Newbies to Le Mans
Discussion
Reading a lot of the quotes and comments about this years LM it seems that a lot of people have made the trip in 04 for the first second or third time.....
I for one love it in Le Mans having been 11 times previously and also countless times to pre qual weekend and the Classic in '02.. I missed it this year (still gutted) but will be back next year.
With all the negative Le Mans 'bashing' attitude coming out at the moment, which seems a real shame I wondered if we could build the positive side of LM so that the newbies keep coming back in 05 and beyond.
I for one love the British excentric attitude down there, I would never stay anywhere other than houx Annexe and enjoy all the show boating that goes on. In recent years there has been a slight change of attitude but it's not a lot..... So come on, how do people rememebr it in the past.
My best memories include our:
3200 bottle beer mountain
55ft flag pole
Martin and Adrian doing the first Houx Annexe roundabout runs (we all know where that has gone now)
Track invasions after the race and standing under the podium
Ready Stop Go - Death karts
2am bungy jumping
Not being able to turn your head fast enough to watch the cars at cafe Des Hunadieres
JJ Lehto in the McLaren at night, lapping 38 seconds than anyone else in the rain
Houx Annexe floods and British good will response
BBQ Tuna
Sunday night fireworks at houx Annexe
So come on what makes a great Le Mans for you??
PS - 36 days and I'm off to Le Mans Classic!
I for one love it in Le Mans having been 11 times previously and also countless times to pre qual weekend and the Classic in '02.. I missed it this year (still gutted) but will be back next year.
With all the negative Le Mans 'bashing' attitude coming out at the moment, which seems a real shame I wondered if we could build the positive side of LM so that the newbies keep coming back in 05 and beyond.
I for one love the British excentric attitude down there, I would never stay anywhere other than houx Annexe and enjoy all the show boating that goes on. In recent years there has been a slight change of attitude but it's not a lot..... So come on, how do people rememebr it in the past.
My best memories include our:
3200 bottle beer mountain
55ft flag pole
Martin and Adrian doing the first Houx Annexe roundabout runs (we all know where that has gone now)
Track invasions after the race and standing under the podium
Ready Stop Go - Death karts
2am bungy jumping
Not being able to turn your head fast enough to watch the cars at cafe Des Hunadieres
JJ Lehto in the McLaren at night, lapping 38 seconds than anyone else in the rain
Houx Annexe floods and British good will response
BBQ Tuna
Sunday night fireworks at houx Annexe
So come on what makes a great Le Mans for you??
PS - 36 days and I'm off to Le Mans Classic!
Loads of Le Mans virgins camped with Bristol / Surrey / Devon / Cornwall in Maison Blanche. Fantastic time had by all. Loads of adventures and the fireworks on Sunday night were the best I've ever seen!
We did the track invasion and one of the Surrey lot got drenched by Champagne. We took our flags, me with a purple TVR flag being madly waved and Surrey holding their massive new Sail Flags.
Not seen it myself yet - but apparently we made it onto UK telly as part of the Speed Sunday coverage
We did the track invasion and one of the Surrey lot got drenched by Champagne. We took our flags, me with a purple TVR flag being madly waved and Surrey holding their massive new Sail Flags.
Not seen it myself yet - but apparently we made it onto UK telly as part of the Speed Sunday coverage
Nacnud said:
We did the track invasion and one of the Surrey lot got drenched by Champagne. We took our flags, me with a purple TVR flag being madly waved and Surrey holding their massive new Sail Flags.
Not seen it myself yet - but apparently we made it onto UK telly as part of the Speed Sunday coverage
You could easily spot the 'sail' TVR flags right near the front of the crowd and a few others on both ITV, and Eurosport, it was another one of those 'we should be down there' momonets in the racehouse
It was my first time to Le Mans this year and thoroughly enjoyed it. I've been on the hot rodding / drag racing scene for over 20 years and to be honest before last weekend I couldn't of even spelt TVR.
Over the LM weekend I've met some fabulous people, learnt loads of new stuff, broadened my appreciation of all thing automotive and had a bloody good time doing it.
I was unfortunate to get embroiled in the
Range Rover incident at Tetra Rouge on Sunday night but despite that I'll certainly be back next year and the way I feel at the moment every year after that.
Over the LM weekend I've met some fabulous people, learnt loads of new stuff, broadened my appreciation of all thing automotive and had a bloody good time doing it.
I was unfortunate to get embroiled in the
Range Rover incident at Tetra Rouge on Sunday night but despite that I'll certainly be back next year and the way I feel at the moment every year after that.
Well, on a positive note this was my first ever Le Mans and had a fantastic time. We “poshed” it at Club Motorsport. I’d not got my head around the geography of the place when we booked it and although it was a shuttle bus ride to and from the track it was nice to have decent facilities and food (and a real ale bar!). I was a bit worried about all the things that might go wrong with the 30 year old Aston but it ran fine and returned a better than expected 13.8mpg. At one point south of Rouen we were tucked in with a convoy of three Porsches and an S2000 and were caning it to keep up with them. When we came to a roundabout I saw clouds of white smoke coming from the back of the car. Heart in mouth stopped for a check and found the exhaust had got so hot it had melted the underseal which was dripping onto the silencer. Embarrassing but not fatal so we backed off a tad and all was well. It was great to see so many British plated sports cars “invading” France on the drive in and over the whole weekend everybody we spoke to was really friendly. Now I know my way around a bit better and the best place to be at certain times I’ll enjoy it even more next year. Cheers to Degsy, Ian (with the fabulous old Bentley) and the other Pistonheaders we met over the weekend and the Larrylemans crew for the campsite entertainment. Oh, and of course well done TVR!
Ab-fab, loved it. Alan forgot to mrntion the 4* meals cooked for us at the motorsport site. was still on a high at work yesterday. Only one thing marred a great 5 days...why did the french TV stop showing the canadian GP with less than 4 laps to go? and spend the next hour talking about politics? had to resort to wap phone to get the results. the Tasmin went well and will make the trip again next year. cheers to all I met even the bloke from my local pub who found me amongst thousands of brits less than 5 mins after I parked at the track on friday morning/
I wondered if someone would bring this point up...
It staggers me that people think they can gatecrash somebody else’s organised group and then get huffy when the group complains they can’t cope with the extra numbers. Asking is fair enough, but....
As you now know, MB fills up solid and it’s grossly inconsiderate to have unused space in a pitch. Our group takes the attitude that if we have spare space then it’s only right and proper to let people in to use it. Last year we marked out space for 8 TVRs and ended up camping with 15! Unfortunately, this year we got our space estimating a little on the tight side and didn’t really have any room to spare.
By midday Friday we had too many people in too little space and we already knew we had a major problem when you came to see us. We were so crowded that not every tent managed to be properly erected and the pool didn't even have room for a chair next to it and consequently didn't get the use we were hoping for.
I presume you are one of the two Tivs that struck their tent and vanished - it you were then please accept our heart felt thanks, because if you had stayed then we would have ended up having to ask our mates to pitch somewhere else. And that’s something we didn’t want to have to do.....
It staggers me that people think they can gatecrash somebody else’s organised group and then get huffy when the group complains they can’t cope with the extra numbers. Asking is fair enough, but....
As you now know, MB fills up solid and it’s grossly inconsiderate to have unused space in a pitch. Our group takes the attitude that if we have spare space then it’s only right and proper to let people in to use it. Last year we marked out space for 8 TVRs and ended up camping with 15! Unfortunately, this year we got our space estimating a little on the tight side and didn’t really have any room to spare.
By midday Friday we had too many people in too little space and we already knew we had a major problem when you came to see us. We were so crowded that not every tent managed to be properly erected and the pool didn't even have room for a chair next to it and consequently didn't get the use we were hoping for.
I presume you are one of the two Tivs that struck their tent and vanished - it you were then please accept our heart felt thanks, because if you had stayed then we would have ended up having to ask our mates to pitch somewhere else. And that’s something we didn’t want to have to do.....
Nacnud said:
Loads of Le Mans virgins camped with Bristol / Surrey / Devon / Cornwall in Maison Blanche. Fantastic time had by all. Loads of adventures and the fireworks on Sunday night were the best I've ever seen!
We did the track invasion and one of the Surrey lot got drenched by Champagne. We took our flags, me with a purple TVR flag being madly waved and Surrey holding their massive new Sail Flags.
Not seen it myself yet - but apparently we made it onto UK telly as part of the Speed Sunday coverage
Have to echo Duncan's comments, as a Le Mans virgin it was a real blast!
My first time, although Walking Hormone has been several times before. Had an absolutely superb time. I can't stress how great it was, from almost being in tears watching the cars at the start, to laughing at the pathetic attempt at a firework display from our neighbours...from drinking champagne out of measuring jugs (forgot the glasses and they were the only thing the supermarket had to offer) to throwing up over psychobert's tent 
(sorry Simon!)
The drive down
(500 Griff) was out of this world (minor co-pilot boo boo when we were overtaken by a VW Boring) but the highlight has to be when we were absolutely soaked in Johnny Herbert's 
champagne underneath the podium...a moment I will NEVER forget!
Have lots of great photos that we will have to post at some point
(sorry Simon!) The drive down
(500 Griff) was out of this world (minor co-pilot boo boo when we were overtaken by a VW Boring) but the highlight has to be when we were absolutely soaked in Johnny Herbert's champagne underneath the podium...a moment I will NEVER forget! Have lots of great photos that we will have to post at some point
Hi Quinny, good response - thanks
We could have doubled the number of Tivs camping with us and would have been happy too if we had had the space. MB had so many Tivs I heard one group wander past proclaiming that TVR was the new Mondao!!!
Every year we seem to learn a bit and maybe next year we should deliberately over-estimate the space so we can accomodate other Tivs.
100% agree with you about some people being greedy. Surprises me that I didn't see aggro as people attempted to occupy the space by force. Just been looking at my piccies and jeez we were crowded. I'll post one on here soon..
Striking your tent is another way of saying to take it down and pack it up. Don't know what its origins are, but I've always used it since I was knee high
We could have doubled the number of Tivs camping with us and would have been happy too if we had had the space. MB had so many Tivs I heard one group wander past proclaiming that TVR was the new Mondao!!!
Every year we seem to learn a bit and maybe next year we should deliberately over-estimate the space so we can accomodate other Tivs.
100% agree with you about some people being greedy. Surprises me that I didn't see aggro as people attempted to occupy the space by force. Just been looking at my piccies and jeez we were crowded. I'll post one on here soon..
Striking your tent is another way of saying to take it down and pack it up. Don't know what its origins are, but I've always used it since I was knee highOne last post from me on this subject....
We weren't really organised - the three big regions in Houx were seriously organised! Houx regards us in MB as 'overflow rejects' and in comparison regards how we were organised that's possibly true.
The only reasons we organised anything at all was 1) tickets were like rocking horse shit and group purchase was easier 2) Convoys to the event are superb and worth organising 3) Steve and Karen offered to go down on Tuesday and mark out some space so we could all pitch our tents together and have a hell of a party.
One problem of being a rag-tag assortment of TVRCC regions rather than one huge group is that no single person is in charge and hence I can well believe that you got conflicting advice and information from different people. However, we choose to regard the lack of formal organisation and its lack of meal times and work rotas as a plus point. Certainly, Houx cannot even start to touch MB for the party atmosphere existing Wed PM onwards. We reckon MB is pretty darned good in all aspects except the showers. It's certainly the closest campsite to the grandstands, less dust, has a great atmosphere and bizarrely it's much easier to get to sleep at night (yes I've stayed in Houx!).
If you want to camp in an MB spot you like then I'm afraid you need to plan to get there next year on Tuesday (big group) or Wed lunch (single tent). Houx may sound attractive in principle, but there you get no control at all over the location of the camping pitch. Houx Annex, etc will be more like MB. I.E. get there early if the location and group size is important to you!
Sounds like you missed the second MB loo block?
Loads of portacabin loos and wonderfully clean! I never found them last year - DOH!
We weren't really organised - the three big regions in Houx were seriously organised! Houx regards us in MB as 'overflow rejects' and in comparison regards how we were organised that's possibly true.
The only reasons we organised anything at all was 1) tickets were like rocking horse shit and group purchase was easier 2) Convoys to the event are superb and worth organising 3) Steve and Karen offered to go down on Tuesday and mark out some space so we could all pitch our tents together and have a hell of a party.
One problem of being a rag-tag assortment of TVRCC regions rather than one huge group is that no single person is in charge and hence I can well believe that you got conflicting advice and information from different people. However, we choose to regard the lack of formal organisation and its lack of meal times and work rotas as a plus point. Certainly, Houx cannot even start to touch MB for the party atmosphere existing Wed PM onwards. We reckon MB is pretty darned good in all aspects except the showers. It's certainly the closest campsite to the grandstands, less dust, has a great atmosphere and bizarrely it's much easier to get to sleep at night (yes I've stayed in Houx!).
If you want to camp in an MB spot you like then I'm afraid you need to plan to get there next year on Tuesday (big group) or Wed lunch (single tent). Houx may sound attractive in principle, but there you get no control at all over the location of the camping pitch. Houx Annex, etc will be more like MB. I.E. get there early if the location and group size is important to you!
Sounds like you missed the second MB loo block?
Loads of portacabin loos and wonderfully clean! I never found them last year - DOH!
oi nancud you plonker!
Masion Blanche is the worst site at Le Mans.
It has one small hole in the ground which doubles as both toilet and wash basin. The view of the circuit is blocked by a big wall and the short distance to the ciscuit becomes a long walk due to all the people that flood in the entrance and block your path.
Pikeys frequently roam the site, raping , pillaging and stealing anything they can (including acreage) and its constanly rains.
Not only that but the ground is made of titanium with glass shards so that if you do actually manage to pitch a tent the glass rips through it to give an even more un-comfortable sleep.
I sacrifice myself at MB every year just to repent all your sins and save you having to go there.
So next year I recommend you all go to the luxurious Houx or the spacous Bleu or perhaps even the exclusive Houx annexe. But what ever you do, do not go to Masion Blanche. ( at least not until I have managed to get my stripey tape in place!
).
>> Edited by DustyC on Thursday 17th June 09:37
Masion Blanche is the worst site at Le Mans.
It has one small hole in the ground which doubles as both toilet and wash basin. The view of the circuit is blocked by a big wall and the short distance to the ciscuit becomes a long walk due to all the people that flood in the entrance and block your path.
Pikeys frequently roam the site, raping , pillaging and stealing anything they can (including acreage) and its constanly rains.
Not only that but the ground is made of titanium with glass shards so that if you do actually manage to pitch a tent the glass rips through it to give an even more un-comfortable sleep.
I sacrifice myself at MB every year just to repent all your sins and save you having to go there.
So next year I recommend you all go to the luxurious Houx or the spacous Bleu or perhaps even the exclusive Houx annexe. But what ever you do, do not go to Masion Blanche. ( at least not until I have managed to get my stripey tape in place!
). >> Edited by DustyC on Thursday 17th June 09:37
This time the truth...
We got there a day earlier this year and it was already pretty full. Well at least I thought so, but then Fridays lot came in, and Saturdays lot.
It was bursting at the seams. People were camping all over each other and the tension got quite high.
Im talking about the extended area here too.
The first time we camped in the extened but we shared a huge big field between about 5 of us. This year i think there must have been about 5000 of us!
I cant believe they have the cheek to charge so much money for camping in a field and then give us one small toilet block with no showers. (Im excluding the showers and toilets by the main entrance as they are outside MB and not exclusive to the campers).
We also had people tramping through our site while the race was on trying to find other viewing points for the circuit. We didn't complain, it wasn't their fault. There were so many people camped all over the place that the path and road was not obvious. In fact it ended up getting camped on and a few were blocked in.
It was certainly the busiest I have seen MB or any campsite and I also noticed that some of the regulars were missing.
We got there a day earlier this year and it was already pretty full. Well at least I thought so, but then Fridays lot came in, and Saturdays lot.
It was bursting at the seams. People were camping all over each other and the tension got quite high.
Im talking about the extended area here too.
The first time we camped in the extened but we shared a huge big field between about 5 of us. This year i think there must have been about 5000 of us!
I cant believe they have the cheek to charge so much money for camping in a field and then give us one small toilet block with no showers. (Im excluding the showers and toilets by the main entrance as they are outside MB and not exclusive to the campers).
We also had people tramping through our site while the race was on trying to find other viewing points for the circuit. We didn't complain, it wasn't their fault. There were so many people camped all over the place that the path and road was not obvious. In fact it ended up getting camped on and a few were blocked in.
It was certainly the busiest I have seen MB or any campsite and I also noticed that some of the regulars were missing.
I don't want everyone to come rushing over to Bleu next year, where I was, but at least the toilets there were impeccably clean. I really have to hand it to the guys who manned them - they were ALWAYS there, scrubber brush in hand, and really kept up with the heavy usage.
I really didn't mind giving them a tip each time because they really did make a difference. It's the second time I've gone with the G/F and she really appreciated not having something disgusting to use as a loo... With that many people and the amount of use they got, it wouldn't have taken long for those things to have gotten pretty nasty but they didn't.
Bleu has no showers, I can live with that but would be happier being able to wash the dust off and just get clean every couple of days. I had to settle for standing under a faucet-thing, which is one way to wake up in the morning!!
I really didn't mind giving them a tip each time because they really did make a difference. It's the second time I've gone with the G/F and she really appreciated not having something disgusting to use as a loo... With that many people and the amount of use they got, it wouldn't have taken long for those things to have gotten pretty nasty but they didn't.
Bleu has no showers, I can live with that but would be happier being able to wash the dust off and just get clean every couple of days. I had to settle for standing under a faucet-thing, which is one way to wake up in the morning!!
Agreed - MB was stupidly busy this year, many times more than last year - we arrived v. early Thursday morning and still had lots of hassle finding a spot for 5 cars and tents. We ended up sandwiched between people with no ability to get some of the cars out. Coupled to that we had the neighbours from hell with the loudest sound system etc and never seemed to leave their gazebos to watch the race 
I said at the time that I am in favour of finding somewhere else to go for next year - maybe outside the circuit?
>> Edited by iains on Thursday 17th June 15:48
I said at the time that I am in favour of finding somewhere else to go for next year - maybe outside the circuit?
>> Edited by iains on Thursday 17th June 15:48
The only proble we had in MB was some tosser taking a dump behind our gazebo and throwing shitty paper over the bush.
We worked out who it was, we had had a bit of what we thought was friendly banter with someone playing rock ballards on Thursday night.
Caught one of them on Sat night coming out from behind it after going for a piss.
We followed him to his tent, but didnt bother saying anything as it wasn't worth the trouble
looking forward to 2005 - minus the turd !!
We worked out who it was, we had had a bit of what we thought was friendly banter with someone playing rock ballards on Thursday night.
Caught one of them on Sat night coming out from behind it after going for a piss.
We followed him to his tent, but didnt bother saying anything as it wasn't worth the trouble
looking forward to 2005 - minus the turd !!
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