Having suffered some criticism last weekend for daring to permit my topic to stray from cars, here’s a long overdue update on the M5. It has had relatively little use over winter – a notable exception being a trip to Wales for the Wyedean rally.

I actually forgot to blog about that. Fortunately, Brenden did so. Anyway, the M5 still had the Michelin Pilot Sports on the front that were fairly worn when I got it.

Legal, but tired, if you’ll forgive the pun. I therefore nipped out and got a pair of Good Year Eagle F1s – a quick £270 for 245/40R18s.

After a brief pit-stop at Vines BMW to pick up some bits for the tractor (more on that next weekend I imagine), I decided to pay to have the car cleaned.

With a new set of boots and a bath, the super saloon was once again restored to its former glory!

There were a couple of other niggles I resolved too. Firstly, as ever, it needed a dash of oil (E39 M5s use oil at a rate comparable to petrol it seems). Also, regular readers may recall I mentioned the windscreen washer jets were broken. I bought the replacements before Christmas, and this weekend I finally got around to fitting them!

In the above photo the old ones are on the left – note that one of the inputs is completely missing!

The new items were really easy to fit, and now they’re aligned I’m pleased to once again be able to say that everything works on my M5 – not bad for a 10 year old car with all the bells and whistles! Next weekend: tractor time. Until then, I shall admire my lovely new boots.

Prompted at least in part by Robin being asked to blog more, and also because I noticed that I completely failed to blog in January, and February is coming to a close, here’s a long overdue update from me on ’stuff’.

I’ll start with Di’s office, a room that doubles as my gaming room. Here’s a shot of the gaming end of the room taken in August, shortly after we moved in and began decorating:

Here’s a shot of that end of the room today:

The blue screen reminds me I’m in the middle of a Fedora Core upgrade on the server, but that’s probably a topic for a more geeky post. Most relevant in the above photo is the sub and two satellite speakers. There are two more at the other end of the room, plus a centre speaker behind the TV. I’ve also run a signal cable from Di’s computer, so there’s a choice of inputs from the PS3, the server, or Di’s workstation. This can either be in 5.1 theatre mode – great for Modern Warfare on the PS3 or films, or in general audio mode – excellent for music while we work or are entertaining.

I’m really quite disproportionately enthusiastic about this audio situation. I’m a really big fan of having speakers high up in all corners of the room. Music from a tinny point source just isn’t something I’m interested in; I’d much rather have music fill the room without needing to be too loud. Additionally, the surround sound experience is amazing. When playing Modern Warfare in the dark, the sound of gunfire and explosions going off in relevant corners of the room definitely adds to the experience.

Moving on then (ahem!), the living room. Remember this?

We’ve made some progress here. I started by ripping up the minging carpet. This reveals slightly less minging underlay. Still, we’ve had the room decorated, fitted some curtains and stuck up a few pictures. Finishing touches (like a replacement carpet and a new sofa) will have to wait until the hound can be better trusted.

I also want to get a modern surround sound system for this room (the one in Di’s office is well over a decade old). There are also speakers in the kitchen and dining room, and I really want to be able to chain the three rooms together in such a way that any source in any room can be listened to in any or all rooms downstairs. This will be so good not only for parties, but also for some banging tunes to do chores to.

As a general note I want to replace all the interior doors. Unfortunately they’re all a very bizarre non-standard size, so I’ll have to appoint someone to make nice white doors with glass panels to just the right size. Moving through that doorway to the kitchen and dining room:

We still haven’t done anything about the funny green walls or that revolting door, but we have had Alexander Barden round to fit new flooring. There was lino flooring in the kitchen, and it is just about possible to see the old carpet below the cupboard door. I did have a picture of the man himself, hard at work displaying his generous bum-cleavage, but fortunately for you, dear reader, I can’t find that photo. Still, we’re really pleased with the results.

Upstairs there has been progress in the master bedroom, taking it from this:

To this:

New carpet required here too, and fortunately this is a no-dog zone, so we just need to get our act together there. As an aside, I’ve replaced the three single sockets in this room with double sockets. I really despise single sockets! Why go to all the effort of cabling up, cutting a hole and purchasing hardware to arrive at a single socket. A double could have been fitted for such little extra effort and cost!

The darker wall there is covered in a really nice textured paint – just a hint of 3D to it. I did try to photograph it but I appear to lack sufficient skills to produce a picture that suitably demonstrates the effect.

Finally, while Alex was working here he also fitted a shower screen which has modernised and tidied the bathroom nicely:

One day I’ll get around to putting the side of the bath back on!

In other matters Di is currently catching some rays in Tunisia, and Snoop is growing up nicely. Without going into too much detail, it has been a few weeks now since he has done anything, even overnight, that means I can’t call him house trained.

Alex is now self-employed. He specialises in network cable installations for business, but has significant experience as a builder and so is generally available for home improvement jobs such as new kitchens, bathrooms, wall relocation etc. If you’re interested in his services drop me a line and I’ll put you in touch!

As this decade draws to a close I thought I’d reflect back on the motoring changes I’ve experienced. As we celebrated the new millennium I was the almost proud owner of a 1992 Ford Escort estate. With a lusty 1.4 litre engine it could barely pull the skin from a rice pudding, but it was mine and I could deploy that 75 horsepower to take me wherever I chose. As this period pre-dates my digital camera ownership, I only have this rather sorry excuse for a photograph:

What a beauty! I upgraded those 13 inch wheels to – wait for it – 14 inch wheels. With extra driving lamps I ranged across the country – I shared my first trip to the Lake District and even nipped across the border to Gretna in this machine. It had manual windows and mirrors, no central locking, no power steering – not even ABS. Looking back this was useful, as it provided an excellent bare bones introduction to motoring.

Yet this wasn’t the only Dagenham Destroyer in my fleet – hell no! I was also the extremely proud owner of a 1990 SWB Transit – used to cart around my sound and light gear.

A real rust wagon – powered by a 2.0 litre petrol engine that offered neither performance nor economy. Whether I was in the Escort or the Transit, I was always seen tearing around the streets with all the apparent vigour of a tortoise with gout.

Having had the Escort since acquiring my licence in 1996, during 2000 I began to look towards moving on. I was driving my dad’s car occasionally – a Vauxhall Vectra SRi (pictured here in 2005 at the Nordschleife entry gate – an episode I’ll cover later).

Suddenly I had all the modern luxuries – electric windows and mirrors, 15″ alloys, air conditioning, remote central locking – even traction control. Perhaps most importantly for me, its two litre engine developed 136 horsepower, with – compared to the Escort – very useful low down torque.

2000 was my first year of full time employment, so as 2001 arrived it was certainly time to stop borrowing the Vectra, and replace the Escort. Being 21, my needs weren’t very complicated: I needed to be faster than anyone else I knew, I wanted it to be reliable, and I had heard that rear wheel drive was A Good Thing. This ruled out the Peugeot 306 GTi6 I was considering, and the Audi A6 Quattro that wasn’t pure RWD, so I got myself one of these:

This car introduced me to a whole new world of motoring – both on-road and virtual. It absolutely ignited my passion for driving (and perhaps, oversteer) and also introduced me to car internet forums. The latter provided a double-edged sword – such forums attract all sorts – but one forum in particular led to some absolutely fantastic road trips around the UK. The first of these was a visit to the Lake District in early 2003.

While all this was going on my sound and light business had outgrown the little old transit, so I “upgraded” to a 1992 LWB 2.5 litre diesel effort. Look how beautiful it was!

Okay, so it was an eyesore. But it did offer significantly more load space and payload, and with power steering and a classic diesel chugger it was far more the freight machine I was looking for.

Still, back to the cars. With almost 200hp and over 200 lb/ft torque at my disposal, in the 328i I was fast, it was reliable, and RWD was good. After two years though it was time to move on, so in February 2003 I took the next natural step: it was time for an M3.

Still to this day this has been my favourite car. 321hp, 258 lb/ft of torque and a proper LSD. I didn’t care that the interior was a bit manky, and I liked the fact that it was a saloon and not a coupe. I used this car a lot. I shared my maiden voyage to the Nürburgring with this car, multiple trips to Cornwall, the Lakes and Wales, and had an epic tour of Scotland.

Sadly I was separated from this car by a local garage who rather carelessly wrote it off for me in March 2005. While the insurance wrangle was taking place I once again took ownership of the old family Vauxhall Vectra SRi. Of course, this was quite a step down, but as a utility wagon it was very useful. The transit had recently died, I had wound down my sound and light business, so it was a good one-stop interim solution.

There was however a complication. I had a trip to the Nürburgring already booked before the M3 was written off. I therefore had to take the Vectra – a grim prospect at the best of times – but significantly more so given that its gearbox was obviously broken. I therefore fitted a refurbished item and headed to Germany.

In convoy with an E36 M3, an E34 M5 and an E39 M5 the SRi was completely out of place – an utter embarrassment. However, it redeemed itself with some massive lift-off oversteer:

All jolly hilarious, until on the way home the car once again spat its gearbox. Having to come home from Bonn on a flat-bed transporter is horrible, and the entire trip was perhaps the low point of my motoring decade. The Vectra therefore finally left the family, and I was car-less.

By this time Diane and I were living together, so we got by using her Peugeot 106 Rallye. Despite being of French origin I feel this little car was certainly good enough to warrant more than a passing mention in this post. It was light, had over 100hp, and developed a good chunk of torque from its little 1.6 litre 8V unit. So despite being a touch unreliable and a FWD scrabbler, it was a lot of fun.

We had this car from 2004 to 2009, so it certainly made its mark on our motoring decade. So, back to March 2005 then when I was car-less. After much research, I concluded that for the money I’d received for the green M3 I simply couldn’t do any better, and so bought another M3!

Rather than the all-I-could-afford green saloon, this was perhaps my ideal E36 M3 Evo. Techno-violet with heated silver leather – this thing even had electric rear vent windows!

I had this car for a year, ensuring it took in all the usual Cornwall/Lakes/Curborough/Nürburgring trips, and even a camping holiday to La Rochelle. At the end of 2005, we once again – but briefly – became a three car family. Robin and I invested in a £50 Ford Sierra Ghia for our charity “Staples 2 Naples” rally trip.

The car was of course horrific, but everything worked, and it didn’t let us down at all despite thorough abuse all the way from Woking to Naples. We scrapped it in Rome and flew home; something I really regret.

By early 2006, despite the M3 Evo being a fantastic example, I felt it time to move on from the E36, so I traded it in for an E46 330d sport touring. This represented a significant step down in terms of performance and a shift away from motorsport in general. Yet the new car was a lovely place to be, extremely practical and pleasingly efficient.

In our first month together we went to the Lake District, to Birmingham, to Wales, to Scotland, and to the Nürburgring – some 5,000 miles! I chopped off the droopy tail pipe and sorted some nice straight tips, and changed the wheels to the more recent items (more recent above, originals below).

As we leave this decade, this is now our primary family car. We sold the 106R in 2009 when it became a little too unreliable, and frankly basic, for our liking. We’re now married, own a dog, and this is our car. I write this article from the Lake District – marking this car’s 4th visit there with me. However, this doesn’t end my motoring decade review – not by a long shot!

I realised that, much as I love my tractor (330d, above), it lacks a certain bit of motoring soul. I filled this in January 2007 with the purchase of a 1988 E30 M3!

With a screaming straight four and LSD I was back in the M-club, and what a party it was. I loved it so much I decided in July 2007 to upgrade to a 1990 E30 M3 Evo II.

I held onto this car for another year, during which it featured in two BMW Car Magazine articles and two trips to the Nürburgring.

In amongst all this I decided to take up a spot of rally navigating. Pictured here with driver/owner Simon Stevinson, I spent a few shifts in 2007 in the nav-seat of his E36 M3 Rally Compact.

It was a great little car, and Simon an extremely composed driver, who I can’t thank enough for being so patient with me while I learned the ropes. I had a massive amount of fun in that car – we had many battles, and I’ve even got a trophy or two as a result somewhere. It was fantastic having to deal with the elements, and at times fix the car, to get us through to the end of the day. I would have loved to have taken the next step to driving and car ownership, but I sagely (and perhaps boringly) concluded that I couldn’t afford to allocate funds in that way.

Ultimately though, when I became married in August 2008 I decided that both rallying, and E30 M3 ownership, and all the oil and rust which was involved, wasn’t really becoming of a husband. I therefore packed in the rallying and sold the M3. Immediately I realised that in doing so I had lost much of my identity, so 4 hours later I rushed out and bought a nice sensible family car:

That’s right, it’s a 2000 E39 M5 – 400 horsepower to you. This basically brings us up to date – we’re a two car family with a wonderful E46 330d sport touring and a V8 M5. The 330d is a great utility vehicle. I’ve modified it to play DVDs on the move to entertain my passengers, it has iPod integration, stealth sub and a built in inverter. It’s a fantastic, quick machine, boasting 200hp and 40mpg. We love it, and it is backed up by a super saloon sporting an astonishing blend of performance and comfort. While both cars have been around the block a few times (both just under 120,000 miles), they still scrub up nicely and provide everything we currently need on the road. Oh, with the exception of four wheel drive – that’s my prediction for the 2010s!

This sums up my review of the decade. Throughout these years I’ve documented a good deal of motoring action which has, in some parts at least, been well received. I’ve even landed a regular slot writing for BMW Car Magazine. I’ve had an absolute ball these ten years thanks to my cars and my motoring friends. I can’t thank those friends and family enough for their support of my crazy ventures, and as my last blog post of the decade I’d like to thank you all for reading, and wish you a very happy new year.

A couple of days of Lake District action to catch up on. I have been amazed by the constant severity of the weather here. During previous visits I have wished for a decent attempt at winter weather, and this time we’ve got it. I’m used to snow covering the hills during winter, but here we’ve got proper snow coverage even in the relatively low lying towns like Ambleside. As a result, many of my usual pastimes such as white knuckle rides over mountain passes are completely off the agenda; they would be a suicide mission, ending prematurely at best. Furthermore even the fell climbing I’m used to has proven too much.

Our aim on Monday was to have a bit of a walk and to generally give the antipodeans a feel for the Lake District. The morning was damn cold – some minus 4 degrees.

After a certain amount of scrapy scrapy, we headed north-west from Ambleside to Skelwith Bridge, and from there we walked to Elterwater – a beautiful little village. We parked the tractor up:

Got out our walking sticks:

We got our hike on:

Brenden loved a bit of it:

We made found a snowman:

It was a touch icy in places:

Brenden and Emily were clearly getting on nicely with the great British countryside:

Even Robin popped in to join us:

After a spot more trekking:

We happened upon the delightful Brittania pub in Elterwater. Hound friendly, a great selection of drinks, open fires, low beams, real ales etc – it had it all.

After a stride back to the car we set out to see how viable climbing Sca Fell would be the next day. As it happened, getting across the Wrynose and Hardknott passes just wasn’t feasible at all, so we attempted to drive the long way around. Sadly, even getting to Wasdale wasn’t possible so we had to scrub that idea. In any case, we headed back to base (Ambleside).

We found Ambleside’s “Royal Oak” to be most accommodating that night. The next morning we woke to find a stunning view across lake Windemere.

That (this) morning we decided that as Sca Fell wasn’t accessible. we should attempt to climb something else – settling on Helvellyn, the third highest peak in the Lakes (and England for that matter). Further reading on that Wikipedia page to which I just linked suggested that during winter months anyone considering climbing Hellvelyn should first consult “weatherline”. Here’s the entry for today:

Issued: Tuesday, 29 December 2009

FELLTOP CONDITIONS REPORT from Helvellyn at 1.30pm on Tuesday 29th December 2009. There is significant snow and ice at all levels. Snow depth increasesi with height to reach between 20 to 30cm. With the recent wind the snow has shifted and drifts of over 100cm are common with some evidence of loose windslab. The deep snow makes the going slow. Significant cornices have formed along the summit ridges, so please keep well back from the edge and advise others to do likewise. Full winter clothing, footwear and equipment, including ice axe and crampons are essential for anyone venturing out onto the fells. Several Lakeland tarns, such as Red Tarn, have frozen. The ice is not that thick, so please do not be tempted out on them! Summit statistics today (these are taken when the Fell Top Assessor is on the summit, they do not represent max/min figures for the past 24 hours). Temperature, minus 3.4C. Wind chill, minus 13.4C

Between the four of us, we were prepared to some extent: we had two walking poles and two water packs. No ice axes or crampons in sight! We didn’t know all this of course, so set off regardless. It was a picturesque journey north from Ambleside:

Upon stepping from the car we soon realised that yesterday’s calm, bright conditions were history; today was colder, overcast and damn right breezy.

We began our ascent, and quickly made progress. In the photograph below, the car was left at lake level:

The snow quickly became deeper:

The wind grew in strength:

The going soon got really tough. Hail in the face, snow drifting so fast it immediately covered the tracks laid by the person in front. Frightening stuff; time to sit down:

This picture just about shows the rate of snow drifting:

At this point, given that we weren’t fully prepared, we decided to turn back. Even those with crampons, ice axes and rucksacks full of various other unimaginable kit were turning back. So we bailed too. Fortunately romping back down the hill in deep snow was tremendous fun!

We had climbed quite a distance – certainly enough to justify a bit of relaxation for the rest of the day. We tried to explore the Kirkstone pass, but unsurprisingly, that too was formally shut. So with little else to do, we headed into town for some ale and whisky, pausing briefly to photograph lake Windermere.

So far, while the roads that have been closed due to snow and ice have certainly proved to be a disappointment, we’ve had a wonderful time sampling perhaps the most beautiful slice of English winter.

Today we waved goodbye to the hound, loaded the now repaired 330d, and headed up to the Lake District. From Woking’s grey drizzle we motored through Oxford’s sunshine, got snarled up in some West Midlands traffic and landed in snowy Cumbria within 6 hours – pretty good going.

Some views from the A591:

I fear the Hardknott pass and friends may not be on the agenda this trip! A quaint view from our hotel room:

We’re up here with Emily & Brenden, so check his blog for more photos (later, I imagine).

It has been an extremely interesting week for not only the British music industry, but also for the internet and social media. The battle for the UK Christmas number one single has been fought on many topics. I won’t hide my point of view here: I thought the X-Factor’s offering was painful at best, and I am delighted to have such an entertaining song at number one from RATM, but I would like to focus on how it happened.

Tracy and Jon Morter, a couple that I’d never heard of before, started a Facebook group originally titled “Rage against the x-factor“. It strived to get members to buy RATM’s “Killing In The Name“, in the hope that it might outsell the X-Factor’s single. Given that the power of traditional broadcast media and interruption marketing has meant that every X-Factor winner from 2005-2008 had been number one, this seemed like quite a task. Yet, although it was close, that campaign succeeded.

As I write, that group has just shy of 1,000,000 members. The initial growth was completely viral. Tracy and Jon invited their friends, who invited their friends, et cetera. This wave swept through my Facebook account. I can’t remember which of my friends appeared in my news feed as having joined the group, but it was enough to convince me, which means my other friends may have also seen it in their news feed, and so on.

Twitter became a vital key, attracting the attention of the likes of Stephen Fry and Bill Bailey. With retweets from celebrities came a massive following, with #ratm4xmas trending, and eventually crunch point: media attention.

Suddenly Jon Morter was being interviewed live by Jo Whiley on Radio One. Rage Against The Machine were interviewed and played live on Radio 5 – predictably ignoring their promise to keep the version clean – which of course attracted yet more attention.

Zach de la Rocha, Rage Against The Machine’s lead singer, was interviewed when their number one success was announced, and said something quite inoffensive that raised my eyebrows. He referred to the “UK kids” having “spoken”.

Here, I think he’s got it all wrong. Facebook’s insights would be able to confirm. If we consider kids to be those under 18, I wonder how many of them changed their usual music buying patterns as a result of this campaign. Aged 30, I am confident that I and my peers changed ours a lot. Prior to this week, I hadn’t bought a music single in over a decade. Why would I? Albums, yes. Yet for everything else there’s the likes of Spotify and Last FM.

Social Media has torn traditional marketing apart. It has reached to all ages. It got people’s attention when it suited them – when they checked Facebook or their Twitter feed. Traditional marketing relies on people observing bus shelter adverts, wanting to listen to radio DJs, wanting to buy a magazine or newspaper to see the adverts. In this case, it also relied, heaven forbid, on people wanting to spend their Saturday evening watching the X-Factor.

Yet Social Media marketing arrives as a message from your friends, when you decide you want to see it. Your friends have already done the research, they’ve shown an interest, and maybe you would like to as well. Simon Cowell and the X-Factor will be back – presumably at number one next week. This campaign has of course been a flash in the pan, but for Social Media, it is perhaps a coming of age. It’s a marketing tool that can be ignored no longer.

I need to take some photos of the cars for my BMW Car Magazine “longtermer” report which is due in today. I haven’t run the M5 for about 20 days now, and I’ve got a lot of decorating to be cracking on with, so I took the photos on the rather unglamourous surroundings of my driveway. I’ve decided to post them up here partially because it’s been a while since I’ve shown either of them, but also because it’s “cold, damn cold” this morning, and I thought Robin might like a little reminder of a classic British morning!

There are snow showers forecast for later today, and on this firm base it will lay, but those showers are also forecast to turn to rain.

On other matters I didn’t make a great deal of progress with the decorating yesterday, but I did bizarrely get the heating and upstairs toilet fixed. I would like to concentrate more on that task today, but Diane is out so I’ll be entertaining Snoop – an activity which isn’t compatible with a steamer!

Coincidentally, we’ve got a chap coming in to decorate the living room this week, the same week I’m largely off work to decorate one of the bedrooms. As work gets underway on both rooms, I thought I’d share a few ‘before’ photos.

So, the living room:

And the bedroom:

Clearly all carpets, power points, light fittings and interior doors have to go! Although the carpets and doors might have to wait until the dog is a little more under control.

On a geeky note, all images served on this blog’s pages are now hosted on Amazon’s Simple Storage Service (S3). It’s a great platform that ensures high availability and redundancy, so these pages should always be nice and quick.

Diane kindly bought me a PalmerSport driving day for my 30th birthday. What’s that then? I’ll let them explain:

In one perfect day you will drive a selection of the world’s greatest track prepared road and racing cars, and you will be encouraged to push yourself – and our machinery – harder than you may have imagined possible, and all in outstanding safety. It’s the experience of a lifetime.

So this Thursday I was up at 5am, ready to pilot the M5 to Bedford Autodrome. An interesting place!

I arrived to find myself 1 of 30 participants – a mixture of individuals and small corporate groups. While all very informal, it was to be a competition, with awards for each car driven. Some other attendees had their own lid and racing boots – all rather intimidating! A glance around the car park saw the M5 in good company – M coupes, 911s and the odd DB9. Even more intimidating! After a quick cooked breakfast, I was delighted to discover that the track was damp, and my first car was on slicks. Time to jump into a romper suit and pixie boots!

First car of the day was a Formula Jaguar single seater, billed as “a window into the world of F1″. I can certainly say I’ve never driven a car which requires the steering wheel be removed to get on board before.

Some stats on this car.  A 3 litre V6 generating 250bhp. The car doesn’t weigh very much, so it does 0-60mph in just 3.1 secs. The brakes are magnificent: no servo assist, but given plenty of beef they offer eyeball squashing deceleration. It has a clutch pedal, but gear changes were all applied through paddles on the steering wheel, and with the exception of setting off in 1st and returning to a standstill, there’s no need to use the clutch pedal. The throttle can be mashed to the floor, and the car manages the upshifts perfectly. Changes are fast, the steering is fast, the car is fast. It’s the perfect go-kart!

This certainly woke me up! I could tell I was doing well – despite some hairy slides I didn’t spin and I’m pretty sure I was in the minority there – but one or two others were certainly moving quickly. I can’t think that I’ve ever been in a faster car, and given how badly I cope with G force at theme parks, I’m a bit surprised I didn’t notice any issues when nailing the throttle, or on the brakes.

Interestingly – perhaps because we weren’t accompanied – the organisers chose not to rank our performance on best lap times (as they were to on most other cars), but instead on lap data. Needless to say I didn’t win this, but I can’t tell how well I did compared with my competition.

So we moved on. Mainly for a bit of fun to fill some time before the next real car was ready, we indulged in a spot of karting. Single engined, but in good condition, outdoors (wet), with enough room for the odd overtake. I was pleased to hear I obtained the 4th quickest lap time across the day (from that field of 30), just 0.96 seconds behind the quickest man.

Next I hopped into a Palmer Jaguar JP1 two seater, for my first experience with one of the trained instructors.

Now the trouble here is that I’ve never really been particularly interested in going fast. I am especially interested in driving fast machinery at least a little bit sideways. So here I had to put that to the back of my mind, and focussed on being smooth, studied my lines, and above all listening to someone who really knew the car and track. I quickly realised I could have driven the single seater considerably faster in places! Another 3 litre V6, but a slightly heavier car – still a 0-60mph time of 3.5 seconds though. Like the single seater, plenty of grip, plenty of power, loads of brakes and that fantastic paddle gearbox.

Certainly the quality of my competition became painfully apparent: I posted 18th from 30. Again I hadn’t spun, but I soon realised I had to try harder!

The 4th car of the day was one of the two I have been particularly been looking forward to – a Caterham 7. A traditional H-gate gearbox this time, but still a far cry from any car I’ve ever owned. Here’s my kind sponsor Diane modelling with a road prepared Caterham.

Fast, and grippy to a point, but then – the tail would wag. This led to a strange first lap while I got used to the car and my instructor got used to me. But then, we all clicked together and we were off!

Once my instructor had the confidence to shout “keep the power, keep the power” while we’re oversteering at goodness knows how many miles an hour, I had a whale of a time. Afterwards my instructor was most enthusiastic, telling me it was a great drive and a decent lap time. I came 14th. Hmm. Interestingly the 13 who were faster than me ran in the other session (we were divided into 2 groups of 15 for the day), so I wonder if there was a subtle change in the course, or perhaps if the track was dry for the other session.

Finally before lunch, we moved to the first normal car of the day: a race prepared Jaguar XKR. A 4.2 supercharged V8 producing 420 bhp, with paddle shift gearbox. So it should have been a lot more fun to drive than the M5, right?

Wrong. There were two main reasons for this. Firstly, I just didn’t gel with my instructor. He was enabling and disabling the car’s traction control system to keep things in shape. I wasn’t trying to power slide everywhere (really, I wasn’t), but when he was bellowing “more power” while effectively engaging and disengaging the throttle like a digital switch it made it rather hard to control.

But significantly more irritating than this was the car’s woeful, awful, and frankly retarded automatic gearbox. That’s right – while it has paddles like the Formula Jaguar cars, this was just a remote control for the pot noodle that appears to sit between the car’s engine and the prop shaft. As such I concluded that the car was rubbish – the M5 was significantly better – at least a league ahead.

All this said, I came 6th, so clearly everyone else had similar issues.

After a sumptuous luncheon we arrived at the moment I’d been looking forward to most of all: the Porsche 911 JP3. This was the first time I’d ever driven a rear engined car. These 911s had the 3.6 litre flat six that delivers 320bhp, gifting a 0-60 time of 4.5 seconds. I thought this was going to be great.

It wasn’t. Same story as the Jag XKR really. An instructor that I didn’t gel with (to be clear, all the instructors were good, but some more on my wavelength than others), and another shonky gearbox. I don’t like changing gear by appointment, especially when the engine is, most unnaturally, behind me.

A really interesting exercise certainly, but it did quench my thirst for a Porsche. I posted another 18th place. What a shame.

Without pausing for breath, I was straight into the next car: a Renualt Clio cup racer – the only FWD motor of the day. With a 2 litre four-banger and a 0-60 time of 5.2 seconds, it should have been fun.

It was! I got on well with my instructor, and the gearbox, and we scrabbled our way to an 8th place. More interestingly, we ran the Clio on the same course as the 911, and not only was I faster in the Clio, so were most participants.

Moving on, we encountered what transpired to be the best part of the day: a Caterham 7 pursuit challenge. Put simply, we got back in a Caterham, and had to punt it around a tiny circuit in a manner that required sideways action, culminating in a donut into a parking bay. I came 3rd! What luck – it seems that a smooth, calm driving manner escapes me; yet when yanking all the controls like an organist on speed is the order of the day, I excel.

Finally, an off road challenge. I’ve always fancied a spot of green laning, so I was looking forward to this. The course involved vehicle position tests, loose surfaces, insane gradients and towering ramps. Really good fun, and a 6th place to boot.

Overall, a stunning day. I really hurt for the following 48 hours – chest, back and shoulder pains which reminded me that while I didn’t really notice at the time, I had subjected my ageing frame to considerable forces. I’m very happy that I learned plenty more about driving, and about various vehicles that I would not normally have the chance to sample. I loved the Caterhams, but they’re not something I’m hardcore enough to own. I was disappointed by the 911, hated the XKR, enjoyed the Clio and really would quite fancy a proper 4×4. I can’t express enough thanks to my wonderful wife for not only making this happen, but so diligently documenting proceedings with the camera.

Despite my varied results, I came 6th overall – perhaps a sign that if nothing else, I’m more consistent than most.

The best thing about it though? It reminded me how much I love the M5. With the exception of the off-road challenge and the karting, I could have done all the other events in the M5, and I strongly suspect I would have done better in most. It’s an exceptional car – the super saloon indeed.

I’ve just finished putting the car back together, and I’m pleased to report a full recovery. Gear changes are once again quiet; the faint ‘clonk’ has now departed.

I’m disappointed I didn’t take more photos. When things start going wrong it’s easy to forget to document stuff. The removed part looked like this:

The new part can be seen in the corner of this photo:

This goes between the gearbox output shaft and the prop shaft, and provides a valuable bit of shock absorption. Here’s a good example of how a worn item breaks down – picture stolen from Andy Eccles’ excellent post on the matter.

The issue I had was that one of those bolts pictured above had become seized in the end of the propshaft. In the photograph below you can see the extent Alex and I had to go to in order to get it out. The 6 mm hole in the middle was drilled by me on Sunday. The next circular cross section is the bolt itself. The outer ring is a sleeve from the old donut. This piece was removed from the end of the prop shaft. Quite something!

When it came to test driving this evening, I had almost forgotten about the new brakes. I’ve bedded those in nicely – I’d forgotten what it feels like to have straight brake discs! So we’re pretty much there now, with a couple of exceptions. While at BMW today collecting the new bolts I also grabbed a replacement oil separator. When I get a chance I’ll look at fitting this, and straightening the exhaust that just doesn’t look quite right at the moment. This will have to wait though – I’ve got a stag weekend to attend to this weekend, and there’s a rally I want to see the weekend after.