Le Mans 2006
The Tourists' Story
The Night (Part 1)
I think I'd be entitled to accuse you of not listening too well if you've read any of my other stories here (or have heard me prattling on at the Tenth Tenths sportscar forum) and still don't realise that my favourite time of all during a Le Mans weekend is the night. Absolutely, completely, definitively. And I still firmly believe it's one of the things that you have to experience if you want to be able to say you're a real Le Mans aficionado. There really is more to Le Mans than getting legless on Friday night and then spending the whole of the race trying to recover from a hangover - or just topping it up..... No, to begin to realise just how spectacular a race this is, you have to stick with it - all night!
There's a degree of irony to this of course - I miss the time when the evening transforms into night while we're eating at Le Cheval Blanc but as soon as the meal is finished and I can persuade Ian or Robert to drive me back to the circuit, its a case of looking forward to something like 6-7 hours of solo contemplation, just looking for shots I've either not taken or just never got right before. There's also a little guilt, as I fully appreciate I'm dragging someone away when they might prefer to stay in the restaurant or a local bar, but there always seem to be at least a couple of Tourists who are happy to come back and sample an hour or two of Le Mans at night.
By 2006 I had been trying for 20 years to get a decent set of pictures during the night at Le Mans. Of course, this has become ever harder as the ACO have put up more and more seriously obtrusive debris fencing. The availability of a seat in T34 makes a lot of difference, but without a media pass and several thousands of £'s worth of kit, I guess I'll have to continue to content myself with what limited facilities and (definitely) limited skill brings me! As it happens, I was much happier with the pictures I took at this Le Mans than I had been for a number of years. So, let's move on to the first of two pages of the fruits of my long night's labour.....
We start with some pictures taken on the start-finish straight just after we arrived back at the circuit. I love the backdrop the lights from the pits provide, but for the amateur photographer, whilst you can generally 'pan out' some of the worst effects of the thin links of the debris fencing, the thicker and more obtrusive stanchions are a different thing entirely. So are the occasional heads that get in the way! Some of the shots which follow I have 'adjusted', so you may see two versions of the same picture or shots on which I have bestowed the 'arty' treatment!
This year, for the first time, I splashed out on a second grandstand seat as a last-minute extravagance. I had bought a ticket for the small stand down at Tertre Rouge - well, it was actually looking out over the latter part of the Esses rather than Tertre Rouge. I was keen to get down and sample the view for the first time so I said farewell to Ian, Robert and Martyn (having made a mental note to offer prayers for getting back after a journey back to the circuit driven at such speed by Robert that I had to hold my specs on in the back of the open-top BMW......).
After sampling the delights of what proved to be quite a chilly vantage-point in the Tertre Rouge stand, I decided to start the long walk back again to my other grandstand..... I paused at the inside of the Dunlop Chicane and thought I'd try and take some shots from where the cars appear from nowhere as they arrive from the start/finish straight. It's difficult to shoot there as it's a guessing game anyway - you don't really know what's coming nor do you have much idea of exposure or shutter speed, you just know there's something coming from the approaching engine sound. A few years ago when I was shooting roll film I wouldn't have bothered to even try, but with digital, who cares if you waste a few dozen shots? As it happened, I got one or two I was very pleased with - even if they were more by accident than design!
After a good spell at the Dunlop Chicane, I made my slightly weary way back to my seat in the pits grandstand. Actually, I didn't go back to my seat at all. By now - I suppose it was getting on for 3 am - the stand was virtually empty. There were probably no more than a dozen people in the whole stand, and apart from a couple grabbing some shuteye, most were doing the same as me - trying to get some good night shots. (On to the next page).
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