Sam Posted June 18, 2014 Report Share Posted June 18, 2014 I'm not sure where to begin, so I'll just say what a fantastic bloody weekend! Ok, I'll start at the beginning. I mentioned this to someone here at work who's into their racing and camping, but owns a motorhome. We quickly decided it was something we wanted to do, so assembled 4 of us from work to drive down and enjoy LeMans. Fast forward up to 12th June when we headed off. I was a little disappointed that I hadn't got to go in the directors big camper, and was only going in this 'small' 6 sleeper, but when I arrived at work, 5am, I was presently surprised at the size of the damn thing. We had shopped at Costco the night before for all supplies, apart from beer, and spend over £200 for 4 of us to last 4 days. We figured we'd get booze in France where it was cheaper. 3 odd hours down to the ferry terminal, and onto the boat. We arrived a few hours early and managed to drive straight onto it and it sailed 5 minutes before. Spotting more and more exotics as we're coming off the boat, but generally people were behaving themselves, compared to how it used to be 10+ years ago. We trundle down to LeMans, trying to find a supermarket, we've got 2 sat navs and 2 people on phones trying to find one, the driver also insisted we got tinnies (a rarity in France!). We visited 5 supermarkets in the end, reckon we wasted 2 hours trying to source tinnies before we gave up. Anyway, €140 later, we've got beer! Arriving at LeMans and the signing was awful, we've learnt to ignore it. We finally joined the long queue to get into the track. We arrived at our camp site, which was a stones throw from the Dunlop Curve and setup. We'd not been there 5 minutes and people we're saying hello and taking my camera off me to get shots with me in. A very friendly place. We setup camp and get on the beers, it'd been a long day. The boss then got a call from his son, who works in the Aston pit crew, he'd get us in! We walked down to the paddock in our "Aston Martin Racing" tops, and had to sneek into the paddock (it was parc ferme, so tighter security), a quick wave of our tops got us in, it helped one of them was chatting up some birds. We met our inside guy, who took us through to the car in the pits. The next day was a non race day, we'd taken 4 bikes, so set off to find some good viewing spots for the big day. We ended up cycling past the Porsche support race pits, where we saw a car fall off it's stand with no wheels on, a lot of red faces and they quickly blocked the view with sheets, luckily I got a snap of it. Carrying on, a member of our team saw a few marshals just on the track, so he just cycled onto it, the rest of us looking in disbelieve! They didn't stop him, so we all followed. We managed to do about 3/4 mile on the track, before coming to a public road part, which we carried along and ended up in Arnage. We sunk a few beers watching the exotics driving through, and the French jet water at passing cars. They got a cyclist, who stopped, and went for the fella. Before landing one on his nose, he looked around and saw 400 roudy drunks and thought better of it. So he grabbed the water gun and soaked the soaker. Good spirit. We headed off and ended up going back a different way, past the mad Friday bit, where it was stop start traffic. It was quite good fun cycling past, after a few beers, all of the poor people in the queues. People were lining the road with "You burnout, we drink" signs too. So we hung around for a little while to see a few burnouts, and cars stall! Sirens rang, and it soon dissipated, although it turns out the coppers went straight past. Back to the camp for a few pints in the bar and dinner. Up the next day and we got a quick breakfast and headed out on the bikes to catch the support race and parade. By the time that was over it was RAMMED. So 2 of us went back to the camper to stock up (beer) and walked back. We sat and watched a few hours of the race with some beers. Some French fella decided he didn't want the fence in his shot, so climbed it, a few moments later he was getting loads of stones thrown at him! After a few more hours, we headed back to stock up, we also had a coach trip booked (took us to some further away parts of the track). Dinner and few more beers and we're heading for the coach at 1am. We get taken to Arnage corner, which was a great viewing spot, but had some shifty looking French blokes about. We only had 40 minutes before the next stop, which was the long straight. Experiencing these cars 2 meters away doing 200mph+ was something else. An other beer and 40 minutes past before getting on the coach home. A quick power nap and we're back at 4am. We hit the hay. Up again, with the noise of 54 cars power around a 7 mile track was a good wake up call. Food and back to the track. We found an other great location, to see them exit the Dunlop bridge and flow around a few esses. Then an other call came in, this time we'd get to see a pit stop of the Aston. We made our way to the paddock to be stopped, this time my top wasn't getting me in! Our inside guy grabbed 4 passes from the crew and handed them over the gate, we walked straight down to the pits and into the garage, we we're there for about half an hour and then the Aston came in for a refuel. After that, we wanted a beer, so found a close by bar and settled in. €7.50 a pint saw us burn through money pretty quickly, and at this point we were 15 minutes before the end. As we're next to the paddock, we just nipped to a high up wall and saw them cross the line, then enter parc ferme once again. For one final time, we headed back to the campsite, had some beers and dinner before a early night (midnight). The journey home was nice and easy, exiting the circuit at 7am was a breeze, and we saw some more nice metal on the way home. We had to pay £60 to get a earlier ferry. All in all it was a bloody amazing trip, the pit visits and coach trip made it even more special. We talked to strangers and had a few over to our camp for beers too. Everyone was in the same boat and just wanted a good time. We're signed up to get advanced bookings next year, but I wonder if we leave it as it was, a great time, and book somewhere else. The_Judge_, Cannockwolf, L4nky808 and 8 others 11 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wasabi Posted July 7, 2014 Report Share Posted July 7, 2014 Great write up and pics. Thanks for sharing! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Judge_ Posted July 8, 2014 Report Share Posted July 8, 2014 Looks awesome, a mate of mine is still there with his caterham, seems like quite a bonne experience! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arry Posted July 8, 2014 Report Share Posted July 8, 2014 I love Le Mans. Didn't get to go this year; but then last year's marshalling was a particular career highlight that I don't think I'll ever get to top so going back might even feel a bit disappointing! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simonlpearce Posted July 8, 2014 Report Share Posted July 8, 2014 Was refraining from looking here in case of any spoiler until i had finished watching it all, then forgot to respond. Looks like an awesome trip though and is definitely on my bucket list! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mit Posted July 8, 2014 Report Share Posted July 8, 2014 I've always meant to do Le Mans properly but with my skating event there 2 weeks later where I get to actually go on the track it seems like a waste... I don't fancy doing that drive twice in succession like that Loved your write up, glad you enjoyed it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arry Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 I've always meant to do Le Mans properly but with my skating event there 2 weeks later where I get to actually go on the track it seems like a waste... I don't fancy doing that drive twice in succession like that Loved your write up, glad you enjoyed it A mate of mine has a second home in Argenton-Sur-Creuse; it's about ~2 hours to Le Mans from there. I keep meaning to stay down there for a few days after the race just to chill out and then come back, but I've never found the time. It's really nice around that area Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sam Posted July 16, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 We went on the track on our bikes. Although not the whole thing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
