the Government of South Australia as a replacement for the previous Australian Grand Prix that had relocated to Melbourne a few years earlier. The first Tour Down Under was originally a UCI 2.4 class race, and featured teams from Australia and around the world, including GC-Casino, BigMat-Auber93, Crédit Agricole, Lampre–Daikin, Palmans–Ideal, Deutsche Bank Telekom, Team home-Jack&Jones, Saeco, the Australian Institute of Sport, Mapei, plus teams assembled under the banner of 'Team Australia' and 'World Team'. The race was won by Stuart O'Grady. In 2005, the Tour Down Under was promoted by the Union Cycliste Internationale to the highest ranking outside Europe. In 2007, South Australian Premier Mike Rann and tourism minister Jane Lomax Smith launched a campaign for the Tour Down Under to become the first race outside of Europe to secure ProTour status from the UCI, thereby guaranteeing the attendance of all the world's top teams. That campaign successfully led to the Tour Down Under being awarded ProTour status the following year, and joining the UCI World Ranking calendar in 2009. In September 2008, Rann said Lance Armstrong would make his comeback at the 2009 race. Armstrong's participation saw visitor numbers doubled, the economic impact more than doubled (from $17.3 million in 2008 to $39 million in 2009) and media coverage increased five-fold. The 2010 Tour Down Under was named Australia's Best Major Event for the second year in a row in the Qantas Tourism Awards. Armstrong participated in three successive Tour Down Under events, retiring after 2011. The 2011 Tour Down Under had an economic impact of $43 million and crowds of more than 782,000. In 2013, it attracted more than 760,400 people to Adelaide and regional South Australia across eight days, including 40,000 interstate and international visitors who travelled there for the event. Since then the race has continued to build, with milestones including becoming the first non-European event to achieve UCI ProTour status, status as Australia's Best Sporting Event in 2016 and a bronze medal at the Australian Tourism Awards. The Tour Down Under is currently the highest-ranked professional road cycling race in the southern hemisphere by start list quality. From its inception, Michael Turtur was its internationally recognized Race Director. Turtur officially handed over the reins of Race Director to Stuart O'Grady at the end of 2020 race. In November 2020, organisers confirmed the 2021 edition of the race would be cancelled, owing to logistical