Mansell was back at Silverstone yesterday

We went to the World Series by Renault at Silverstone yesterday. An excellent day of motor racing with the icing on the cake being the appearance of Nigel Mansell who drove several laps in his son Greg's car,



decked out with the famous red 5, at a blistering pace. Free tickets and free parking made motor sport extremely affordable for the estimated 130,000 who attended both days.

Looking back at my previous post, it brings it home to me the difference in hunger for success that Mansell displayed in his day and that shown by some sports personalities today. 15 years in Formula 1 and 31 victories marks him as our most successful driver ever. Shouldn't there be a role for him somewhere in our preparation for London 2012? Simply passing on advice on how to want to win may be a good start!


nick

Second is first loser!

Many years ago, 1973 to be exact, I attended the Wimbledon tennis final day. With a pal from school, we slept out on the street in sleeping bags to queue for the public ticket allocation. At about 7am, a bobby gave out numbered tickets so you could get some breakfast and a wash and return to your point in the line. There was probably less interest that year as there was a professional players boycott in the men's tournament. Heavy rain had postponed the women's final on the Friday and so we were treated to Billie Jean King's demolition of a very young Chris Evert and then saw Jan Kodes defeat Alex Metrivelli.

How times have changed and my sporting taste too. I wouldn't sit on the Centre Court today for love or money. I find it strange that after waiting so long for a British man to contest the final, the home crowd can be so gushing towards his opponent. Every aspect of a Wimbledon crowd's behaviour is exactly what I hate about British sport. If foreign players don't feel intimidated they've stepped into the lion's den, what's the point in having the tournament here in the UK?

During last year's Olympics, our eldest daughter was living in Australia. She noticed how the Aussie television stations would report that an Aussie swimmer had won a silver in the pool, but then completely ignore who won the gold or bronze. The Australian public simply weren't interested in who else was competing. Yet most of us with an interest in sport admire the Aussie will to win and their successes in relation to such a small population. We started to get the feeling of being the best from our magnificent Olympic cyclists. Winning is a whole lot better than losing, in fact winning is everything. Perhaps the LTA could print that on next year's Centre Court tickets?


nick

Crossroads North Wales Trustees

I had the pleasure of being part of the panel that interviewed three applicants to our Board of Trustees this morning. It quickly became obvious that all three were perfectly suited to the role and we readily agreed to recommend all of them to our fellow Trustees, assured that they will all add skills and vibrancy to the Board.

I value my position at Crossroads incredibly highly. We are approaching only our second birthday as the North Wales scheme, made up from six previous county schemes. I feel honoured to play a part in delivering a much needed service to the Carers of North Wales and as a new scheme, today added to my belief that we are building for the future. I feel incredibly proud that we can attract the calibre of applicant we saw today and I look forward to working with them in the future.


nick

Farrah Fawcett, the face of the 70s

A dumped ex-girlfriend smeared my Farrah Fawcett poster with toothpaste. I didn’t have the famous swimsuit version, I had this blue sweater one. After seeing her performance in Murder in Texas, I realised she was actually a brilliant actress as well as a pretty face and I’d recommend viewing the movie.

Sadly poor Farrah has died at exactly the same age, 62, as her sister who succumbed to lung cancer.


nick

Costs prohibit our youngsters activities

Why do we allow things to be so completely wrong for our young people? I was at a meeting of an organisation for young people last night and we were looking at some future activities. A new local 10 pin bowling alley was mentioned and it was revealed that one teenager had been and it was ‘good value’ at £16 for two games!

One of the hotels Julie and I stayed in Las Vegas had a 55 lane bowling alley in the basement. They charged youngsters 99 cents for two games. Guess what? The place was packed out with young people, giving them an affordable alternative to haunting a street corner.

Even outside this present economic nightmare, £16 is way out of the reach for many youngsters. To top it off, a colleague then declared that to enter a football side into a local league wasn't achievable for under £1,000 these days.

Total bloody madness!


nick

....it's the poor wot gets the blame

I'm thinking that the adage "One rule for us etc" couldn't be more true today than when I read government whip Mark Tami's reaction to the possibility of having over claimed on Council Tax. I'm trying to fit "I am going to look into whether I have over-claimed and if I have then clearly I will pay back any over-claim" into the scheme of things with a former constituent of mine who was summoned into an office, cautioned and then interviewed for failing to notify the appropriate authority of his newly acquired employment status, some two days after his right to JSA ceased!

I certainly don't remember him being allowed to casually consider the option of paying back any over-claim and I can vividly recall him being reduced to tears in our discussion by the ridiculous threats he'd received of a jail term as punishment for his neglect.

In the mother of all democracies, I guess there's still a giant chasm between an MP and a labourer in a brick works!


nick