Newmarket and Ely Living Dec 2019 - Jan 2020

On a completely different note, did
you go to Silverstone this year? If so,
how many Grand Prix’s did you get to
attend?
I did go this year, it was great! I’ve seen
four this year, sometimes it’s five. But I
did three Europeans and one fly-away,
and so we send a chef out to all the
Europeans to support ROKiT Williams
Racing, and I go to Monaco, British,
Monza and America. Sometimes I do Abu
Dhabi and I might try and do Singapore
next year. I do as many or as few as I
want, but no less than three.
What’s your favourite?
Monaco is amazing but the racing is
dull. Monza is the fastest track. Italy, I
love Italy. But I love Silverstone for pure
racing, it’s a great track. It’s a fascinating
sport, and I think as much as we criticise
it, one minute you can have a dull race
and the next minute you can have the
most exciting race.
I know you are very involved with
charities, and you have the Michael
Caines Academy at Exeter College?
It’s probably more of an educational
programme at Exeter College where we
take sixteen students through two years
of training and they then graduate as
a Michael Caines Academy student. In
that time they have a slightly shortened
curriculum where they spend six weeks
in work experience and they have do
one ‘experience day’ a week, which are
cooking demonstrations, visits to the
industry etc. After these two years when
they graduate they are very sought after,
because of the experience they have
gained. So the academy is very important
and it’s doing a great job supplying the
industry with some much needed talent.
They are all like-minded and are fabulous
kids, and now in its eighth year we’ve had
sixty cohorts going through, and we will
continue to develop. We might increase
the cohort, and we might expand the
academy within other colleges. But in
terms of the charity work I do, I work with
seven different charities. I’m patron of
Families for Children which is an adoption
charity, I’m the president of the wonderful
charity Farms for City Children, I’m on the
board for the Exeter Chiefs Foundation,
which is the charity for the Exeter Rugby
team which do a fantastic job. I’m also
an ambassador and advisor to the board
of the Calvert Trust, and I also work
alongside Damon Hill’s Charity who
support people with Down’s Syndrome.
So it’s lots of different charities! But it
increases public awareness, and I’m
particularly proud to have been made
a deputy lieutenant to the lieutenant of
Devon, because through this position
I am able to work on improving the
network of charities in Devon, and get
them working together.
In terms of the success of the Exeter
Chiefs, and the work that they do – we
support seventeen charities every
year, but alongside that we donate
undesignated funds to a huge amount of
different charities. What we are seeing
is a way in which we can help charities
with capital projects, and last year we
got together with the Property Ball.
They raised £55,000 last year towards
charities, and we chose to match fund
"If you are a public
figure...then I
think you have a
duty of care to do
something and
put back in the
community"
that, and so between the two charities
we raised £110,000 to refit Devon
Hospice in Exeter, which was a wellworthy
cause and an incredible thing
to do. But it’s things like that, that are
about the community, that inspire you
to get involved. If you are a public figure
or you are someone who is perceived
to be a celebrity or you are successful
then I think you have a duty of care
to do something and put back in the
community. Not everybody does it but I
think it is important.
You can find out more about Michael
Caines at michaelcaines.com
and Lympstone Manor at
lympstonemanor.co.uk
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