Lotto, the Belgian national lottery, has committed to sponsoring the cycling team – currently OmegaPharma-Lotto – for a further four years, according to Het Laatste Nieuws. The lottery is advertised using images of the team, especially Philippe Gilbert, and has the slogan “No balls, no glory”.
"The lottery will meet its responsibility to keep Belgium at the top in an increasingly globalised world of cycling," says a Lotto statement. "With 47 Belgian employees out of 59, including 17 Belgian riders out of 27, Lotto, with pharmaceutical giant Omega Pharma and all other sponsors in 2010, supports the largest and most successful Belgian professional cycling project."
OmegaPharma has sponsored the team since 2005, when it was named Davitamon after Omega’s vitamin brand, and has committed to stay with the team through 2011. The lottery though, has supported the team since 1984; the team began simply as “Lotto” in its early years it has gone through any number of co-sponsors in that time.
Until 2004, when the team was called Lotto-Domo, the lottery was the largest sponsor of the team; when OmegaPharma joined in 2005 its stake was bigger and so took the principle naming spot.
Since the partnership between OmegaPharma and Lotto started in 2005, the team has taken a total of 206 victories, including 18 this year. Wins like Philippe Gilbert’s Amstel Gold and second successive Giro di Lombardia, as well as Jurgen Van Den Broeck’s fifth place at the Tour de France has helped to lift the team to seventh in the International Cycling Union (UCI) rankings.
Lotto also sponsors a women’s UCI team, which was known as Lotto Ladies in 2010, this year’s team included Ronde van Vlaanderen winner Grace Verbeke and Commonwealth champion Rochelle Gilmore.