From "Coopdevil" (Cooper enthusiast???) :
"I was quite bored at work today so found myself looking at the tea leaves in the bottom of the mug, trying to divine in this new year what the next ten years would bring for slot racing...
2004 - The financially embarrased club of Chastity, CT hit upon the novel scheme of running not merely a Proxy Race but a whole Proxy Season. Thanks to the interest in this the club are able to race twice monthly for a whole year without any expenditure other than the bit of petrol needed to drive to the post office to pick up 80 parcels of race-tweaked cars.
2005 - In an attempt to protect their finish of their cars, Fly adopt a policy of heat-sealing the crystal boxes to the baseplates to prevent them being opened. It takes eight months before anyone notices and only then after a box is mistakenly prised open by a poorly-informed and trained shop assistant who is immeadiately sacked
The Melton Hackett club are forced to abandon magnet racing after a Scalextric Mustang deslots and removes seven feet of nickel steel contacts from the track. Club veteran Arthur Fawcett-Urp suffers a malfunction of his pacemaker after the errant ponycar attaches itself to his chest. Fortunately club members wedge his fingers under the sparking braids of a poorly maintained Artin Porsche GT3 and his heart is galvanised back into life.
2006 - Scalextric offer what they claim to be their most realistic set ever - the "2006 Formula One Procession" offers Sport track with only one lane and enough amps to run six cars on that one lane. Sales are disappointingly low and the idea is dropped.
The Daytona 500 is won by Toyota and riots break out. Chairs are flung from the grandstands, and drunken good ole boys invade the pits attempting to tear down the Toyota flags and replace them with their own US and Confederate banners. Scalextric's plans to finally complete their NASCAR lineup with a sidewinder Pontiac are dropped as the future of the series looks in doubt.
2007 - In an attempt to cut production costs, Fly no longer supply motors, braid or wiring with their cars. It takes six months before anyone notices and a further three months of Internet grumbling about build quality before anyone notices that this was a deliberate move by the factory. Sales figures are untouched.
At the Gas Guzzler Speedway in Buggery, OH an 'off' causes two Scalextric Corvettes to become dog-knotted together by their magnets and neither a bucket of cold water, a vets injection of ketamine or a sharp stick inserted into the rear of the topmost vette can seperate the pair.
Meanwhile in F1, the Ferrari F2007 is released and shockingly, it's carbon fibre horizontal upright prong truss has a 13.4mm radius at it's widest point narrowing to 11.7 at the flange angle. Every other manufacturer looks shame-faced at having produced their prong trusses with a mere 13.2mm radius. Once again Ferrari prove their innate superiority with such clarity of thought and engineering brilliance and F1 looks forwards to another season of Scuderia dominance.
2008 - The Formula 1 calendar is announced, not one race is to be held in Europe or North America.
Disgracefully, club racer Norman Scoggs is hounded out of the sport after admitting on an Internet forum that "I usually throw the boxes away or use them in the garage to keep screws and things in". Following weeks of online abuse Scoggs abandons slot racing and takes up Nitro RC instead.
Young girl-racer Shakira Cholmondely is banned from the Wyre Piddle Scalextric club after inverting the polarity of the magnet in her Ninco BMW M3. When the car is placed on the start line, it's magnet violently flings the other five cars from the track causing assorted bruising, lacerations and concussion amongst club members.
On lap 23 of the Grand Prix of North Korea, Michael Schumacher is forced to scratch his groin and loses 0.8 seconds to the pursuing Kimi Raikkonen. Despite extending his lead in the following laps this raises serious questions in the press about whether this proves Schumacher is past it and should retire.
2009 - In a paranoid attempt to preserve their trade secrets, three F1 teams request that their cars be pixelated out on television screens. In a compromise move, F1 tracks are painted blue in to enable the TV channels to use Hollywood 'blue screen' technology to CGI different images in place of the pixelated cars. The result show of a computer generated Ronnie Peterson dicing with Ayrton Senna, Fangio and Clark boosts viewing figures but sponsor complaints forces the system to be dropped after two races.
Meanwhile Fly save even more money on production costs by no longer tampo-printing the right hand side of cars. The public only discover this when a tired worker accidently boxes a Lister Storm the wrong way around. In the ensuing furore, owner of the factory mistake Lister, Nigel St. Hubbins manages to sell the car for £3,500.04 on ebay and still gouges the buyer for postage by charging £75 to ship second-class from Leicester to Grimsby.
Slot magazine MARSHAL!!!!!! announces the grim findings of their latest research - that 1:32 size is now a whole 8% larger than it was in 2005. The editor predicts that by 2015 racing will only be possible if every other lane is left clear.
2010 - Fly release their 250th re-tampoing of the Chevron B19 but are struck by tragedy when Bongo their trained chimpanzee dies of rickets. Bongo's manipulation of an old bingo machine had provided Fly with their pricing scheme since 2001 and his demise is mourned by slot car collectors worldwide.
An informal survey by onlineslotting.com reveals that as many as 78% of online racers may be using drivebots and that 93% of them "would not hesitate to drop the line if they were losing a heat".
The final of the Greater Snivelling Slot Club's GT championship is thrown in confusion after a Cartrix NSX is placed within six feet of the race controller's PC and the hard drive gets mysteriously wiped.
Live on the BBC, Jeremy Clarkson breaks the news to an incredulous British public that, actually, The Ford Motor Company is American and Vauxhalls are just re-badged Opels. Sales of England flag bumper stickers pummet after the show is aired.
2011 - The impending EU-wide ban on the advertisment of products containing caffeine or sugar creates scandal in Britain as it turns out that Prime Minister Geraldine Halliwell granted F1 a three year moritorium on the ban after receiving a multi-million pound donation from Lord Bernard of Ecclestone for "party funds".
The Melton Hackett club abandon their magnet-less class after an weighted SCX Kia F1 tops the scales at 2.3 kg and causes the surface of the entire of the red lane to crack and split.
Thanks to PM Halliwell's funding initiative a full 40% of UK secondary schools are able to start up slot car clubs. Acting under recommendations of the Department of Education, Scalextric amend their product so that schoolchildren will no longer be able to deslot and after each race, the RMS announces that "The winner was red lane... and blue lane... and green lane... and white lane... and yellow lane.. and black lane!". The resulting product is thought ideal for the British schoolchild of today. The 2011 Scalextric Schools Championship is won by no less than 483 schools and 6533 racers, a resounding success allround although prize-giving lasts for 18 days and several racers pass out from hunger.
2012 - Victory at the Micronesian Grand Prix for the Kia K2024 brings Britain it's youngest ever F1 winner in the form of young Brooklyn Beckham.
Malcolm Oulton of Shifnal, Shrops sets a new ebay record by paying £799.50 for a motorless Scalextric TR7 described by the vendor as 'trodden on'. Despite the excuse that 'but dear, it had the spotlights!' his wife immeadiately files for divorce.
2013 - In the interests of safety, this years Japanese Grand Prix, held on Neo-Tokyo's state of the art Neo-Suzuka circuit incorporates four Gatso speed cameras and a mandatory 50 km/h in these intermediates. Panic braking ruins the GP as two thirds of the pack are elimiated after running into the back of one another. Neo-Tokyo police riot after it is discovered that fines from the Gatsos will be not be used to top up their Christmas bonuses.
Catalan club "La Slotio" are prosecuted under Spanish Health and Safety laws after employing tramps and students to run across their rally tracks before the cars in the interests of "realism". 64 year old homeless alcoholic Pedro Don Ninco falls into a drunken stupor while crossing an R1 piece of track and loses an ear to an out-of-control SCX Corrola. This follows a black period for Spanish slot-rallying in which club members hurl stones at the windscreens of rival cars, leave logs across the slot and are forced to wear ridiculous bobble hats.
2014 - In the F1 pre-season testing in Bahrain, Williams experiment with a weight-saving device by keeping their new signing Brooklyn out of the car and guiding it by means of a single hand-controller from the pits. Williams are swamped by CVs from slot-racers all over the world but drop the idea after Brooklyn crashes out shortly into testing and flings his controller at the Chief Steward claiming the Steward was too slow operating the crane to return the stricken Williams to the track.
Vanquish MG's 1:32 Chapparal is released. To the surprise of absolutely nobody this turns out to be larger than both the Monogram and Cox offerings in 1:24."
T54
