When a number of current Formula 1 cars appeared in the centre of London last year the media went wild but, sadly, the cars were constrained between motorway style safety barriers and had little opportunity to show their pace.

 

In early June of this year  FFSA, the French Federation equivalent of our own MSA decided to celebrate 100 years of Grand Prix racing by arranging a demonstration of cars throughout the ages around the streets of Paris. David and Lorina were approached at very short notice and asked if they would bring their cars and, knowing the flair of the organizers, were very enthusiastic. Frantic calls to Hall & Hall who, as ever, responded to the challenge, resulted in the cars arriving just three days later at the end of the Champs Elysees.  The intrepid FORCE duo figured they would get in some sneaky practice so on the Saturday purchased two rover tickets and spent the day touring the proposed route from the vantage point of an open top bus !

 

Come Sunday and things were getting serious, the weather was beautifully warm and the ‘opposition’ included a Prost F1 and our old friend Rene Arnoux in the first Renault F1 turbo car. Lorina was in her McLaren M23 and David brought his Lotus 49 which attracted enormous attention form a knowlegable French crowd. Front page pictures of this beautiful car were described as...Sublime dans sa livree    verte a bande jaune la Lotus 49 avec laquelle Jim Clark remporta son ultime victoire en 1968 a Kyalami...

Behind were luminaries such as Nick Mason publicizing his up coming tour with Roger Waters in his Bugatti and Mulberry founder Roger Saul in his fabulous Alfa Romeo.

 

So, of we set, the Prost true to form completed about 100 metres and expired at the first corner and then we wound our way on a 9 km lap of the best sites of Paris. Up to Trocadero and very crossed up over the cobbles with the police outriders giving us just enough room. Imagine the sight from the cockpit as you nose up the inside of little Rene Arnoux as he grapples with early turbo lag and no grip whatsoever and then lights it all up along the bank of the Seine. Of course now its getting competitive...the police bikers are not going to be shown up by a load of rosbiffs in some old cars. They are forcing their way through the traffic and using their batons to threaten any unsuspecting motorist who dares to slow the progress of this cavalcade, Paris is crowded with tourists and there seem to be thousands of them lining the route and applauding our ever faster progress.

 

The sight of the Eiffel Tower as we cross one of the bridges was hard to describe and then we roared down the Champs de Mars and left the glistening Golden Tower of Les Invalides (as shown in the photo above) behind. Finally we slid broadside across the Place de la Concorde with a wave as we passed under Max Mosley’s office window !

 

This was a genuinely surreal experience and our thanks to our hosts at the FFSA for making it possible.  If you get invited in 2106 to use up the last  few litres of fossil fuel dont miss it !