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We've made it to the right year (2002) and the event is well prepared and well subscribed. We had three full cars loads spread between the Audi A4 and two people carriers allowing us to take 11 people and plenty of supplies including a pink bucket! (Well a big blue bucket). This was to out do any previous outing partly boosted by being Graham's 40th Birthday Bash.
We all meet up at team headquarters in Liss before making the short trip to the port and the overnight crossing to Caen. The evening started rather bizarrely with Graham being marked down as a Dodge Viper then being asked if he was transporting any guns or explosives. A rather incredulous response of "no" was backed up by the fact that the fireworks we actually loaded in Roddy's car. Thursday morning involved a leisurely drive down to le Mans. It should have included breakfast but Graham in the lead Audi managed to fail to see any of the various supermarche we drove past. On arrival at le Mans we decided to travel into town to get some very belated breakfast as well as refuel the diesel cars with cheap French diesel. This made James happy as he was panicing that he was about to run out of fuel. On arrival at the track we made use of the three Maison Blanche camping passes secured shortly before departure to allow us to pitch camp in between a few trees only meters from the track. In the evening we travelled to Arnage to watch some qualifying and see the brake discs glow.
Friday was a quiet day which include the obligatory pit walk and more importantly the big bucket got sprayed pink by the kids (Zack, Aaron and big kid Will). The rest of the afternoon was spent trying to avoid the heat (a good excuse to start building the beer wall) and included an impromptu cricket match involving a stick and a pine cone. The T-Shirts (a result of the T-shirt competition) were handed out to all. We nearly didn't have any T-Shirts as a result of Parcel Force losing the first batch. The second batch arrived just in time to be taken to le Mans. The first batch turned up some weeks later and became the possessions of the model car racing team. Later on Friday we were joined by a pair of Roddy's friends to bring our number to 13.
Saturday morning dawned and the team decamped to the start line complete with pink bucket full of beer cooled by the water in the bucket. The advantage with camping in Maison Blanche meant it was only a ten minute walk from the tent to the start line grandstands. Having staked our claim underneath the start line grandstand we were able to explore the surrounding area as well as make trips back to the camp site to get lunch. The race started an hour later than usual to allow other sporting events to be televised first including England's 3-0 win over Denmark at the World Cup. From the early stages of the race it became obvious that this was going to be an Audi R8 whitewash no matter how hard we cheered for the MG and Bentley Boys (as well as the TVRs and Morgan). Extra interest was provided by the filming of a Michel Valliant (French cartoon character) movie based on the race. The first time the race has been used in a film since the classic 1970 Steve McQueen 'le Mans' movie. Saturday night saw a number of the newbies take a trek to the Mulsanne straight guided by Mark.
Sunday came and the race came to an expected conclusion with Audis 1st, 2nd and 3rd followed home by the lone Bentley in 4th. Congratulations must go to Emanuele Pirro, Frank Biela and Tom Kristensen for winning three years in a row in the same driver lineup in the same Audi team. On Sunday evening we got to launch our own fireworks along with the thousands of others launched around the circuit, as well as making more contributions to the beer wall.
On Monday we made the trip home having first managed to, accidentally, get a professional photographer to take our group photograph in front of the beer wall. We made it safely back to port and enjoyed the crossing home. Click here to see some photos of our adventure.
Last updated on the 18th September 2004.