star’s ultimate rock stars but they’re OK. Ordinary. Funny. They particularly liked it when we asked if they’d written ‘Sharp Dressed Man’ after seeing our sound man somewhere. Murray has a habit of tucking his shirt into his underpants.
Murray felt right at home at a Texas race meeting. All motorsport fans have no idea how to dress properly but you should see the lengths they go to to look daft in Texas.
The cars aren’t much better, because they aren’t cars at all. Inevitably, they’re pickup trucks, and what you do is line up in front of a big puddle. The lights go green and you try to get to the other side, 200 yards away, as fast as possible.
Some of the modified trucks were quite impressive, spewing up plumes of mud in their wakes, but most people were using stock Toyotas or Fords and honestly, basket-weaving would make a better spectator sport.
Then I found out why the grandstands were full.
The Big Foot truck is an awe-inspiring machine. It weighs five tons and sits on tyres which are six feet tall. To get into the plastic pickup truck body, you climb through the chassis and emerge through a hole in the Perspex floor.
Inside, there’s a racing seat, a five-point harness and a dash straight out of
You turn on all the pumps and hit a big red button which fires up the 9700cc V8. One blip of the throttle to get it running evenly and a gallon of fuel is gone. Think, Wow, this is loud, and another gallon has been spurted through the injectors. On the move, it uses one gallon of alcohol to do 300 yards.
They’d told me that it had an automatic gearbox but that I’d have to shift the cogs manually by pulling the lever backwards. The trouble is, they said ‘pull’ and not ‘wrench’.
At 6000 rpm I tugged on the lever and nothing happened. The revs continued to climb up past 7000, then 8000, until in desperation, I nearly yanked the lever out of its socket. It worked. I had second and we were going ballistic.
This monster accelerates from 0 to 60 in less than five seconds which is enough, but what truly surprised me was how those big fat tyres gripped on the wet grass.
A little flick on the tiny racing wheel and I was hurled sideways as the car canted over and simply changed direction. What made it all especially bizarre is that you could see the action through the Perspex floor.
They didn’t let me turn on the rear-wheel steering because they said it makes the truck a bit of a handful. And, I discovered later, they were beginning to wish they’d never let me go out in it at all.
Even after ten minutes, I was still having trouble with the gearbox and the telltale rev counter was stuck at 9200 rpm. This had, apparently, been accompanied by some spectacular backfiring, which had had the crowd on their feet and the owners on their knees.
I was blissfully unaware of the drama and having practised leaping some hay bales, was lining up for a real run, which involved leaping over a line of six cars.
It cut out. What I hadn’t realised is that to ensure the crowd would be safe if the driver had a fit, the owners have a remote control shut-down facility, which they’d operated. As I climbed out, one called me a crazy son-of-a- bitch.
Which, from a Texan, was quite a compliment. I’ve driven all manner of fast, large and expensive cars but my absolute favourite is that Big Foot. In an interesting country, it would stand out. In Texas, it was breathtaking.
Monaco
Hunting is one of the very few controversial issues on which I have two opinions. On the one hand, I can see it keeps Britain in touch with its glorious past. What sight stirs the loins quite so vigorously as a bunch of hoorays in tight trouserwear coming at you through the mist on a winter morning?
And let’s face it, the only reason every fox in the land hasn’t been shot, gassed and mangled already is because they’re needed for hunting purposes. So, if you like those cheeky little ears and that big bushy tail, you’d better get down to the meet on Boxing Day to cheer the chaps on. These people will hunt come what may, and isn’t it better they choose to go after foxes rather than cows or your hamster?
On the other hand, fox-hunting is a barbaric sport which has been taken over these days by ghastly people from neo-Georgian houses in Surrey. What’s the big deal about being ‘blooded’ anyway, a ceremony that should have died when we stopped burning witches. And poor little foxy-woxy being torn apart by those snarling dogs. I’m going to get a Parka and get out there in the woods with my aerosol.
I have the same problem with Monaco. There are two arguments and I subscribe to both of them.
On the one hand, it’s a lavatory and someone should pull the chain. It’s a police state, where pickpockets are shot but fraudsters are welcome to tea and buns at the palace. Plus it rains all the bloody time.
On the other hand, Monaco is the epicentre of jetsetdom, a playground where you need feel no guilt if you have a hundred mill in the bank because everyone else has more. Plus, it’s a sun-kissed paradise.
First, let’s get Monaco sorted out. It was a palace and a few ramshackle cottages right up to the middle of the nineteenth century when the casino was built. But even this exquisite building failed to put the little principality on the map. That didn’t happen until 1956 when the dashing Prince married Grace Kelly, a deal that brought big- time American investment and the European jet set. Monaco exploded so that, today, it’s a high-rise eyesore, a collection of sixties’ tower blocks and ageing face-lifts.
But more than all that, Monaco is a Grand Prix. It is
There was something awe-inspiring about the result. Street circuits were not new, but to watch the drivers sliding their cars past lampposts, under the Mediterranean sun and round the harbour was really rather special.
The first race, in 1929, was won by a Francophile Englishman called William Grover-Williams. Later, he was shot by the Germans. Perhaps that’s why Damon is so unwilling to overtake Michael Schumacher.
Or maybe he can’t. The trouble is that it’s pretty bloody hard to overtake anyone there. It was designed for a different time and very different cars so that today’s carbon-braked monsters are virtually unpassable.
The teams hate it but all the sponsors treat it as their annual bun fight, rolling up in droves aboard ever- larger yachts. They like to bring along their clients who stay in wondrous, glittering hotels and gorge themselves on food which looks like art.
The drivers don’t mind it either, mainly because so many of them live there. On any night of the week in the Stars and Bars you’ll find Schumacher, Hakkinen, Coulthard, Rosberg, Berger, Boutsen, Patrese, Moreno — even Colin McRae. Monaco is to motor racing what Hollywood is to the cinema. Only Monaco is weirder.
It’s governed by an elected assembly that answers to Prince Rainier, so it’s kind of like Britain in this respect, except Mrs Queen doesn’t interfere, and Rainier does.
Though it measures just three miles by as little as 300 yards in places, there are several districts, of which Monte Carlo is best known. Monte Carlo is where you’ll find the big hotels and the casino. Monte Carlo is the jewel in the crown or, if you like, the carbuncle on the arsehole.
Economically, Monaco is tied to France because they both use the same currency, but all similarities stop there. If something costs ?10 in France, it will be ?2.5 billion in Monaco. One shop tried to charge me ?65 for a child’s romper suit. We paid ?140 for two small bottles of Heineken in Jimmyz, the nightclub.
Money, in fact, is what makes Monaco tick. The police, the hospitals, the street lighting and all the other state services are paid for by a company called SBM which owns the four big hotels and the casino. This means that the local residents pay no tax.
Think about that. If Schumacher lived in Germany, 40 per cent of his salary would go to the exchequer. By having a flat in Monaco, he saves more than $7 million a year. That’s a lot.
All you need do to get in on the act is prove two things: that you have enough money in the bank to last a lifetime and that you’re not French.
Yes, to be born French really is to win second prize in the lottery of life. Your wife will have hairy armpits. You will have to converse in a stupid language, in which a table is somehow female. You will know that you have
