2 replies to this topic

[Ray Bell]

To the true enthusiast, being at the circuit (yeah, yeah, in the pits!) is the aim. And what racing doesn't happen at our doorstep will drive us to any length to make some kind of difficult journey.
Tasman Cup time was for me the ultimate. Home was Sydney and Warwick Farm, Sandown was in Melbourne, 560 miles away, Lakeside about 670 miles in the opposite direction. Longford was a hop on a boat from Melbourne.
There were many times I drove this in cars my father referred to as 'Hornsby cars' - ones he wouldn't trust to go past Hornsby, on the outskirts of Sydney. Usually they were made overnight, so as to avoid losing time at work.
One of my ultimate trips was a journey of 9h 20m to Melbourne - hitch hiking. About twelve lifts, never out of a car for more than a minute, culminating in covering the last 300 miles in a Dodge Pheonix with the speedo sitting on 105mph virtually all the way. One to Lakeside included flooded roads, a mad driver of an FC Holden and 24 hours in the journey.
Early Peugeots had water pump weaknesses, and no temperature gauges. One trip involved stopping every ten miles or so to bail creek water and refill the radiator, another replacing a head gasket with one recently removed from a local hearse during an engine rebuild - missed a day at work that time!
We used to see people we never knew along the road, but we saw them time after time. We never saw the competitors travelling, though, for they left well before us.
Let's hear about your classic trip, with dates and times...

[Art]

Charleston Sc.to Sebring 1955.

Leave 7:00 am un eventful eight hour trip except for a bad truck wreck. Get a room and a shower and head for a restaurant up the street. While walking by the open door at the Ford garage an un godly roar scares the hell out of us. Walk inside and there sets the Ferrari Factory team being tuned for tomorrows race. Promptly marched back out the door by a smiling Italian mechanic we continue on After dinner back in my buddies 140 Jag and out to the track. We were told that if we stayed in the right lane and watched out for other cars we could drive the track. Big time drivers step aside the dynamic duo are on the track. Down the pit straight at 125 mph hang a left hander and heading for the esses man we are nuthing but whipping ass.(That wasn't there). Into the esses with tires a screaming then a thundering roar and I am looking at Mike Hawthorn in a D Jag about 2 feet away which didn't last very long. With the wind blown out of our sails we battled on. We eventually get to the pits and Mike was standing by the car and the mechanics had the plugs out and were checking them. We stopped to look at the D Type and said hello and Mike nodded and gave us a big smile. A great 12 hour race and a near head on colision at 130 mph on the way home. But something I will remember as long as I live.

[Falcadore]

My favourite Motorsport road trip will always be Bathurst. There's that much more anticipation, you know you're always going to have a good time, Motorsport News editor, Phil Branagan believes because everyone is basically stuck at the track for the duration, everyone just lives and breathes motorsport at the place, is why it's so much better an atmosphere than any other Ozzie meeting.

But each year my Bathurst trip is anything but dull. For Super Touring Bathurst in 1997 I was feeling REALLY sick just prior to the drive down, so much so that two days after I returned to Brisbane I was booked in for exploratory surgery to find out what was wrong. Wednesday night in Dubbo, I feel so ill I've looked up the number & address of the local base hospital before bed. But then I've crested the rise from the Bathurst township to the circuit, seen Mount Panorama written in the white rocks in the distance on the Mountain and adrelin took over. When I got home the surgeon found a disintegrated appendix in my belly. I could walk again after three days, and another three days I was back on the road to Bathurst for the V8 race. Although I was the 'nominated driver' for any night we went out.

1998 and Super Touring Bathurst so me with some of the worst flu I've ever had. And driving up and down the mounatin, the altitude changes left me with a colassal headache. Murray Walker and Derek Warwick were having a chat ten feet from me and I wasn't interested. At V8Bathurst a few weeks later while on a heavy photographing schedule it pissed down rain in practice, while my campsite team mates sat around and drank beer, here's me trakcside getting drenched in jeans I had to wear the next day. A wind gust blew me over at one point, I must have been a picture to the campsite returning soaked through and covered in mud.

1999 October Bathurst, and a few weeks prior I'd had a head gasket failure in my car neccessitatng a frantic engine rebuild so I could get down. But all the down the car was smoking horribly and overheating. A jounrey of 1000klm to make in a day travelling at 70kph. By the time I got back to Brisbane, I'd had momentary lapses in wakefullness 5 times and damn near killed myself. But that was my first Bathurst as a writer - awesome. The the V8 Bathurst meant due to a lack of PC amongst the crew I had to race back to Brisbane immediately after the race. I was out of Bathurst before sunset and got to Brisbane with only a 4 hour sleep over before frantically writing race reports from home. Only 4 hours sleep in two days. Worth every second of it.