Going solo

Imagine you’re a wealthy chap. If you don’t have to, lucky old you. But for the rest of us, there you are with your well-padded pockets, probably a bit bored, and you fancy having a crack at this race in France. You tried once before, only for the race to get cancelled, but the itch won’t go away.

So you enter your car. It’s not as young as it used to be, and neither are you, but it’s not exactly as if you’re going to win the thing. You just want to get out there. Soak it up, tick the box.

Co-drivers are, of course mandatory, but you know a chap called Tom Clarke who used to be a bit useful in Aston Martins a while back and seems suitable. So off you toddle to Le Mans. You take the start of the race and it’s all going swimmingly. So swimmingly indeed that at the time of the first driver change you decide you’re too busy enjoying yourself to give up what is, after all, your seat. So you wave Tom away and head back out into the fray. At the next stop the same thing happens – and the one after that and the one after that…