[Aysedasi]

I went with my son on the Saturday this year, courtesy of my other son who won the tickets in a works raffle (he's in 'the trade'). I hadn't been to a GP (practice, qually or race) for over 30 years. You will need car parking., There is no longer any 'rocking up' and expecting to have a space. Despite the fact that I didn't know we were going until about 5 days beforehand, I managed to book a spot just down the road for a modest price and a 15 minute walk in and out. Well run and very easy access. As far as we were aware, there was no access to a grandstand seat with the ordinary entrance ticket. It was pretty busy.... We got there in time for gates opening and queued for about 25 minutes, I guess. We took our LM camping chairs and set up camp at the end of the bank at Vale. It filled up pretty quick but the crowd was jolly and pleased to be there. Then the rain came and didn't go away....

Despite the rain we quite enjoyed it, but Le Mans it certainly wasn't. We were astonished at how quiet the cars were, in all honesty we could barely hear them. Qually was entertaining. Food was decent but of course very pricey. Exit afterwards was pretty simple. We didn't wait until the very end of the programme and even with the walk to the car park we were off and on the road inside 35 minutes with no great traffic issues on the way home.

Would I do it again? Probably not - even with another freebie. Had I paid for the experience I wouldn't have thought I had great VFM. It was fun doing something different, but far from spectacular. Maybe we should have found a better vantage point but I didn't want to be miles away from the car when we wanted to leave. As a tick in a box..... well, it was just that.

PS Coppice is right about the screens - times on the big screens were completely unreadable.