For 10 years, the Spanish summer was accompanied by one of the most legendary contests on television: the Summer Grand Prix. This summer the Grand Prix returns.
Although there were other times when there was not so much television offer, the Grand Prix del Verano marked incredible audience data at a time, the summer, in which television consumption is much lower. Seeing two Spanish municipalities facing histrionic and funny tests was the most on television at that time.
Despite the spectacular audience data, the high production costs led to the fact that in 2005, RTVE decided to end the program. Since then, from time to time, viewers clamor for his return, which has never come to fruition for the same reason that ended the program: money.
However, this Thursday the Board of Directors of the Public Corporation has given the go-ahead to the proposal presented by Europroducciones, the production company that already took over the contest in 1995. Now yes, the Summer Grand Prix returns to the small screen, returns to La 1 this summer, but this time without the historic heifer starring in so many of its tests.
As this newspaper has learned, the Board of Directors has approved seven Summer Grand Prix programs for a total cost of 3,800,000 euros plus VAT. That is, something more than 542,000 euros per program. An amount that is quite close to the cost of RTVE programs, despite the great infrastructure involved in carrying out the Grand Prix.
In fact, the high cost of producing the program is what has led to its return being delayed so many times and what caused Ibai Llanos and Ramón García’s plan to bring the program to Twitch to be postponed for a year.
To those who remember the program, the tests of the pool, bowling or the heifer will not sound strange to them. Yes, in the Summer Grand Prix one of its most mythical tests was in which several of the contestants had to avoid the animal in a small bullring set up in the studios where the program was carried out. In this edition, in principle, the heifer disappears.
Nor is it closed how the very important presence that the heifer had in the bulk of the program is going to be replaced. In the years that the Grand Prix was broadcast, the heifer was not only in one of the tests but was used for several such as the so-called Los arcos in which the contestants had to assemble a structure in the center of the square, while avoiding being attacked by the animal. Or La vaca Pichichi in which you had to score in the rival’s goal while the heifer was chasing them.
At the moment, neither the type of tests is closed, although there will be no shortage of Hot Potato, Explosive Heart, Crazy Trunks or Bowling. The type of municipality that will be able to participate is not closed either.
Although few details have been released. In its new installment, The Summer Grand Prix will continue to have two towns from different parts of Spain facing each other in each program.
The dynamics of the contest was very simple. in each program two Spanish municipalities that did not exceed 50,000 inhabitants faced each other. The people chose who was going to compete in each test and in the public another good part of the inhabitants attended, always accompanied by the mayor and his godparents, celebrities who helped the municipalities pass the tests.
Nor is it closed who will be the presenters. There have already been talks with Ramón García so that he can put himself back in charge of the contest as before, but nothing is closed yet. The only thing that is certain is that there will be a presenter and a presenter.
A few days ago in Herrera en Cope, Ramón García revealed some of the secrets of the Summer Grand Prix. According to what he said, the contest was born from the hand of Francesco Boserman “on a trip he made with his wife through Spain. Boserman saw the festivals of the towns and the heifers and it occurred to him to create a program that had all this and at the same time gave visibility to many towns in Spain.
Regarding the possibility of the return of the program, García revealed that with the current animal protection law, it would not be possible, since the figure of the heifer would be necessary. “There have been approaches, but until the total combination that has to be given is not produced, it is not easy. It is better not to say anything and not to excite many boys and girls who have grown up with the program,” he confessed
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