstanding job."
Thunder Over Louisville 2008 will kick off with the Air Show beginning at 3 p.m. on Saturday, April 12. (This year's Thunder will be held one week earlier than usual due to the beginning of Passover on April 19.) Once again, the six-hour Air Show will feature an exciting array of military and civilian aircraft, as well as parachute and demonstration teams. The grand finale - the nation's largest annual fireworks show - will begin at 9:30 p.m.

Thunder Over Louisville - the Derby Festival's Opening Ceremonies - is one of the more than seventy events produced by the Derby Festival in the spring. The Derby Festival is an independent community organization supported by 4,000 volunteers, 400 businesses and civic groups, Pegasus Pin sponsorships and event participation. It entertains more than 1.5 million people in a two-week period and has a local economic impact of more than $93 million. Thunder alone contributes $31 million of that estimate to both sides of the Ohio River.  This involvement has made the Festival the largest single-attended event in Kentucky and one of the leading community celebrations in the world.