Five Go Mad In France

This year's Lotus expedition to Le Mans started at 5.30 am on the Wednesday before the race when the three of us, me, James King (SCC) and Grant Laurenson set out in James' Elise and Grant's W reg Eclat to catch the 8 o'clock catamaran from Folkestone to Boulogne. Even before this, we had had some drama, as the Eclat's MoT on Saturday had revealed the need for a new differential bearing, duly sorted at short notice by Miles Wilkin at Fibreglass Services in Yapton on Monday.

After stocking up with duty free and an uneventful crossing I began to test my navigational skills in France: unfortunately (depending on your point of view) their road building programme is considerably more active than ours and my selection of maps proved rather less than adequate, with even the 1996 version not showing the autoroute down to Rouen. Nevertheless by a combination of skill and luck we found a quick route, avoided any péage and stopped for lunch at a roadside bar just south of Rouen. Here we found the proprietor to be another motorsport fan, with pictures of a Renault 5 racer all over the walls. It turned out, as far as we could make out (none of us is fluent in French) that he didn't actually drive it, just owned it and paid someone else to have the fun; good work if you can get it! Here we also encountered our first setback, as I was informed that the cash I had saved from last year's trip was no longer legal tender. Fortunately we just had enough of the real thing between us to cover the bill, so we parted on friendly terms.

It's a long haul from Boulogne to Le Mans and we were not sorry to arrive at our camp site, "Karting Nord" at around 4pm, particularly as the Eclat was beginning to overheat.

The site was a bit of a disappointment, just a field with three portaloos in the corner, and after five days we still hadn't found the water tap! Nevertheless, in true Brit fashion we established our perimeter and set up the tents before heading off to find a petrol station and a bank. We didn't find a bank with a cash machine but the local garage in Ruaudin took great interest in both cars until they were eclipsed by a Blower Bentley, even if he did drop oil all over their forecourt. Some arm waving and schoolboy French resulted, not in violence, but in the gift of a replacement radiator cap for the Eclat which went a long way to solving its overheating problem.

We returned just in time for a bite to eat and the first session of qualifying. A phone call home from the trackside during the session left my wife Allison wishing she hadn't stayed at home this year, with wistful comments like "was that a Toyota?" and "that was a Panoz!". Predictably, after touring a selection of spectating points and checking out our seats in the grandstand overlooking the Dunlop chicane, we found ourselves in the Café Tertre Rouge, imbibing bières grandes just feet away from the cars hurtling round the famous corner and onto the old Mulsanne straight. Here we met up with some friends of James' who had come down in a pair of Sunbeam Tigers; they have been going to Le Mans for years and had many suggestions for different ways of passing the next few days.

As the first qualifying session (7-9 pm) had been delayed by one of the Nissans going off at Tertre Rouge (before we arrived) it was extended, running up to the scheduled night qualifying session (10-12pm), giving us a continuous spectacle, and the teams a chance to practice in dusk conditions, not usually available prior to the race. We stayed to the bitter end, had another couple for the road and retired to our camp site (just a half hour stroll), where it seemed appropriate to hand round the Southern Comfort. This was Grant's big mistake, as he spent the whole of Thursday in his tent, wishing he hadn't come; James and I, I fear, were callously unsympathetic and videoed his distress before heading into Le Mans to find a bank and stock up on supplies.

It was lovely day when we set out, but extra stress was created by James' decision not only to take the roof off the Elise, but also to leave it in his tent! As we negotiated the traffic under an increasingly grey sky, James was becoming more and more anxious, despite burning off the occasional motorcycle at the traffic lights ("cars are too boring these days"). By the time we located a suitable bank in the town centre, it looked like the car was due for its first dunking. It was at this point that another lesson was learnt: don't bother changing money at a bank, use a bureau de change. I wanted to draw francs from the cash machine using my debit card; it worked but took several minutes to process. James, however, wanted to change some Sterling and a few US dollars he had in his wallet from a business trip. While he waited in the car and communed with the weather gods, I found out that there was only one cashier on duty, everything else was automated, there was a queue, itself a rarity in France, and that each transaction had to be printed in duplicate on a laser printer. As changing each currency involved two transactions, buying and selling, I ended up signing no less than eight separate pieces of paper and left half an hour later, not certain whether I had actually opened an account! To cap it all, the rate was lousy and the commission extortionate; fortunately for James' blood pressure, the weather had got no worse. The Elise and its roof were soon reunited, Grant was confirmed as alive but not coming out to play, and it was time to join the Tigers for a beer or three and the final qualifying sessions.

John Connelly has a very pretty primrose yellow Mark 1 Tiger, with the standard 260 cu. in. engine, whilst Neil Wingate's is blue, with a rather non-standard engine bored out to 301 cu. in. with manifolds and carbs imported from the States. It also sports a very natty louvred bonnet. I fancied owning a Tiger in the days when I ran a Triumph Herald. I decided there and then that I still fancied a Tiger, but now might be in a position to do something about it! However, I digress. Their camp site, "Camping du Houx" seemed to be much more civilised than our field, with marked spaces and proper facilities. Amongst the exotic vehicles all around, Jaguars, Aston Martins of all ages, one car stood out:, a battered Skoda, modified to mimic a Le Mans prototype, complete with wings, spoilers, mirrors on stalks and Union Jack paint job, signwritten with "Bag of Shite Racing Team" and "Clacton - Le Mans or Bust". Sadly a detached cylinder head and straw hat with the sign "Head Gasket Replacement Fund" told their own story.

During qualifying, ordinary members of the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) and their guests are allowed into their trackside enclosure and onto the roof of the timekeepers building at the end of the pit lane. This was a spectacular spot to watch the final session of night qualifying, particularly after an excellent dinner in the ACO restaurant. By arriving just before the end of the evening session we managed to miss the hordes who arrived between sessions. Membership of the ACO is a pretty good deal, offering discounts on track, grandstand and camping tickets, as well as roadside assistance, entry to their facilities and free posters, programme and entry and results lists.

After a quiet night, Friday offered a break from track action, although the pit lane was open during the day for anyone who wished to wander around and watch the final preparations being made to the cars and perhaps spot a celebrity or two. In the evening, in the town centre, the drivers ride around in an enormous parade of historic cars, the parade de pilotes. As I had done both in the past couple of years we chose to join the Tigers for lunch at the Café Hunaudieres, a short walk from the camp site when the track is not live, but a bloody long way during the race, as we were to find out later. Before this, however, we had to indulge ourselves by joining the traditional blat round the public road sections of the circuits. It's usually too crowded to do anything too dramatic and the gendarmes are never far away, but what the hell, tradition is tradition; we got one good run through Indianapolis, which made it all worth while.

Friday lunchtime at Café Hunaudieres is a lively affair: in past years owners of exotic and historic cars have been allowed to park and pose all along the famous straight; this year the gendarmerie were moving them on within minutes - very sad. Nevertheless, everyone at the roadside was having a good time; whenever the gendarme stopped the traffic to let someone across the road, out rushed a guy carrying a life-sized cardboard British Bobby to help him. Musical accompaniment was provided by a trumpeter, who was getting at least 80% of the notes he wanted, and an impromptu chorus, who regrettably were rarely performing the same song as the trumpet. This was one of the few times we weren't wearing headphones and listening to Radio Le Mans, which was a shame, as apparently one of their roving reporters had found the Tigers in the car park and was drooling on air. All evening people were asking John and Neil if they had heard it; c'est la vie. Next we returned to the camp site to chill out and prepare for the evening. Grant and I took the opportunity for forty winks, while James lay down in front of his car and told her repeatedly how much he loved her. Oh dear!

We then took a cab to the Restaurant de la Poste in Arnage, a favourite haunt of the Tigers, where la patronne greeted them like long lost relatives. Another fine convivial meal, accompanied by serenading from another happy band of Brits, much to the amusement of the local diners. Further entertainment was provided when, most with knotted napkins on their heads, they all piled into a Herald convertible and drove off. After another session of pass the Southern Comfort that night resulted in James' discovery that falling asleep in your chair doesn't work so well on a tripod stool. Fortunately he landed undamaged, almost inside his tent, where he remained.

Race day dawned bright and sunny, with a leisurely start, listening to the practice session, both on the track about 100 yards away. and on the radio, where we were amazed to hear that one of the Mercedes was on its roof at the end of the Mulsanne straight, a harbinger of things to come. As we were running out of bottled water and money again, Grant and I opted to drive into Arnage. Another mistake; half the roads were already closed off and those that weren't were packed and virtually gridlocked. A quick half hour excursion ended up taking the best part of three hours. It was a good test of the Eclat's cooling system, however, although the first signs of a starter motor failure were apparent. When we got back James had discovered a nick on one of his new alloy discs, so out came Grant's trolley jack, and off came the wheel while the offending foreign body was removed. We may have been minimalist on camping equipment, but we didn't stint on car maintenance. By then it was definitely time for lunch and we headed for the circuit, indulging in a helping of tartiflette, a concoction of onion, potato, ham, egg and cheese, rather like a soggy Spanish omelette: It was delicious but Grant thought it looked like something that had already passed through a cat and opted for a crepe instead.

Finally, after all the build up, at 3.50pm we were settled in our grandstand, watching the cars set out on the formation lap. On the first racing lap, a BMW and a Panoz tried to be in the same place at the same time, with the Panoz launching itself across the gravel trap and the BMW spinning, receiving polite applause from the crowd once he had it pointing in the right direction again; a Le Mans prototype just cannot do a three-point turn! It is really surprising how fast the time passes in GT racing; with a big TV screen opposite and English commentary from radio Le Mans, as well as near continuous action on the track in front of us, it was three hours before we decided to move on to a new viewpoint. This year was one of the closest races of recent times, with the leaders frequently within a lap of one another and challenges developing over the whole 24 hours. (The story of the race has been covered in numerous other publications, which I will not attempt to paraphrase here)

We followed the circuit, past the funfair, the Esses (another good vantage point) and Tertre Rouge before striking out through the woods to Hunaudieres. We stuck to the road although there must be a short cut through the forest for those bold enough to try it. Nearly an hour later we arrived, somewhat flustered and in dire need of a beer. Thirst quenched, I spent a thrilling quarter of an hour halfway up a tree overlooking the straight as cars thundered past at speeds purported to be in excess of 200mph before braking for the first chicane. Awesome. I had only just returned to the restaurant when we heard of Peter Dumbreck's horrific crash at the far end of the Mulsanne. With the safety cars out, the atmosphere in the Chinese Restaurant was strangely muted, but once the reports of Dumbreck's survival came through things lightened up again and we were enjoying the bizarre combination of Chinese food and high powered racing cars. The food may not have been memorable but the location most certainly was.

Now our plans really began to go awry. We had ordered taxis to take us from Hunaudieres to Mulsanne corner, with the intention of watching there for an hour or so before moving on to Indianapolis, now the fastest part of the circuit, and finally back to the grandstands. Hunaudieres was jammed solid while a gendarmerie van tried to force his way against a queue of traffic leaving the restaurant and some idiot had blocked another exit road with a coach. No sign of our taxis, and increasingly irate telephone calls to the taxi firm getting the response "bloquée, monsieur", even when the jam had cleared and no other cars were even in sight. Eventually we gave up and hijacked the first taxi we saw, who took us back to Tertre Rouge in two loads. Next year I will stay sober and drive to Mulsanne and Indianapolis, honest! James and the Tigers stayed at the Café Tertre Rouge, Grant went to bed, but I returned to the grandstand, eventually leaving just after 3 am, just before Thierry Boutsen tried to park his Toyota in it.

One of the highlights of the 24 Hours is getting up on Sunday morning to find out who is still in the race. Walking along the stands opposite the pits says it all, pit door closed, car withdrawn. Grant and I spent the morning wandering between the Ford chicane and the Esses while James met up with some other friends and replaced his tripod stool, which had been stolen the night before. This was our first experience of crime in four years of Le Mans. The last couple of hours of the race were gripping, after J.J. Lehto went off and the all-Japanese Toyota set about catching the other BMW. The behaviour of Thomas Bscher in the black BMW, baulking the Toyota down the Mulsanne, brought howls of indignation from the grandstand as we watched it on the big screen. After Katayama's puncture, the last few laps were virtually a formality, although all the cars were enthusiastically applauded on the last lap, especially the two Panoz who finished in formation.

You might think it's all over, but it isn't! We had planned a quick return to the camp site, not waiting for the prize-giving, so as to be on the road before the worst of the crowds. We had not allowed for Grant's sudden desire to check his differential oil, so by the time we did get away we were in the thick of it. Even having people standing waving at you by the roadside loses its appeal when you are pootling along in stop-start traffic for ten miles, but we eventually reached the autoroute, heading for our overnight stop at Reims. Not content with Le Mans, we were planning to return via the old circuits at Reims, Nürburgring and Spa-Francorchamps, driving as much of them as we could.

What with our late departure from Le Mans, a monstrous bouchon outside Paris and an ominous rumbling from the Eclat's rear end, we didn't arrive at our hotel until 10pm. Not a problem, we thought as this was exactly the time we had told them when we booked, when we had also checked that they had a restaurant. They had omitted to tell us, however that although they had restaurant, it had closed at 9pm. After another hour fruitlessly wandering around the depressing industrial suburb of Tinqueux, we eventually piled into the doughty Eclat in search of sustenance, finally finding a Tex-Mex pizza bar in downtown Reims, where we had a really good meal before returning to the hotel to crash out.

After the unbelievable luxury of a bath, sit-down toilet and breakfast we drove out to the old circuit of Reims, on a misty ethereal morning. It is a most amazing place, with the control tower, pits and stands seemingly untouched since the last race in 1970 Creepers are growing over the old concrete buildings and the painted signs, still clearly visible although not for much longer, as the paint is flaking and fading rapidly. Grant commented that he could really feel the ghosts as he scrambled over the old control tower. The atmosphere was further enhanced, rather than ruined, by a maniac on a motorcycle popping a 100 yard wheelie down the track. We then drove round both the old circuits, one of which actually passes through the small town of Gueux and must have been incredibly tight. It is set in beautiful rolling countryside and really evocative of the earlier eras of racing, before Armco, chicanes, debris netting and safety.

Snapping back to the present, we headed out of France, crossing into Belgium at a completely deserted customs point on the autoroute, and stopping at Bastogne for lunch. Anyone who has seen "Battle of the Bulge" will know this is the town virtually destroyed by German tanks after the American commander's famous refusal to surrender. Appropriately we ate in the Café "Nuts" opposite a Sherman tank, complete with 88mm hole in its side. After a spectacular piece of international navigation, we arrived at the Nurburgring circuit shortly before 5pm, just in time to buy our tickets for a lap of the infamous Nordschleife. Yes, that's all you do; hand over DM20, put the ticket in the entrance gate and off you go, no insurance checks, no scrutineering. no helmets, no marshals, cars and bikes together, just off you go.

Grant set off like the proverbial bat out of hell in the Eclat and was soon lost to view, although I was trying to keep a lookout for pieces of yellow fibreglass as we went round. James and I, in the Elise, soon realised why the Nordschleife had got its reputation. Some of the complexes seem unending, just as you think its time to accelerate out, they stick another one in. We came out of one sequence, over a crest, to see nothing but kerb in front of us; fortunately James guessed correctly, we got round and stayed on the track, noticing that Grant was much closer than he had been. It turned out that he had seen a gap in the kerb and taken to the grass rather than try to get round. It was shortly after this point that James remarked "****" my old boots, Dave, get me out of here, I'm getting too old for this". I replied with one of the many grunts recorded on the videotape of our lap. About half way round, after being bombarded with bikers who had clearly been round before, when we thought things couldn't get much worse, what should we encounter but a tour bus, trundling round at about 40mph.

No problem as it was on one of the rare straights, but I wouldn't have liked to have found it in one of the complexes!

As we began to settle to the rhythm, the circuit had yet another surprise for us, two of the hairpins, at least 210° are reduced to about half width by steeply banked sections on the inside, rather like large gutters; great for bikes maybe, but not at all attractive to those of us on four wheels. Suddenly, after a seeming eternity, we were on the start-finish straight again, back in the car park and discussing a second lap. We decided to forgo the pleasure on this occasion, as we wanted to get to Spa that evening, Grant said that his wheel bearing was now really sick, and the Eclat's brakes would probably need another hour to cool down, judging from the smell.

On the face of it, Nürburg to Spa is a short run, just a couple of hours easy drive. True if you have a decent map, but the only one we had was very small scale and ten years old. I learnt the hard way that when in Germany, road signs will indicate the tiniest German town in a particular direction but ignore the largest Belgian or French towns. The same is true vice versa. Consequently I am afraid that I disgraced myself navigationally, ending up twenty miles north of where I wanted to be, steering by the sun having abandoned the map. Shortly before arriving at Spa we had to go through the worst road works we have ever encountered, being directed down a rocky slope onto a roadbed that can only be described as a 200 yard pile of rubble. By some miracle Grant's exhaust remained attached to the Eclat and we reached the circuit at Spa around 8pm.

As we approached another set of road works, with Armco either side, the road ahead dropped away dramatically as we were diverted round the side of the hill. To our astonishment we found that we had been looking at Eau Rouge, having had no idea from TV coverage just how steep a climb it is. A lovely hotel just up the hill from the Start-Finish line beckoned and we checked in for the night.

The Hotel de Bruyeres is a magnificent old building and must be a gold mine on race days, even having its own camp site attached. Having settled in and found the bar, we enquired about dinner. "Alas, the restaurant is closed, it is the day off of the chef!" The sight of three stricken faces touched the heart of le patron, who disappeared into the kitchen, returning with a list of the contents of the freezer and a menu, having volunteered his daughter to do the cooking. We all thought steak sounded acceptable, only to find that there were only two available. Being true democrats, we drew straws and Grant lost even though he was holding them. His consolation was a double helping of beefburgers, lucky fellow!

After breakfast, it was onto the circuit, where both the old road circuit and the modern GP circuit are all on public roads, according to our map, although part of the GP circuit was coned off apparently in connection with the resurfacing works. From the start-finish line the track slopes down into Eau Rouge where it rises sharply upwards and right before going back left on the crest. Pretty impressive in the Elise with a speed limit and construction vehicles all over the line, let alone at grand prix speeds. Where the modern circuit goes off to the right at Les Combes the old circuit continues uphill before dropping down into the valley at Haut de la Cote, leading eventually, via the long Burnenville curve to the Masta straight, named after the village it passes through, before turning back at Stavelot to climb through a series of lovely sweeping curves to rejoin the Grand Prix circuit. Even more so than at Reims, Spa demonstrates the changes that have taken place in motorsport since the fifties and sixties.