The Man in the White Suit: The Stig, Le Mans, the Fast Lane and Me by Ben Collins Read Free Book Online

unless you slow down, so don’t get stuck out in front or … Jeezus Chri st !’
    Colin’s gaze suddenly disappeared some way over my shoulder. ‘Look at ’er, she’s gorgeous !’
    Stil grappling with his advice, I looked to up to see the blonde bomb-shel swinging down the pit lane. Glimpses of her perfectly sculpted figure appeared from beneath a leather bomber jacket as she swished back her hair and beamed in our direction.
    ‘That’s my girlfriend, Georgie.’
    ‘You must be jokin’ !’
    He had a point. I couldn’t quite believe it myself.
    I’d met her when we were seventeen and she took my breath away. I fel in love with her on Day One
    – she has one of those smiles that make you feel like the six mil ion dol ar man. My mates and I were al horrid little oiks who spent our whole time playing rugby and pouring buckets of water on to girls’ heads as they walked beneath our windows, so I didn’t give much for my chances. But a few months ago I’d somehow summoned the bal s to invite her to a racing dinner – a very glamorous affair (not) at Brands Hatch’s onsite hotel – where she won a tyre trol ey in the raffle. She seemed to enjoy watching my car come back with fewer wheels with each successive contest. I can’t think why; she was far too attractive and kind to be with me. When she entered a room my mouth fil ed with tar, reducing my vocab to Neanderthal grunting. Yet here she was looking lovely and looking at me, but …
    ‘What do you mean – slow down to win?’
    ‘Rule number one: to finish first, you must first finish, right? With these cars you sit two car lengths behind the ones in front to catch their slipstream and draft past ’em on the straights. If you get one on yer tail, back off into the corner so he can’t get a run on ya.’
    I shared my newly acquired wisdom with Georgie over lunch. She was riveted. ‘So does that mean you won’t crash in this one?’
    ‘I hope so,’ I sighed.
    The race that fol owed was a drafting masterclass. I became embroiled in a four-way scrap for second place whilst the leader ran away. Against every instinct, I backed off through a flat-out bend to put some space between me and the three cars in front. I braked slightly early for the next corner, Sear, then smashed the accelerator.
    I hauled up behind the guy in front as he zigged left to overtake the other two running line astern. I stayed put and felt the suction of the two-car draft propel ing me down the straight.
    Whilst the relative speeds of the other three cars hardly changed, mine doubled. I pelted past al three in one move. I was ful y clear as I approached the Esses corner and was so excited I nearly forgot to brake.
    The leader was too far ahead to catch but I summoned the fury I found at Cadwel and strained every bit of speed out of my black bul et. I closed in on the final lap but not enough to pass, until he made a mistake at the final bend. I powered out of the chicane and we raced to the line. I won it by one tenth of a second.
    Crossing the line first meant the world to me. And I’d learnt some key truths about the sport. Had I forced my overtaking moves early on, I would have crashed. Had I not driven flat out through every corner of every lap, I would have lost the crucial tenth of a second needed to win. It was a delicate balance, knowing when to risk everything and when to hold back. Luck had been a factor, but at least I had started making my own.

Chapter 4
Snakes & Ladders
    M y second season produced a 100 per cent finishing record. A string of podiums and race wins put me into the lead of the Vauxhal Junior Championship, battling with talented pilots like Marc Hynes and Justin Wilson, two of the most genuine blokes in the sport. Marc was sponsored by Nestlé Ice Creams and looked a bit like one himself: a tal teenage vanil a speckled with hundreds and thousands. Justin was on his meteoric rise to Formula 1, somehow squeezing six foot four of northern sinew into a soapbox