My Gathering Thanks and a bit of Behind The Scenes...
I've been mentally writing this since Sunday evening, but had so much to do since I got back, coupled with trying not to do anything for a change, that it has had to wait until now to get written down. I really need to thank a few people (with reasons), then I'll do a bit where I go on too long about stuff that is a bit behind the scenes, then I'll wrap it up with bold plans 50% of which will probably happen. Ready? Good...
Thanks
As ever first and foremost are Charlie and Keith.
Keith is the other half of Retro Rides Gathering Ltd. and sorts out venue logistics, bins, security, insurance, catering etc. the less glamourous half of the show I guess, it is now a pretty slick machine after 9 years of doing it. The catering this year looked first rate. He is also dealing with the issues/insurance around the guy who had a car fire at the event. He is the one that probably looks most harassed on show day this year, I was half asleep at the entrance having had 2 hours sleep, he had probably had similar but was still having to run around and sort things out.
Charlie is my other half, and has been sorting out all our communication stuff this year (if you sent an email to Retro Rides she probably answered it), did all the ticket (and merch) orders, sorted out our merchandise supplies, flags and banners. Then she comes along and runs the merch stall with Alice. She also has to put up with me for the time before the show when my brain starts to break and the time after when I’m distracted by people’s comments, and for the rest of the year! She is the most awesome person I’ve ever met.
Closely followed thanks must go to Ian, Tash, Paul, Gillian and Tom. Ian runs our paddock and we couldn't do the show without him, he is hard on himself to improve and make it better, but he already does a sterling job. Tash and Gillian are the ladies in the sign on booth and are the front line for all problems that may arise. Paul and Tom help out Ian in the paddock and this year helped lay out the show field (the WORST job at the show)
Jody and Claire complete our regular helpers this year, they were put in charge of guiding people in the show field, a very pregnant Claire doing an amazing job. Jody helped us lay it out and is so cool and relaxed, he just gets jobs done. Having spent a rather intimate half hour or so with him, kfw and rmad in tiny hut trying to get out the rain he seems fairly unflappable as well.
On top of that this year's the show field was a curse word. We had a variety of helpers that came and went (most not foolish enough to come back for a second round), Robin (who also mowed some of the field for us to make the edges of the tracks clearer), Steve Speedman, Kev From Wales (who I'll come back to in a minute) and rmad all helped us get the show field in order. It is massively draining work in the hot weather with lots of walking, carrying and nearly always some miscalculation on sizes (damn field is a WEIRD shape).
At the other end of the weekend I want to thank the Magical Clean Up Crew who helped on the Sunday evening, who I'll come back to in a moment. Elk, Lisa and Andy stayed on Sunday so they could help us clean and do a second litter picking on the Monday, we were all there from 9 until about Midday, even after MCUC had already cleaned the field once.
Now the weekend was a HARD one for us this year and there were points I rather seriously vowed never to do it again, it simply wasn't fun anymore. Then an actually magical thing happened. On Sunday evening jaded and exhausted I was coming back to our base at the sign on booth and said I'd go and look at tidying the camping field and we could disassemble the show field on Monday. "Kev's already done the camp site... and I think they are going to the show field", and there they were, picking up stakes and putting it in the back of the truck. At my lowest point with our event for the last 8 years I rediscovered my love for it, this community and what it is all about thanks to Kev, James, Penski, Matt, Simon and I know there were others who I can't name (Rich? Dave?), please make yourself known, your attitude and awesomeness has totally revitalised me. It reaffirmed why we do this and who we are doing it for, I'm looking at something a bit special for the RR faithful which may seem a bit cliquey (something I really try to avoid), but there is something special there and it deserves some recognition.
On that note I'd also like to thank EVERYONE that came, the weather forecast was all over the place and we're very much outside at Shelsley, yet people came and took their chance on our little event, as you can see our organising team is VERY small in comparison to some events, so it is immensely satisfying that people get excited for our event and we try to pay back that excitement by putting on the show we hope they would like to go to, in many ways we put on the show we want to be able to go to, but ironically never get to enjoy.
Also despite being paid to help these guys need some thanks too, the Security guys were great (same company as last year but they (like us) learned what works and what doesn't), also our young firefighters and the senior ones were entirely the correct choice for the parking in the public car park and the retro parking areas.
The thing is even with all this thanks I've forgotten people, the guest cars that came (despite the rain), everyone that tidied up after themselves, the club stand organisers, everyone really that took a chance on our show...
Behind The Scenes! (long and maybe a bit boring)
Okay so this is probably a bit like sausages, you don't really want to know how they are made, but I'm going to talk through some stuff anyway. We arrive on site on Thursday, usually around lunch time for me, Keith is usually on site earlier. We decided this year to start setting out the field on Thursday, however so many other things were going on that we ended up starting on Friday. Robin turned up early as did Steve, so there were six of us doing the show field for the first time ever, previous years we've done it with three of us and I've always complained it is too few, but at the same time I've not provided enough information for anyone else to be able to help, this year would be different, six people, a pre-prepared map, a field we'd done before, it was all going to be okay. Four hours later, exhausted, tired, hungry and never wanting to see another stake or bit of breaker tape again we were done for the day. We'd only put the top and bottom ends on the rows.
Saturday saw us continue with the field in the morning all the backs went on the stands, which just left the club signs to go on all the stands. A changeover of teams (to allow Paul, Tomas and Ian to rest/recover before the show), saw Kev From Wales join me in the field, followed by Jody, followed by Simom at various times. KFW disappeared for a bit, but we were doing okay, and then he returned all apologetic (he didn't need to be), just in time for End of Days spec rain. Four of us ended up huddled in one of those little huts which had so many leaks we may as well have been standing outside, the wind was so strong it attempted to lift us off the ground, it was frankly terrifying. We only had a few rows left to do, as the rain eased up we accepted being more wet and finished off the field. Kev and Simon headed back to get ready for the Tat auction whilst Jody and I attempted to straighten all the bent stakes in the field. A job we gave up as light started to fade and we hit a wall of exhaustion. The security guys moved to the show field in the morning and straightened them all out for us, heroes.
I'd hoped to do the whole Tat auction thing this year, a chance to relax, but Charlie and Alice were staying in the B&B on site (the big house), and had bought the printer, after heading out for a chicken burger, we headed there to update my map (we had to move some stands around as we found extra space and noticed a few places where we were short). The wifi gave me the chance to find out that at least two of the guest cars weren’t coming (the Spice and the 037), and I had no contact from the Lancia S4, *sigh* … I printed off as much information as I could so I could leave it at the booth with Tash and co. I went to bed at around 11pm ... and didn't sleep ... in the end I think about 2-3 hours was all I got. Up at 5:30 to get ready for the day we headed down for breakfast at 6:30 which I could barely eat due to being so tired. I took my bacon in a sandwich for lunch and then went and stood at the show entrance to be a door whore and decide who got in and who didn't. There I stayed, half asleep on my feet, until a loo break gave me the chance to fill a flask with hot water so I could have a tea when I got back and grab a fold out chair (the traffic had calmed at this point).
Just before mid-day I stepped into the field briefly to see if I had any more food in the car, to see Dean of incredible Lotus Esprit fame running towards me, with a panicked expression on his face "A car is on fire" ... right ... I grabbed a fire extinguisher and followed him up the hill, it was starting to smoke a bit at this point. I found the senior fire fighters on the case already making sure people got back and no one got hurt. After the extinguisher was exhausted (along with a few general public ones), the fire fighters called to see if anyone could help move it and the most pristine Range Rover I've ever seen went and dragged it, using someone's tow rope. I was already on the move away from the scene, the fire folk were keeping people back (the crowd was growing though), and we needed to make sure no other cars came up into the area as we need to stop people getting injured by either the burning vehicle or from not seeing a car arrive behind them. An anxious few minutes later fire engines arrived, closely followed by the heavens opening up and everyone making a sprint for their cars.
Ahhh lunch time, usually I'll stay on the gate until around 1:30, cars generally stop arriving after that, and start to leave from about 2-2:30-ish . This year I left the gate at around 1pm as cars had started to leave because of the rain. It meant we couldn't do the awards, which we had got rmad with the van for and set out a really nice area to do it in. I wandered down to the paddock to see how everyone else was doing, generally okay. The guy with the car fire arrived and we exchanged contact details. I went back to the show field to see how Charlie and Alice were doing, check in on Simon (who was not having a good time) and see if I could see some of the show. The rain had settled in and people seemed to have just accepted it, umbrellas and hoods up, a British motorsports event in full swing. Unlike drag strips hillclimbs keep running even when it is wet, which if you can arm yourself against the weather makes for some interesting action on the track.
As the day wound down I helped disassemble the merch stall and load it up into our lovely Volvo, with some of it heading into the surprisingly spacious Datsun boot. Then the miracle of Kev and Co. happened and I almost cried. The rain had stopped and wandering the field with Andy, Simon and everyone else felt like something else, an affirmation of this whole "spirit of Retro Rides". We'd picked the field clean in record time and we headed back to the paddock/storage area to dump the stakes. Gradually everyone departed leaving the Monday clean up and tidy crew which included Andy, Elk and Lisa. We went for a roast at 7. Last year the heat had broken me so badly I could barely eat, this year tired though I was I ate with gusto, I needed it. We talked about previous years, about how the various people had got involved with RR, of the past and future. I went back to my self-catering place at about 9 planning an early night... 10:30pm saw me still on the (flakey) internet seeing peoples pictures and reaction. I slept the dreamless sleep of the exhausted.
Checked out of the self-catering, car fueled up, snacks ready for the journey home, I headed back to Shelsley for another morning of work. Andy, Elk, Lisa and I did a second (rubber gloves) pass of the camping field, took down the gazebo from the merch stand, threw away our (newer) gazebo that had been twisted by the Saturday storm, tidied up a few last bits and pieces in the show field and bid it fair well. It was approaching mid day by the time we were done and the TAB guys had a long journey home, so we gave hugs and wished them a safe (successful) journey home. Another couple of hours of sorting things into their right places and we were all ready to head out. After four days of pretty much non-stop work I jumped into the Datsun, heading home a slightly longer route (but one less like to have hold ups). It was thankfully uneventful.
What Now?
If you actually read all that I'm impressed, this is what it is like running the Retro Rides Gathering, and that is just my view point, Keith and everyone else has stories every bit as exhausting, it is a massive undertaking. Hopefully though you arrive, get parked up in the right place, enjoy the show and then head home. That is all we really want. It doesn't stop there, Retro Rides Gathering Ltd. is a business, albeit one that pays minimum wage to two people (neither of which are me, I am essentially doing it for the love), so now we need to do accounts, stock takes, pay all the services we used (skips etc.), and then look at what next year looks like. The show is preceded by at least six months work, and followed by a couple of months of follow up. For my part now I'm looking at how next year lines up for Retro Rides as a whole, the forum and the events. Oddly the experiences of this year have made me want to do more events. We've got the frankly brilliant Summer Holiday (you know it is good when I rave about an event where I had to sleep in a tent!), and I'm hoping to be able to do the Awards properly this year. I'm in talks to do another event, although it would be a collaboration so the retro side of things would be just one aspect of it. I really want to do another hill climb session of some kind to get people on the hill, maybe all pre-booked and no explicit show field (marking one out twice in a year would be too much). I’m also considering the line up for the Gathering.
I'm keen to get the forum up to scratch, it hasn't been neglected, but I've got a whole load of ideas I'd like to get in place, it seems Proboards are up to something too, so I'm going to have a chat to them and see what the future is bringing and how best we can use it. I entertained the idea of doing some Retro Rides Sunday Sessions, but it is probably the wrong end of the year for sorting those out (local meets again). Expect to see more community activity from me though, generally life has got back on to an even keel after an horrendous start to the year, followed by getting used to our house move and my working/waking hours.
Despite the harshness of this year's show, it has oddly revitalised my love of it all. The only current wrinkle for next year is that Shelsley want us to be on the bank holiday weekend (due to motorsports calendar scheduling), I fear that weekend because there is so much else on, and it could rain ... we've done that once, I'd rather not do it again ...
I've been mentally writing this since Sunday evening, but had so much to do since I got back, coupled with trying not to do anything for a change, that it has had to wait until now to get written down. I really need to thank a few people (with reasons), then I'll do a bit where I go on too long about stuff that is a bit behind the scenes, then I'll wrap it up with bold plans 50% of which will probably happen. Ready? Good...
Thanks
As ever first and foremost are Charlie and Keith.
Keith is the other half of Retro Rides Gathering Ltd. and sorts out venue logistics, bins, security, insurance, catering etc. the less glamourous half of the show I guess, it is now a pretty slick machine after 9 years of doing it. The catering this year looked first rate. He is also dealing with the issues/insurance around the guy who had a car fire at the event. He is the one that probably looks most harassed on show day this year, I was half asleep at the entrance having had 2 hours sleep, he had probably had similar but was still having to run around and sort things out.
Charlie is my other half, and has been sorting out all our communication stuff this year (if you sent an email to Retro Rides she probably answered it), did all the ticket (and merch) orders, sorted out our merchandise supplies, flags and banners. Then she comes along and runs the merch stall with Alice. She also has to put up with me for the time before the show when my brain starts to break and the time after when I’m distracted by people’s comments, and for the rest of the year! She is the most awesome person I’ve ever met.
Closely followed thanks must go to Ian, Tash, Paul, Gillian and Tom. Ian runs our paddock and we couldn't do the show without him, he is hard on himself to improve and make it better, but he already does a sterling job. Tash and Gillian are the ladies in the sign on booth and are the front line for all problems that may arise. Paul and Tom help out Ian in the paddock and this year helped lay out the show field (the WORST job at the show)
Jody and Claire complete our regular helpers this year, they were put in charge of guiding people in the show field, a very pregnant Claire doing an amazing job. Jody helped us lay it out and is so cool and relaxed, he just gets jobs done. Having spent a rather intimate half hour or so with him, kfw and rmad in tiny hut trying to get out the rain he seems fairly unflappable as well.
On top of that this year's the show field was a curse word. We had a variety of helpers that came and went (most not foolish enough to come back for a second round), Robin (who also mowed some of the field for us to make the edges of the tracks clearer), Steve Speedman, Kev From Wales (who I'll come back to in a minute) and rmad all helped us get the show field in order. It is massively draining work in the hot weather with lots of walking, carrying and nearly always some miscalculation on sizes (damn field is a WEIRD shape).
At the other end of the weekend I want to thank the Magical Clean Up Crew who helped on the Sunday evening, who I'll come back to in a moment. Elk, Lisa and Andy stayed on Sunday so they could help us clean and do a second litter picking on the Monday, we were all there from 9 until about Midday, even after MCUC had already cleaned the field once.
Now the weekend was a HARD one for us this year and there were points I rather seriously vowed never to do it again, it simply wasn't fun anymore. Then an actually magical thing happened. On Sunday evening jaded and exhausted I was coming back to our base at the sign on booth and said I'd go and look at tidying the camping field and we could disassemble the show field on Monday. "Kev's already done the camp site... and I think they are going to the show field", and there they were, picking up stakes and putting it in the back of the truck. At my lowest point with our event for the last 8 years I rediscovered my love for it, this community and what it is all about thanks to Kev, James, Penski, Matt, Simon and I know there were others who I can't name (Rich? Dave?), please make yourself known, your attitude and awesomeness has totally revitalised me. It reaffirmed why we do this and who we are doing it for, I'm looking at something a bit special for the RR faithful which may seem a bit cliquey (something I really try to avoid), but there is something special there and it deserves some recognition.
On that note I'd also like to thank EVERYONE that came, the weather forecast was all over the place and we're very much outside at Shelsley, yet people came and took their chance on our little event, as you can see our organising team is VERY small in comparison to some events, so it is immensely satisfying that people get excited for our event and we try to pay back that excitement by putting on the show we hope they would like to go to, in many ways we put on the show we want to be able to go to, but ironically never get to enjoy.
Also despite being paid to help these guys need some thanks too, the Security guys were great (same company as last year but they (like us) learned what works and what doesn't), also our young firefighters and the senior ones were entirely the correct choice for the parking in the public car park and the retro parking areas.
The thing is even with all this thanks I've forgotten people, the guest cars that came (despite the rain), everyone that tidied up after themselves, the club stand organisers, everyone really that took a chance on our show...
Behind The Scenes! (long and maybe a bit boring)
Okay so this is probably a bit like sausages, you don't really want to know how they are made, but I'm going to talk through some stuff anyway. We arrive on site on Thursday, usually around lunch time for me, Keith is usually on site earlier. We decided this year to start setting out the field on Thursday, however so many other things were going on that we ended up starting on Friday. Robin turned up early as did Steve, so there were six of us doing the show field for the first time ever, previous years we've done it with three of us and I've always complained it is too few, but at the same time I've not provided enough information for anyone else to be able to help, this year would be different, six people, a pre-prepared map, a field we'd done before, it was all going to be okay. Four hours later, exhausted, tired, hungry and never wanting to see another stake or bit of breaker tape again we were done for the day. We'd only put the top and bottom ends on the rows.
Saturday saw us continue with the field in the morning all the backs went on the stands, which just left the club signs to go on all the stands. A changeover of teams (to allow Paul, Tomas and Ian to rest/recover before the show), saw Kev From Wales join me in the field, followed by Jody, followed by Simom at various times. KFW disappeared for a bit, but we were doing okay, and then he returned all apologetic (he didn't need to be), just in time for End of Days spec rain. Four of us ended up huddled in one of those little huts which had so many leaks we may as well have been standing outside, the wind was so strong it attempted to lift us off the ground, it was frankly terrifying. We only had a few rows left to do, as the rain eased up we accepted being more wet and finished off the field. Kev and Simon headed back to get ready for the Tat auction whilst Jody and I attempted to straighten all the bent stakes in the field. A job we gave up as light started to fade and we hit a wall of exhaustion. The security guys moved to the show field in the morning and straightened them all out for us, heroes.
I'd hoped to do the whole Tat auction thing this year, a chance to relax, but Charlie and Alice were staying in the B&B on site (the big house), and had bought the printer, after heading out for a chicken burger, we headed there to update my map (we had to move some stands around as we found extra space and noticed a few places where we were short). The wifi gave me the chance to find out that at least two of the guest cars weren’t coming (the Spice and the 037), and I had no contact from the Lancia S4, *sigh* … I printed off as much information as I could so I could leave it at the booth with Tash and co. I went to bed at around 11pm ... and didn't sleep ... in the end I think about 2-3 hours was all I got. Up at 5:30 to get ready for the day we headed down for breakfast at 6:30 which I could barely eat due to being so tired. I took my bacon in a sandwich for lunch and then went and stood at the show entrance to be a door whore and decide who got in and who didn't. There I stayed, half asleep on my feet, until a loo break gave me the chance to fill a flask with hot water so I could have a tea when I got back and grab a fold out chair (the traffic had calmed at this point).
Just before mid-day I stepped into the field briefly to see if I had any more food in the car, to see Dean of incredible Lotus Esprit fame running towards me, with a panicked expression on his face "A car is on fire" ... right ... I grabbed a fire extinguisher and followed him up the hill, it was starting to smoke a bit at this point. I found the senior fire fighters on the case already making sure people got back and no one got hurt. After the extinguisher was exhausted (along with a few general public ones), the fire fighters called to see if anyone could help move it and the most pristine Range Rover I've ever seen went and dragged it, using someone's tow rope. I was already on the move away from the scene, the fire folk were keeping people back (the crowd was growing though), and we needed to make sure no other cars came up into the area as we need to stop people getting injured by either the burning vehicle or from not seeing a car arrive behind them. An anxious few minutes later fire engines arrived, closely followed by the heavens opening up and everyone making a sprint for their cars.
Ahhh lunch time, usually I'll stay on the gate until around 1:30, cars generally stop arriving after that, and start to leave from about 2-2:30-ish . This year I left the gate at around 1pm as cars had started to leave because of the rain. It meant we couldn't do the awards, which we had got rmad with the van for and set out a really nice area to do it in. I wandered down to the paddock to see how everyone else was doing, generally okay. The guy with the car fire arrived and we exchanged contact details. I went back to the show field to see how Charlie and Alice were doing, check in on Simon (who was not having a good time) and see if I could see some of the show. The rain had settled in and people seemed to have just accepted it, umbrellas and hoods up, a British motorsports event in full swing. Unlike drag strips hillclimbs keep running even when it is wet, which if you can arm yourself against the weather makes for some interesting action on the track.
As the day wound down I helped disassemble the merch stall and load it up into our lovely Volvo, with some of it heading into the surprisingly spacious Datsun boot. Then the miracle of Kev and Co. happened and I almost cried. The rain had stopped and wandering the field with Andy, Simon and everyone else felt like something else, an affirmation of this whole "spirit of Retro Rides". We'd picked the field clean in record time and we headed back to the paddock/storage area to dump the stakes. Gradually everyone departed leaving the Monday clean up and tidy crew which included Andy, Elk and Lisa. We went for a roast at 7. Last year the heat had broken me so badly I could barely eat, this year tired though I was I ate with gusto, I needed it. We talked about previous years, about how the various people had got involved with RR, of the past and future. I went back to my self-catering place at about 9 planning an early night... 10:30pm saw me still on the (flakey) internet seeing peoples pictures and reaction. I slept the dreamless sleep of the exhausted.
Checked out of the self-catering, car fueled up, snacks ready for the journey home, I headed back to Shelsley for another morning of work. Andy, Elk, Lisa and I did a second (rubber gloves) pass of the camping field, took down the gazebo from the merch stand, threw away our (newer) gazebo that had been twisted by the Saturday storm, tidied up a few last bits and pieces in the show field and bid it fair well. It was approaching mid day by the time we were done and the TAB guys had a long journey home, so we gave hugs and wished them a safe (successful) journey home. Another couple of hours of sorting things into their right places and we were all ready to head out. After four days of pretty much non-stop work I jumped into the Datsun, heading home a slightly longer route (but one less like to have hold ups). It was thankfully uneventful.
What Now?
If you actually read all that I'm impressed, this is what it is like running the Retro Rides Gathering, and that is just my view point, Keith and everyone else has stories every bit as exhausting, it is a massive undertaking. Hopefully though you arrive, get parked up in the right place, enjoy the show and then head home. That is all we really want. It doesn't stop there, Retro Rides Gathering Ltd. is a business, albeit one that pays minimum wage to two people (neither of which are me, I am essentially doing it for the love), so now we need to do accounts, stock takes, pay all the services we used (skips etc.), and then look at what next year looks like. The show is preceded by at least six months work, and followed by a couple of months of follow up. For my part now I'm looking at how next year lines up for Retro Rides as a whole, the forum and the events. Oddly the experiences of this year have made me want to do more events. We've got the frankly brilliant Summer Holiday (you know it is good when I rave about an event where I had to sleep in a tent!), and I'm hoping to be able to do the Awards properly this year. I'm in talks to do another event, although it would be a collaboration so the retro side of things would be just one aspect of it. I really want to do another hill climb session of some kind to get people on the hill, maybe all pre-booked and no explicit show field (marking one out twice in a year would be too much). I’m also considering the line up for the Gathering.
I'm keen to get the forum up to scratch, it hasn't been neglected, but I've got a whole load of ideas I'd like to get in place, it seems Proboards are up to something too, so I'm going to have a chat to them and see what the future is bringing and how best we can use it. I entertained the idea of doing some Retro Rides Sunday Sessions, but it is probably the wrong end of the year for sorting those out (local meets again). Expect to see more community activity from me though, generally life has got back on to an even keel after an horrendous start to the year, followed by getting used to our house move and my working/waking hours.
Despite the harshness of this year's show, it has oddly revitalised my love of it all. The only current wrinkle for next year is that Shelsley want us to be on the bank holiday weekend (due to motorsports calendar scheduling), I fear that weekend because there is so much else on, and it could rain ... we've done that once, I'd rather not do it again ...
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