Sponsorships
Mazda is a major sponsor to several professional sports teams, including:
- Hometown teams:
- Sanfrecce Hiroshima (J. League): Originally known as Toyo Kogyo Soccer Club and founded in 1938, it was owned directly by Mazda until 1992 when Mazda reduced its share to professionalize the club for the new J. League.
- Hiroshima Toyo Carp (Nippon Professional Baseball): The "Toyo" part of the team's name is in honor of Mazda's part-ownership of the team since 1968 (when Mazda was still known as Toyo Kogyo). The Matsuda family, descended from the founder of Mazda, holds the majority share in team ownership.
- Teams abroad:
- North Melbourne Football Club (Australian Football League)
- ACF Fiorentina (Italian football league – Serie A)
The company also sponsors various marathon and relay race events in Japan, such as the Hiroshima International Peace Marathon and the Hiroshima Prefectural Ekiden Race, along with numerous other sporting and charity endeavors in Hiroshima and Hofu. Mazda was also the league sponsor for the now-defunct Australian Rugby Championship.
Mazda also maintains sponsorship of the Laguna Seca racing course in California, going so far as to use it for its own automotive testing purposes as well as the numerous racing events (including several Mazda-specific series) that it hosts - as well as for the 2003 launch of the Mazda RX-8.
Mazda also sponsors the Western New York Flash, a professional women's soccer team that plays in the WPA and has some of the best players in the world, including world player of the year.
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