J'AIME JUNE 2019

other driver and
pedestrian we
encountered utterly
gobsmacked and
rubbernecking as
we whooshed away
into the horizon.
These cars can
be tuned to over
300BHP and have
Lambo shaming
acceleration, which
I nonchalantly
informed Aston
Martin Plowman
I would be using
to humiliate him
when he tried to set
a better lap time
than me around the
track.
Didn’t seem too
troubled, I have to
say, but he was probably still just a touch mortified
and ashamed about getting himself lost earlier.
Steve explained that groups of up to 20 people
hire his track and his buggies to race around. It is
muddier than The Somme and makes for some for
some hilarious entertainment with pile ups clumsy
enough to make Wacky Races look elegant by
comparison.
We would be going round the track individually this
day though, so as to see who could set the best lap
time and thereby cement his eternal status as the
fastest man at J’AIME.
As a gentleman I allowed Aston Martin to go first.
And he took his time for the first few laps but was
soon thrashing it around the track, mud and gravel
rooster tailing spectacularly all over the place as he
hung the little car’s tail out and mashed pedal to
metal in the ruthless fashion only a race car driver
can.
He set a blistering pace but then came into the pits
early because he had to dash off to his sewing circle
or embroidery class or some such nonsense. And so
he left.
And then your correspondent from Titan stepped
into the arena and I admit I had the highest
expectations that the snake belt glory days would
soon return and I would have a new swagger in my
step.
I had watched and learned from Steve Adams’
faultless tuition, had watched Aston Martin do his
bit and I had amped up the adrenalin in myself to
such unprecedented levels I might have easily been
mistaken for Caster Semenya.
Pumped, psyched, focused I had the eye of the
tiger as I strapped myself into the bucket race seats,
ready to tear hell-for-leather around that track,
leaving Aston Martin’s time trailing in my wake and
eating my dust and I set off with the tyres of the car
seeming like they were on fire, Steve Adams beside
me chuckling nervously as I threw his perfectly
weighted vehicle around the track.
On my fifth round of the track I reckon I had
mastered the art of going sideways very, very
fast and I hammered the loud pedal in my bid to
utterly thrash Aston Martin. I was heel and toeing,
balancing the car on a knife’s edge and, I sincerely
believe on the verge of true greatness and glory.
Right up until I stuffed the wee car painfully and
unceremoniously into a frickin’ hedge! Which
seemed to appear out of nowhere, if I’m honest and
I’m not going to suggest this could have been dirty
tricks on Aston’s part, but, y’know, I’m just saying.
That was that though. The end of the race. The end
of the event.
But anyway, I’ll be magnanimous in defeat and all
that and congratulate Mr Le Mans, well done etc etc,
(gritted teeth) and, of course, I’ll buy you a Peroni
one day.
And no doubt you’ll be happy now too, McLatchie,
won’t you?! You and that wee weepin’, bed wettin’
Desdemona! After all these years, you’ll be getting
hiiiiigh tonight in celebration!
But just mark my words, dear readers - crash or no
crash, I have lived to fight another day and this is by
no means the end of the matter. I’m just not one for
letting a grudge lie. You have been warned.
58