Despite all the bad press, 2016 has actually been a good year for me – mostly down to the arrival of Owen!

My plans for 2016 didn’t exactly go as expected, Jen and I did get to Croyde, but I didn’t get a mountain bike trip to Scotland, nor did I hire a Morgan 3 wheeler – hopefully both are on the cards for 2017!

The year started with Jen’s 12 week scan – our first chance to see Owen! Then the Autosport Show and Leisure Lakes Mountain Bike Demo Day, both of which are regular features in my calendar.

The first few weeks of April were great – a trip to Santa Pod for my first experience on the drag strip. There wasn’t much rest for the MR2 – the next weekend we took it Croyde, a last minute decision, because I wanted to use it as much as possible whilst we were still a twosome! I had brilliant drives over both Exmoor and Dartmoor, we may have been restricted on luggage space, but the decision to take the MR2 really made the holiday for me. After being thrashed up the drag strip and a 600 mile road trip; it was service time for the MR2 – because I had a trackday booked the next month and wanted the car in top shape. The weekend after getting back from Devon, I had motorsport filled weekend: I met my friend Phil and his son William at Donington Park for the BTCC; then the next day I went to the FIA WEC at Silverstone with my Dad.

May started with another weekend away in the MR2 – up to Stockport to stay with our friends Rich and Anna, then over to Bakewell, via the Cat & Fiddle pass, to meet up with Helen and Hayley for Jen’s baby shower. The highlight of May was the track day at Donington Park – my first wet trackday, I had a fun lap following an Austin A35 race car. It dried off in the afternoon and I really felt like I was faster than my previous Donington track day. May was also the start of ante natal classes – things were starting to feel very real!

We didn’t get to our last ante natal class, as Owen arrived on the 6th of June, about 6 weeks early. This was a bit of a shock to us – we hadn’t finished decorating the hall, stairs and landing, let alone started on getting ready for our new arrival! He spent a few weeks at hospital, which felt horrible at the time – we just wanted to get him home, but looking back on his time there, we learned a hell of a lot from the nurses and I think we coped well when we eventually got Owen home! The rest of the year was dominated by Owen; watching him grow and develop into the cheeky little boy he is today – the last few days he seems to be sticking his tongue out at everybody! We have taken him on trips away to Church Stretton – with my family and Weymouth – our first holiday for our little family, where the photo at the top of this post was taken. Owen is the star attraction wherever he goes – especially since learning to smile, which he does a lot!

To celebrate our first wedding anniversary, Jen and I hired a classic Fiat 500 and spent the day touring the Cotswolds, whilst Owen enjoyed some time with his grandparents. In October a got the MR2 on track again, this time at Silverstone – once more I felt like my driving had improved since my previous visit to the circuit. The MR2 also made it into the Pistonheads Carpool in December and I seem to enjoy it more each time I drive it.

On my bike, I was never going to beat my 2,015km in 2015, in the end I only clocked 1,281km in 2016 – about the distance from home to Barcelona. The highlight of which was conquering my nemesis – “Cardiac Hill” at Cannock Chase. Annoyingly, I was 64km short of my friend Partho’s 2016 total – although he did need to ride all the way to Paris to beat me!

Owen is tucked up in bed, and we have a few friends coming round to see in 2017 with us (quietly), so I wish everyone reading a happy new year!

©Richard Long 2015

2015 has been a great year – possibly the best yet!

January and February were fairly quiet, I think we were mostly planning the wedding, which was a good move as from March things started getting a lot busier! Starting with my first trackday of the year on the Silverstone National Circuit, then the Leisure Lakes Demo Day at Cannock Chase, where I got to try some expensive bikes. We also went to London to see Frank Turner at the Royal Albert Hall as part of the Teenage Cancer Trust’s series of gigs – a great gig in an amazing venue, all for a worthy cause.

In April we went on our first road trip of the year – to Scotland in the MR2, also calling in at Scarborough and York on the way home. In May we started the redecoration of our front bedroom, the aim being to have it ready for us to move into after the wedding. We also went to Prescott Hillclimb to see the La Vie en Bleu French themed event.

June and July were both busy, in June I only had one weekend at home for DIY with a day out to Matlock Bath to meet our friends from York, my little brother’s stag do in London, then a weekend mountain biking in Wales, which was allegedly my stag do, but thanks to my best man Partho turned into a Welsh A&E tour. After the madness of Wales with the lads a relaxing long weekend in Croyde with Jen was just what was needed. The next weekend we went to a wedding, then the weekend after I flew to Japan. After a mammoth 42 hour journey home the weekend after and a trackday at Donington Park (which I really should have blogged about) it was already August!

August started with a Segwaying adventure for my friend Richard’s birthday (Richard took the photo at the top of this post). Also in August was Jen’s hen do, I took this opportunity to go mountain biking at the Forest of Dean with Jen’s cousin Richard. At the end of the month we were back up to Scotland for my little brother’s wedding – I was best man, so no pressure there! It was also the first time I got to wear my kilt and good practice for the main event in September!

Of course the highlight of the year was marrying Jen, having all our family and close friends there to share the day with us made it even more special. We are still humbled by all the kind messages and gifts we received from everyone. After the wedding comes the honeymoon – in our case a California road trip, a trip we had been talking about since we first got together in 2010. The trip was all we expected and more – I’ve still got the last few photos to sort out, but will be updating the blog posts in the next few weeks, as they were quickly posted whilst we were there.

Since getting back from California the last few months have flown by, I did another trackday at Silverstone, with Jen driving a session too, actually getting more laps in than I did. I got out on my snowboard a few times, bought a sensible car, spent my birthday weekend in London and completed my 2,015km in 2015 mountain biking challenge. We are going to see out 2015 with our friends in York.

Thanks to everyone who made 2015 such a special year!

2014 is another year which has flown by in a whirl of roadtrips, travel and DIY. Things didn’t quite go as per the 2014 plans I blogged about on the first of January – work got in the way out our European roadtrip and the dining room didn’t get finished until about the twenty third of December.

As is becoming common, the year started with a trip to Autosport International, this year was even better than usual as it was combined with a Pistonheads Sunday Service, which added an extra dimension to it. Later in January I also had my first visit to Race Retro, another local motorsport show.

March was the start of my travels, with an ace roadtrip to North Wales and Chester in the MR2, then the first of my trips to Japan for work. The Pistonheads Sunday Service at Morgan Cars was my favourite of the year, even if a puncture the previous day meant that I turned up in Jen’s Fiat 500. I enjoyed the tour so much I took my Dad back on his 60th birthday.

May was the start of our big DIY project for the year – building my garage! Which continued for most of the summer, with distractions for Coventry Motofest, Le Mans (which I didn’t get around to blogging about) and a trip to Copenhagen with Jen.

In September I went back to Japan for business, but more importantly I spent a week in Croyde with Jen and asked her to marry me! Fortunately she said yes!

The last three months of the year were spent renovating the dining room, as we were hosting Christmas dinner for my family and enjoying my new hobby – mountain biking! The latter of which is why this post was written whilst waiting at Walsgrave hospital A&E department, thankfully due to a dog bite, rather than any failed extreme manoeuvres on my part.

2013 has been another great year, at times it has been very full on trying to fit in work, holidays, house stuff and keeping some time for me, but I seemed to find a balance and have really enjoyed 2013. Aside from all the DIY skills I’ve picked up the new skill I’ve learnt is smoking on the BBQ, I’ve cooked some awesome ribs and am looking forward to trying pulled pork next summer. 2013 was also the year I got into watches, it started fairly innocently with a Casio GShock to replace my old watch which had broken, but ended up with buying an Oris Swiss automatic watch as a 30th birthday present to myself. Ooops.

Having friends round to see in 2013 meant that plans had been made to keep us busy over the next few months, the first thing we had arranged was a trip to the Autosport Show, which was a great way to fill the winter motorsport void. While I was there I had a few viewings on my flat – one of which lead to the sale, but more on that later! I also managed to break one of my wisdom teeth, which was probably the low point of my year, especially as I had to fly to Germany the next day. Fortunately after a few weeks of painkillers and soft food I was able to get the tooth removed and could get on with fun things again. Like travelling to Paris, this had been another of the new year plans I’d made with Partho, although we hadn’t planned on staying an extra day, which due to the bad weather we ended up having to do.

After Paris, the next few months were taken up with the biggest change of the year, selling my flat in Rugby and buying Jen’s granddad’s house (aka the 119 project) in Coventry (with Jen). Both the sale and purchase seemed to drag on, which gave us plenty of time to carry on with the renovations. The peak of the stress was the run up to easter weekend, when we had been told that we would be completing/moving, so we were juggling painting, fitting skirting boards, packing up my flat and dealing with carpet fitters, removal men and solicitors, only to find out the day before we were due to complete, that we wouldn’t. After the panic to get the house just about habitable, we decided that we would move anyway. It was sad leaving my flat, I’d lived there for five years and had many happy memories. We had a few weeks where we technically squatting, but eventually it all worked out. I lost a lot of money of my flat in the time I’d owned it, but it is great living in the house with Jen, we’ve now got off-street parking for both cars, can have BBQs in the garden and being able to walk to work means I’ve got more free time.

As I was walking to work my MX-5 wasn’t really getting much use, until the end of June/beginning of July, where we had back to back roadtrips planned. The first was to Scotland, for my wee brother’s graduation and a bit of exploring in the highlands, followed almost immediately with a trip to Devon, with a day trip to Cornwall thrown in too. That was almost 1,800 miles in about 10 days and the MX-5 had been faultless and fun to drive; the reality sunk in that I would only have the car for another 8 weeks – time to go car shopping!

The MK-5 was going to be a difficult car to replace, especially given my lowish budget, even though I’d said I didn’t want another MX-5, I was seriously tempted by a mk3, as my current car had been so good. They were just a little bit over budget for a good one, as were the Nissan 350z or the Lotus Elise I really wanted. While I was searching for a car, my criteria was that it would be suitable for travelling to Monaco, but I also wanted something fun, as the car would mainly be for fun drives out at the weekends. After looking at everything from Subaru Imprezas to old Mercedes SLs, I kept coming back to the mk3 MR2, despite the meagre luggage space it seemed to be the best car for what I wanted. After viewing a couple I eventually found a nice grey one locally, and for most of August I had two sports cars (the picture are the top of this post). Actually for the bank holiday weekend I had the choice of 3 sports cars, as I had a test car from work, which I took to North Wales, which was possibly my highlight of the year.

It was sad to see the MX-5 go back to the lease company, it was to be auctioned at Bruntingthorpe, so whoever bought OV11 EBO has got themselves a brilliant little car. Having said that, the MR2 is great, being mid-engined, it is snappier than the MX-5, but feels faster. One of its first trips out was to the PistonHeads Sunday Service at Silverstone, which for some reason I didn’t blog about, but included driving a few laps of the Grand Prix circuit, which was thoroughly enjoyable! Shortly after I bought my MR2, Evo magazine ran an article about which car to buy for £4k and the MR2 fared well. In the next issue they published a short write up of my 2012 trip to the Outer Hebrides in the MX-5, I was extremely proud to have my words and pictures in my favourite magazine.

In November things really cranked up a notch, I had another business trip to Germany, another business trip to Japan, including the Tokyo Motorshow, which I haven’t yet had a chance to blog about – or even look at my photos from. Then, after a day back home it was off to New York to celebrate my 30th birthday with Jen! We had an amazing time, ate lots of lovely food and saw the sights. We haven’t really stopped since, with work on the house, exciting projects at work, Christmas celebrations with colleagues, friends and my family before Christmas, then we spent Jen’s 30th and a lovely Christmas day with her family. The usual void between Christmas and New Year has been filled with decorating our front room and all of a sudden it is New Years Eve and I’m sat here writing this with an Edradour single malt (bought from the distillery earlier in the year) seeing the new year in with Jen & her best friend!