After last year’s efforts of going to pretty much all the motorsport events I could get to, this year has been a very different affair. Having attended the World Series by Renault at Silverstone back in July, I had to wait a whole 4 months to the next event – MPH Show at the Birmingham NEC.

The tickets were bought back in June, so it kind of felt like a free event travelling on the way down. Passing what was a gruesome accident on the M1 we made good time missing most of the queues, and we spent about 10 hours there split between the show and the main feature – Top Gear Live.

Yes, the Top Gear trio live on stage messing about for over an hour. Quite comical, but good entertainment nonetheless. The performance started with them displaying and racing some custom built vehicles (if you can call them that) made from chainsaws and strimmers. Thereby followed some demonstrations from Ford’s own stunt drivers in some Focus RS’s, a line-up of some the world’s most rarest cars, Reliant Robin racing, Japanese-style drifting and not to mention an excellent performance of indoor-driving by none other than The Stig.

After being given the opportunity to attend the Rally GB in South Wales, it provided a different sort of spectator approach to the event. Usually there is a grandstand. Some nice seats. Concrete to walk on.

But this time it was gravel. Then grass. Then mud. Then rain. Oh joy.

With our tickets not actually materialising the night before, it was left for ourselves to sweet talk our way in with a few guided name-drops from our accompanying sponsor, and we set about watching arguably the greatest ever rally driver that has graced our roads.

There are more photos available here on FaceBook.

All systems are go! Kind of. After what seems like a lot of coming and going over decision making, it appears that the road trip for 2010 is picking up pace. However, the time and effort needed to put together a trip across Europe like this only really dawns on you when you actually attempt to plan it. Probably one of the reasons why it is taking so long to confirm whether it was going to happen or not.

Stelvio summit in 2008, and on the exact same day in 2009 (right)

There was a lot of thought about changing my car, Rob has had time out (sort of) to have Reuben and doesn’t currently have a car suitable of gracing the Alps (no Rob, the old mini will not do), and Gav is still thinking about his Lambo.

So the planning is in its very early stages – i.e. still dreaming of routes and supercars – but nevertheless we are making progress. So much so that I’ve ended up trading in the trusty Clio for something far more sensible :) And one thing I have confirmed is the newest member of the Gorman clan goes by the name of VX220 (pictured above).

A standard N/A – none of that tubby lard stuff ;) – she is proving everything I was hoping her to be, and more. Only 24k miles for a 2001; a proper stripped out sports car and just like the Lotus’s, she is quick, agile and definitely the tool for the job. No luxuries in here no siree. There are a few more photos on BookFace. Next years trip is already getting juicy and with the transport bit out of the way, I can now relax and look forward to the planning.

Roll on 2010…

Swiss Alps this was not. The Peak District this was.

To mark the fact that it could be last time Rob went out in his Mini on a decent run before it is sold, we felt the need to celebrate the occasion with a quick run out to the Peaks. Nothing serious, but enough to give us a reminder of the summer trip we’ve just had.

And how did the weather respond – by giving us probably the wettest, damp squib of an afternoon possible. Fog, mist, rain, and plenty of traffic – things we did not have over the summer.

We planned the route using a special TomTom application. Download Windows version here.

We drove in a westerly direction from my house through Owler Bar, and then headed through Castleton onto the Winnat’s Pass. Some fun and games with a bit of the traffic, but with the weather being what it was we couldn’t do too much.

We had one incident with a pimped up Range Rover. Finding room from nowhere to overtake me, he slotted in a gap so small between me and Rob that I thought we were going to touch. After I radio’d to Gav to make a move on the traffic in front of him, Gav and Rob duly overtook the cars in front, but when the Rangie decided to go aswell he didn’t see me up alongside him. I’ve never seen so much black smoke come from the back of a new car, but he clearly gave the game away that he was a derv and so I duly re-passed him after a cheeky flash of the lights. He wasn’t impressed. I just smiled back.

After traversing through Buxton’s traffic, we turned off and headed up the A537 – Cat & Fiddle territory. Visibility suddenly dropped to 15 metres or so and the roads were serisouly wet, and at this point Rob’s Mini and my 182 came into their own and showed the advtange of front wheel drive over the rear wheel drive of the Exige.

Before we knew it, we reached the summit and the infamous Public House. The pictures show just how bad it was up there, and just made us think of the hot grippy stuff we revelled in back in June. Refreshments were taken onboard, and after being traumatised by the picture of a cat playing a fiddle we left to continue our journey.

More traffic was met with more rain, and the journey wasn’t exactly the clearest of routes. We continued up through Whaley Bridge and onto Glossop, before Gav pulled over unexpectantly. I got out to check what was happening, only to be told that lightening does indeed strike twice.

Rob was nearly out of fuel! Oh yes. It doesn’t matter if it was at the top of the higest peak in Europe, or in the murky industrial town of Glossop, his fuel tank was once again reading empty. The slow crawl to find a petrol station had indeed got Rob worried, and that he was hoping beyond all hopes that his little Mini would drink as frugally as possible, sipping every morsal as though it had the last drops of petrol on earth.

With just the snake pass and more traffic left to cover, we were left with the vision that indeed ‘motorsport can be dangerous’. Coming round one of the bends on the Snake Pass, we abruptly jammed on the anchors to find an upturned car.

This was the best picture I could get without the policeman giving me the evils. I’ve still no idea how anyone could upturn a bog-standard clio at this point on the road.

And so as a last fling, we bid farewell to one of the original roadtrip cars and look forward to the next motor in Rob’s garage.

Saluting the Cooper…

We’ve noted some good routes for the future, but to be honest because we couldn’t see much due to the weather it was difficult to get a good impression. Perhaps an earlier start time to avoid traffic for the next one.