Читать книгу Every Split Second Counts - My Life with Fast Carts, Fast Women and F1 Superstars - Martin Hines - Страница 13
ОглавлениеCrisps and a Silver Coke Bottle
I was always eager to learn, and my first trip as a member of the England team was another stage in my karting education. We were racing on a tight, twisty track that really tested our ability to focus, but I quickly realised one driver had mastered it better than the rest of us. This was the first time I saw François Goldstein, one of the greatest drivers of all time in any format. He went on to win five 100cc World Championships, a record that stood for many years until one of my factory drivers, Mike Wilson, went one better. I learned a lot by watching François race, especially about concentration. Over the years I noticed his parents would be in one particular place in the grandstand and every time he passed them he would give a brief signal. It had nothing to do with the race: it was just a discipline to ensure he was constantly thinking about what he had to do.
The weekend in Belgium went well and I thought I’d done enough to impress team manager Doug Jest and the rest of the RAC bigwigs. I enjoyed being an international but, as happens so often in my life, my habit of opening my mouth before engaging my brain threatened to get me thrown off the team. On the ferry going out, we’d all stocked up with far more duty-free cigarettes than we were allowed so, when we packed up to go home, we stuffed them into toolboxes and put them in the truck underneath the karts, thinking no one would bother to look there. Wrong! We arrived in Dover and were waved to one side by a customs officer. We explained we had been racing for England, thinking that would impress him. It certainly aroused his interest because he emptied out the truck and, of course, found the fags in the toolboxes.
For some reason I appointed myself spokesman, stammering out the first thought that came into my head: ‘Er, they belong to our team manager. He asked us to bring them back for him. We didn’t realise we had too many.’
That cut no ice and he confiscated the cigarettes. I was too naïve to realise that some probably took them home and smoked them or flogged them to pals, and for weeks afterwards I was crapping myself, fearing Customs and Excise, as it was then called, would turn up at the RAC and say, ‘We’ve got Mr Jest’s cigarettes.’
Fortunately, they didn’t, and I must have driven OK, because I remained part of the England team for about six years and was also selected in the four-man team to compete in the European and World Championships. It was a fantastic experience, travelling the world and competing against people such as Elio de Angelis, Eddie Cheever, future world champion Keke Rosberg, Andrea de Cesaris, who was already practising his crashing technique, Stefan Johansson and Alain Prost, all of who went on to become top Formula One drivers. It’s strange, I suppose, but, whereas these days all the top young kart drivers are dreaming of moving into F1 or another top formula, it never crossed my mind. I was just thrilled to be karting.
Racing all round Europe gave the whole Hines family the chance to explore life outside Britain and inevitably there were a few culture clashes along the way. I especially remember a meal we had on the Champs-Élysées, which almost ended in our being arrested. Dad was a plain-food man – egg and chips was about as continental as he usually ventured but, from time to time, when he was feeling very cosmopolitan, he might have a fried tomato with it. He was always a bit unsure of foreign restaurants and this particular place was destined never to find its way into The Mark Hines Good Food Guide, no matter what the man from Michelin said. To start with, it had one of those French waiters who can be very friendly when you arrive but, as soon as there’s a problem, decide they don’t speak English. The problem on this occasion was Dad’s meal. He ordered an omelette and chips and, while the omelette was perfect, instead of a plateful of big juicy chips, he received a handful of crisps.
He called the waiter over, waved a crisp at him and said ‘Non! What I want is chips – like those.’ And he pointed to a plate on the next table.
The waiter made out he didn’t understand, scampered off and never returned. If there was a prize for the master of the waiters’ art of managing to avoid your eye when you try to catch their attention, this guy would have been world champion.
Dad finally gave up and just ate his omelette but when he went to pay the bill he made it clear he wasn’t happy and wouldn’t be paying for the crisps. ‘And you can tell your mate there not to hold his breath if he expects a tip,’ he added.
Instead of knocking a couple of francs off and calling it quits, the owner started to argue. Then the waiter weighed in with his two centimes’ worth, having miraculously recovered his grasp of English. That pissed Dad off even more.
‘You stay out of it,’ he barked. ‘You caused this trouble in the first place.’
The waiter put his arm round Dad’s neck as if to lead him away, at which I jumped on his back and all hell let loose. The skirmish didn’t last long. A couple of hefty gendarmes appeared from nowhere and grabbed us. It looked as though we were destined for a night in the Bastille. Fortunately, as he was telling the police his tale, the waiter took his hand out of his pocket to gesticulate and a load of bank notes fluttered to the floor. It turned out that, when customers left cash payment on their table, he would pocket the money and tear up the bill. Suddenly, the owner was no longer interested in us. He had the police take the waiter away and then offered us a drink on the house.
‘Thank you,’ Dad said. ‘I’d like a nice cup of tea.’
There was something about France that always seemed to mean trouble. Towards the end of the 1960s, Coca-Cola produced a silver trophy made in the world-famous shape of a Coke bottle and presented one to a different sport each year. This particular year, it was going to be for karting, and they chose the six-hour international kart race in Caen in Normandy. We fancied it would look pretty good in our trophy cabinet.
Even with guys taking it in turns to drive a forty-five-minute shift, a six-hour race with no suspension is a bit like being pummelled by a Sumo wrestler – your body aches and your arms feel too weak to lift them up, let alone fight the steering wheel round bends and over bumps. But John Stokes and I were pretty good at it and had already won the Shennington International six-hour race, so we were quite confident.
We blew the opposition away in Caen and were in a great mood when we set off for the presentation reception in the evening. The third-placed team, from France, went up and received a handsome trophy and a whole load of expensive goods, including portable TVs. We looked at each other. This was clearly a competition worth winning. The second team, also French, were given even more valuable prizes and a bigger trophy. I was just hoping our van was going to be big enough to carry all our prizes.
Our names were announced and we went on to the stage. Beaming, the official gave us a cup and a cheap battery-powered radio each. We’d been stuffed. Still, we thought, at least we’d won the silver Coke bottle. But we should have realised this was France. After another announcement, the second team went forward and held it aloft.
‘I’m not having that,’ Dad said and charged up on stage. This was daylight robbery and suddenly the entente was anything but cordiale. The organisers tried to persuade us that the Coca-Cola trophy was for the first French team in the race but Dad thrust the programme under their nose and said, ‘It says here it’s for the winners. It don’t say anything about having to be born in a bloody beret or eating frogs’ legs. We won, it’s our trophy and if you don’t hand it over we will sue you through the courts.’ Eventually they had to agree and, even though we never received any of the other goodies, the silver Coke bottle still has pride of place alongside my other trophies.
John and I raced together many times and spent quite a lot of time in each other’s company, either travelling round Europe or at the bar he opened just off the Bull Ring in Birmingham called Bogart’s, a great name for a terrific bar. John had style and a silver tongue from which no woman, not even a nun, was safe. He was also one of the first guys to see the sense of opening a place that catered for all kinds of tastes in the same building: the latest music on the ground floor, bierkeller downstairs, and a smoochy couples bar with champagne, soft lights and sweet music upstairs. He and I also used to hang around the Steering Wheel Club in West Bromwich, which was owned by Sidney Taylor, who was to eventually nominate me for membership of the British Racing Drivers’ Club (BRDC). Among Sidney’s many barmaids there was one who was more friendly than others, so his club was the kind of place where you would pop in for a couple of hours and end up staying two days.
But, at the time we won the Coca-Cola trophy, those hedonistic times were still ahead of me. At that stage I was about to settle down and become a married man.
