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Despite the lack of updates for more than 2 years, I am still alive! Today June 1st 2013, I celebrate my tenth anniversary of Diabo. Ten years of event and team communications, yachting journalism and photography. It has been an amazing, intense and educational period.

I traveled around the world and worked with so many interesting and wonderful people. My dreams came true, such as reporting on two Olympic Games and working for Team Delta Lloyd in the Volvo Ocean Race 2008-09. Subsequently I started my own sailing news website SailReport.nl with a main focus on yacht and dinghy racing.

But everything started with the 2003 Round Texel Race. That was my first assignment and many more followed, such as the North Sea Regatta, 24 Hours Yachting Race, Hobie Cat Worlds and Europeans, IODA Europeans 2006 (Optimist), 2010 470 Worlds, Delta Lloyd Regatta, Aruba Catamaran Regatta and Nacra Int. Championships2010 and 2011.

The other important part of my PR business has always been team communications. That commenced with the Olympic Tornado duo Sven Karsenbarg and Mischa Heemskerk, later Booth/Dercksen and finally Booth/Nieuwenhuis. I also worked for Lucas Schröder in the 2007 Transat 6,5, Extreme 40 Team Holmatro, Team Red in the 2008 Commodores’ Cup and Delft Challenge in the Tour de France à la Voile. In addition, F18 Team Boskalis is still one of my long-term clients.

The third pillar of Diabo is of course journalism. I wrote for reputable magazines as Zeilen, Nautique and Varen (Belgium).

A personal highlight is my first book (cat sailing), which was published in 2006.

Currently

I am proud to being selected as the Dutch Media Manager of the Volvo Ocean Race 2014-15. I actually started this job in the final stage of the last edition, which resulted in a contract until July 2015. A major event on this year’s calendar is the inaugural Nacra 17 Worlds 2013. Me and my colleague Marjolein Brandt will take care of the international press.

Coming up

The biggest change in all those years is the fact that I gave birth to my wonderful twins Dylan and Naomi on February 6 2012. It is the most beautiful thing that happened to me. Combining motherhood with my type of business is a challenge and I am enjoying the journey into new possibilities. One of them is joining forces with Marjolein, more about this is to be announced soon. Besides this novelty, I will also launch a new Diabo website with my personal blog.

For now, I would like to thank all my current and former clients and everybody who I have worked with around the world. It has been a great time!

Cheers,

Diana Bogaards

June 1st 2013