Aysedasi's Le Mans

We all had a great time at Le Mans in 1999, and as always as I say every year, it doesn’t take long for the memories of one year to fade and for thoughts to turn to the next.  Unbeknown to us, a lot was to happen as 1999 proceeded, not all of it good.  Nothing much was happening, for me on the work front.  In October, I completed 24 years working in the Magistrates’ Courts Service and after the disappointments of 1998 things had settled down again into the “usual routine”.  As it happens, aside from the fact that I hadn’t been promoted as I had expected, my working life was if anything, easier than before.  Instead of picking up my work and (as it always seemed) a substantial part of the work of my immediate superior, I had now been joined by a colleague, John Coombes, as a fellow Legal Team Manager.  Fortunately for me, John was enthusiastic and keen to get on with the job, and having him share the duties I had previously had to deal with on my own obviously lifted a weight from my shoulders.  Nevertheless, the events of 1998 had taken their toll and frankly, I was beginning to find some of my work rather boring.

At the end of October, we drove to Paris (with a little help from the Dover to Calais ferry), for a few days at EuroDisney.  It was the first time that Toby and James had been abroad, and as we went with some family friends, we had a very enjoyable, if extremely tiring time!  On the good news front, things had finally started to move on the sale of part of our garden.  With four of our immediate neighbours we had been endeavouring to obtain planning permission for three years to build at the bottom of our gardens.  The planning permission was initially refused, and after giving careful thought to whether or not we should appeal, eventually we all decided to sign an option with a local development company.  They succeeded in obtaining planning permission and within a matter of weeks, our bank balance was looking decidedly healthier!  This enabled us to dispose of Jayne’s delapidated (but much loved) VW Polo, and purchase her a nearly new Daewoo Matiz - what a super little car it is too!  We were also able to pay off our overdraft at the bank and my Barclaycard account.  This left us enough to plan for a new kitchen - “at last!” I can hear Jayne say!

As always, by the time of the new millenium I was counting down the days to the 2000 Le Mans. As usual, one of the first things I needed to establish was whether Ian Gordon would be making the trip this year.  After the usual failed messages, I finally made contact with him during February and he confirmed the trip was on.  We made a similar arrangement to last year to meet up and hand over the photographs from the 1999 trip.   Before we met Ian and I discussed the plans for this year’s trip.  He had already made the ferry booking for two cars and commented on how much the ferry prices had gone up since duty-free shopping had come to and end last summer.  Even at this stage we knew the likely Tourists for 2000 would be Ian, Martyn Prowel, Alan Matheson, Peter Dyment and myself.  Terry (Smart) the dentist, who made the trip in 1989 and 1995 would be joining us again, as apparently would Bruce Fownes, for whom you have to look back to 1989 for his last appearance.

Another returnee was Chris Green, who made his one and only trip as a Tourist in 1994.  Chris’ firm had now amalgamated with another, but he had left and was now working for Ian’s firm.  In fact, the break-up of Chris’ firm probably meant that Jim Taylor would not join us this year.  Jim, a Le Mans regular since 1994, had been one of Chris Green’s partners, and as the split had apparently been somewhat acrimonious, it was unlikely that Jim would be keen to come on the trip with Chris.  These eight would be travelling from Portsmouth.  As last year however, there were others.  Ian’s son, Robert, a member of the team in 1991 and 1999 would join us again.  Robert was currently living and working in Nice, and would meet up with us sometime/somewhere at the circuit.  The final team member would be Jeff Fanstone, a Tourist in both 1997 and 1999.  Jeff was now living permanently in Malaga in Spain and would also meet us at the circuit.  So we were expecting a 10-man team this year.

I arranged to have lunch with Ian Gordon on 22nd March.  Having met him at his office (where I handed over the 1999 photographs and he returned to me the 1998 ones), we made the short walk to a local restaurant where we were soon joined by Chris Green and Richard Smith, and a short while later, by Nick Jordan, another former Tourist, who was a member of the team in 1994 and 1996.  We went over the plans for the Le Mans week-end.  This year’s race would be held on 17th and 18th June.  Ian and I had previously discussed arrangements on the ‘phone, and, as you will recall from the previous chapter, I was keen to start the week-end in the same way as last year, i.e. by going over on the Thursday evening ferry.  If you recall, I was delighted to have the opportunity last year to visit the circuit on the Friday and to be able to visit the pits, in particular.  I wanted to do it again!  Fortunately for me, Ian was keen to do the same, and the ferry crossing had therefore been booked for Portsmouth to Le Havre on Thursday evening.  Initially, I had hoped that we would again make Vendôme the venue for our Friday night stop-over.  As you will have gathered by now, since our first visit in 1996, I had fallen in love with this picturesque little French town.  Ian agreed and I assumed that the necessary arrangements would be made.  I can’t remember whether Ian told me when we met in March, or some time later, that Vendôme would not be possible this year, as when he telephoned to make the booking, the Auberge de la Madeleine was unfortunately fully booked.  Inevitably, therefore, we would be looking for somewhere new to stop on Friday night.

It also became clear around about this time that, as in 1999, we would be cutting short our stay in France, in order to return to the UK immediately after the race.  So, for the second year running, we would not be spending Sunday night in France, but on a cross-channel ferry.  I was a little disappointed, as was Peter, as we both enjoyed the more leisurely wind-down after the race, and the opportunity to stretch out the week-end a bit more.  Last year Ian had needed to get home quickly after the race for his anniversary holiday, however this year I'm sure he said that it was Martyn who needed to get back home quickly.  Not long after our lunchtime meeting, Ian sent copies of the race week-end itinerary for both myself and Peter.  It showed that our Friday night venue would be Fontevraud L’Abbaye, a small town not far from Saumur.  We would be staying at the Hotel La Croix Blanche (the White Cross), which would hopefully prove to be another example of Ian’s prowess at sticking a pin in the Michelin Guide.  

From around March-time I was counting down the days to the Le Mans week-end in earnest, and the time seemed to go incredibly quickly.  Unlike previous years, I had no problems on the finance front this year, as I had taken the money for my francs from the proceeds of sale of our garden (in which one of the two new bungalows was by now already being built - and very quickly!).  The exchange rate was extremely healthy and in April I purchased my francs, getting approximately 10.40 francs to the pound.  Although the rate did fluctuate a little afterwards, by the time of the trip it had actually gone down to below this figure, so I was pleased to have made the purchase when I did.  I started to collect together all the things I would need for the trip, including some new clothes and the customary hold-all full of a variety of medicines, so that I would be ready for any eventuality.  In fact, as the Le Mans week-end approached, I needed quite a lot of medicaments, as I went down with some kind of stomach bug which laid me low for two or three days about a month before the trip.  It then disappeared, only to return at the start of the Le Mans week.  For several days I had what seemed to be raging and quite painful indigestion, and no amount of tablets or liquids had any effect.  At one stage, I began to wonder if I had a grumbling appendix or something similar, such was the discomfort I was suffering.

As in previous years I had taken as leave the Thursday and Friday of the Le Mans week, together with the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of the following week (to recover!).  A little later, I booked the pre-Le Mans Wednesday as well.  Having worked on the Monday and Tuesday (and having attended a late meeting on the Tuesday evening), I was not feeling particularly bright when my leave started on Wednesday, 14th June.  In fact, I felt so ropey that I was quite worried about how I was going to cope if I felt the same during the week-end.  Notwithstanding this, I pressed on with my preparations on the Wednesday, and soon had most of my gear sorted and part-packed.  Following my customary routine, I had purchased all of my films from the company in the Channel Islands which I have now used for the last three or four years, but this year, there was a change to the way I did it - a change which leads neatly into a whole new ball-game as far as my Le Mans exploits are concerned.  This year, I bought my films online!

Having some funds left from the sale of the garden, and having talked for some months about going on the internet, we finally took the plunge during April.  I went out and bought a modem and, hey presto, a whole new world of information became available!  I had absolutely no idea there was so much material available on the internet about Le Mans - if I had known, I would have wanted to get connected a long time ago.  I simply entered the words “Le Mans” into one of the search engines, and was amazed at the vast number of sites the search produced.  As you might imagine, since then I have burned an enormous amount of midnight oil going through them all, on a regular basis.  In many ways my final decision to go onto the internet was prompted by Peter Dyment.  Having not seen Peter for many months after last year’s Le Mans trip, Jayne and I were invited over by Peter and Hilda for a meal.  I then found out that Hilda had bought Peter an “internet-ready” computer and, after our meal we spent several hours “surfing” the various Le Mans and motor racing web-sites.  This led on to further surfing the following week, when I took the plunge and ordered our Le Mans tickets on-line from the ACO’s official web-site.

Since my first forays, I have found some superb Le Mans web-sites, in particular those of Club Arnage, Maison Blanche and the ACO’s official site.  I spent hours on the Club Arnage site, as this has a “Forum” into which you can add comments and questions, and can answer or comment on the questions or points raised by others.  It was fantastic fun, particularly when the subject of the football match between England and Germany came up.  This was due to be played on the Saturday evening of Le Mans, and a number of “correspondents” wanted to know whether (as in 1996), the ACO would be fixing up a Diamond-Vision screen for the football.  But I couldn’t understand why anyone would want to watch football while the Le Mans 24 Hours was going on!  As you can imagine, my comments aroused some interesting reactions...

I was also able to access the Radio Le Mans web-site, and, after downloading a Realplayer, I was able to listen to the entire commentary from the 1999 Le Mans, and gear myself up to listen to some of the qualifying direct from the circuit on the Wednesday evening of the race week.  Of course, being able to access so much information meant that my usual scouring of the pages of Autosport for snippets of information about the race became almost superfluous, as all of the information I needed to prepare myself for the big event was literally at my fingertips.  Not only that, but I was able to download entry lists and, more importantly, the hundreds of photographs of cars at Le Mans (not only at the test day but also from past Le Mans), to my hard disk for storage.  I had purchased a CD-writer for my PC just after Christmas last year, so I was able to use this to record the photographs I downloaded from the web-sites onto a CD-Rom (which would store literally thousands of images).

I made the final changes to my PC shortly before this year’s race by removing my old (and very small) hard disk and replacing it with a brand new 20 gigabyte hard disk, so any concerns I may have had about the limitations of my disk space for storing photographs, music and so on, were a thing of the past.  Having the internet available also brought other benefits, in that I was able to send messages to Peter and others by way of e-mail.  I was also able to chase up the delivery of my tickets from the ACO, and these duly arrived, even earlier than last year, although I had placed my order later than I did by mail in 1999.