A Day to Remember

Longer term visitors to our journal will know that last year we were involved in a great deal of fundraising. This ultimately ended in our company purchasing one of the Gromit sculptures from the Gromit Unleashed trail in Bristol and it was for a very good cause as all the money collected went to Bristol Children's Hospital. One of many charity fundraisers we did was an auction of donated items and experiences. Annie and I successfully bid for the chance to visit the Caterham Formula 1 factory for a guided tour and that trip was today.

We took along two other F1 fanatics, good friend Martin and Annie's brother David and all had a fabulous time. We were taken around by the marketing director and we were allowed to really get in amongst all the activity in the factory (despite cars actually need to set off for the Austrian GP this afternoon). This included seeing up close the detailed processes from design through to manufacture of parts made from all manner of exotic materials. We saw some incredibly sophisticated engineering equipment, climbed aboard one of the team trucks usually seen in the paddock behind the pit garage, saw the design studio as well as chatting to engineers, fabricators and the lucky guy that gets to paint the cars!!

We were staggered at the attention to detail. Yes, Caterham aren't having the most successful of seasons but that isn't reflected in the effort that is going in to make the cars the best they can achieve on a budget that is dwarfed by most of the other teams.

We were a little limited in what we could photograph for very obvious reasons due to the hugely competitive nature of the sport. We were intrigued by (and allowed to photograph) the huge Autoclaves. They're effectively big ovens where carbon fibre components (from tiny widgets to through to a complete car chassis) are cured and it made for a great photographic opportunity!

The people at Caterham F1 were really lovely - so thanks to them for a great time.