Many thanks to Alex for resizing the above pictures and posting them here for me.
I love Spa, and I had really hoped and prayed that it would be a relatively kind weather meeting. WRONG !!
We all go out for the early morning first qualifying session on a very wet, greasy and cold (4 degrees) track.
First corner as we leave the paddock is the fantastic Eau Rouge, and as I exit the top the 917 goes completely loose on me as if the front wheels are falling off. Strewth, I know she is a nightmare in the wet but this is ridiculous, but we keep going, staying in 4th gear except for the "bus stop" and "La Source". The slightest touch of the throttle and she is trying to swop ends, I kid you not.
I had noticed on the very first out lap that a NSU was parked in a gap in the Armco barrier halfway down the straight following Eau Rouge, but did not know why at the time. My survival instincts take another bashing when on the second lap I,m heading down towards Fagnes and out come the Yellow flags and lights, only to see my friends GT40 comprehensively top and tailed and bits of debris all around. He is OK but racing is over for him for the weekend.
A lap later and red flags stop the session while the 40 is recovered from its vunerable position and we are brought into the F1 pitlane. Decision time for me as to abort the rest of practice as I have qualified, or to go out again and tire myself out even more. Well two more laps and the chequered flag, and I,m back to the paddock. Tired through literally fighting the wheel to keep on the black stuff and much anguished about my friend and his battered car looking decidedly second hand by our transporters.
Now, why had my car been so much of disaster to drive, and why was that NSU parked up so early on ???? He had dropped his entire contents of engine oil just before I hit the same bit of track, and of course there was only one outcome as the pictures show. All that black residue coming out of the front arches and louvres is not brake dust and road dirt, but oil and it is covering the whole car. It was impossible to use cement dust as it was a soaking wet track and in all my years of racing and marshalling I have never seen any other car pick up and carry all the oil onto them. My tyres, because of the rain, had not been able to rub the oil away completely and the multi-coloured oil film was just dripping of the tread and sidewalls where she was standing !!! Excuses, excuses, excuses, I know but the proof was there for all to see, and it was just my luck to be in the wrong place at the wrong time !!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh ,the joys of motorsport !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!