BRANDS GP

"This will be what they call crashing then!" was the thought that came to me as I realised the bike and I had parted company. I was more than a little miffed, but for the chief marshall's 5.8 it was a clean sweep of sixes. I had worked hard on technical merit, so it must have been my improptu, "Sooty n Sweep do humourous highlights from King Lear", as I skimed across the kitty litter that had cost me dear on artistic interpretation. Some among you, the ones whose lips are not moving as they read, will be muttering that King Lear is a tragedy. Too right, 3 hours not a single laugh - thats a tragedy!

It has been suggested in some quarters that I staged the whole incident to get out of marshalling on Sunday. Allow me to be the "Rifle on the grassy knoll" and put this to right.

Having obtained an unread copy of Crabtree and Evelyns "A Gentleman's guide to Motorcycle Sport and Personal Hygene" at a very reasonable price, from Daz I eagerly digested its contents to discover if there was any way to improve my performance. Sadly the section on "Plug Chops" could have been a little clearer. In a glaring ommision there was no word of warning that this should be conducted whilst stationary. Had it been a little more explicit I would not have attempted this whilst trying to negotiate Westfield. I had got the plug cap off but in fumbling with the plug key I let my concentration slip. Having cleared this up I shall now cover the other obvious omissions and present my "Beginners guide to Crashing", Bally can skip this bit.

There's no point rushing at it. Seek out a good slow corner with nice soft gravel, dont be tempted by the warm up lap or the pit lane, these are obvious ploys which will cost you technical merit points. Relax is the golden rule, you are only road testing your leathers and with a bit of luck its somebody else's bike that now resembles a down market jumble sale meccano set. If this is the case then award yourself an automatic bonus point. Waving to the crowd is also points in the bag. Snatching up a posie of daisies as you skim across the grass and handing them to a cute girlie in the crowd is an automatic gold medal performance. A feat only ever acheived by Sir Percival de Smalltruss in 1937 at Brooklands. The Colonel claims to have had a second that meeting.

The down side to all this is that I shall now be, once again, at the back o' the grid at Pembrey. Remember this is in Wales, so last to finish has to take an ugly sheep out to dinner ,,,,,

Meanwhile back on the Mothership... The captain drew a deep breath and with surprising calm asked "Just how long have a shuttle craft and George been missing?"

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