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During previous Le Mans weeks, Friday has tended
to be a busy day, particularly for James as for the preceding six years he had
been heavily involved in the arrangements for the Friday pit visit, however this
year it hadn't proved possible to make the arrangement he had been hoping for.
So the end result was what looked like a quiet day for us and we agreed that we
would all welcome a good rest before the race, so perhaps we wouldn't even go
into the circuit at all. Allon was quite keen to take in the normal Friday
pit walk and it was tentatively planned that he would go in with Tony.
After a typically leisurely start to the day we
went up to the bar for breakfast as usual and it was while we were there that
Paul Truswell (of Radio Le Mans - who has become a good friend over the
years) made contact with James and I. Unfortunately Paul wasn't
able to join us for dinner that evening (as had been our habit in previous
years), but he was keen to at least meet for a chat, so we decided to go into
the circuit after all to meet with him at the back of the paddock at 3 pm.
Of course, being the Friday before the race, the
Classic British Welcome was already under way just around the corner from our
bar, with all kinds of exotic vehicles pouring in, including a fabulous Bugatti
Veyron. We left the bar finally at 12.30 and headed back to the hotel for
some 'chill' time before jumping into James' car to head into the circuit for
the meeting with Paul.
We met Paul at the gates to the pitlane and had an
enjoyable conversation about qualifying, the race to come and what was going on
in between. Paul had to head off to do other media-type stuff and we all
thought that as we were there, we may as well take a walk up the pitlane.
We spent about 45 minutes there, pausing for Allon
and Tony to pose as the new recruits to the IMSA Matmut Porsche team and,
perhaps inevitably, bumping into Eric and Stéphane.
It was at this point
that I had a tap on my shoulder and I turned to see someone who I didn't
recognise. The man looked at me very closely and I began to wonder
what was going to happen next. Having satisfied himself that I was indeed
Aysedasi, he announced himself as Gerard, better known as Tenths member 'The
Badger' (aka the infamous Badger!). After a good chat with Ger and his friend, we
decided we had seen enough and set off for the pitlane exit and back to the car
to head back to the hotel.
On our return we found that Julie and Andy had
arrived and shortly afterwards we squeezed into two cars to go out for dinner -
inevitably at Del Arte, where Allon was very keen to experience our favourite
pizza, as were James and I, tucking into our third Pizza Marocco in just six
days! And the beauty of it was that they seemed to get better every time!
It was an excellent meal in every respect; good
food and great company sitting outside in the sunshine - sunshine that hadn't
let us down for the whole of the week, making up for some less than
sunshine-filled days in recent years. Being the night before the main
event we were quite keen to get back to our beds to stock up on a good dose of
sleep, for several of us, our last before Sunday night, in readiness for that
wonderful annual all-nighter that was now almost upon us.....
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