Double Touch

Ever thought that a track day would be great fun but never felt like you could get involved due to one reason or another? Then MGs -on-track is just for you. I went to their Goodwood track day to find out more.

Damn this is fast! In fact according to my driver and advocate of MGs-on-track, it is one of if not the fastest track in the country. I’m at Goodwood motor circuit in West Sussex and this is my first experience of the type of thrills MGs-on-track have to offer.

As we come screaming by the Pit Lane after our penultimate, blistering lap, my driver begins to tell me about MGs-on-track and their philosophy. I learn that Mgs-on-track is a non-profit organisation formed to organise fun, safe and sociable track days for MG enthusiasts, and that it has a particular focus on breaking down the traditional barriers faced by first-time drivers. We hit Goodwood’s first corner, Madgwick; the considerable grip from my drivers MG surprising me once again. There is no body role, not a hint of understeer. As we pull cleanly out of Madgwick I’m informed that the aim of the club is to provide a much more accessible track day than your average one, a track day in which anyone with an interest in MGs can get involved in.

Indeed this mentality of anyone can get on track seems to be well implemented. At the event there are what only can be described as a plethora of cars, both modern and classic. There is an amazing mix of people too, young and old, male and female, inexperienced and experienced. The day oozes a kind of laid back formality and more importantly just plain fun. After signing on and an initial safety talk, drivers at the event are split into three groups depending on experience; beginners, intermediates and the advanced, before heading out a group at a time. For many of the drivers here today it is their first time on track. My driver though is in the advanced group and don’t I know it. We are heading into the right hander before St. Mary’s corner; you must take the former well as it governs the line you take through the latter. He seems to take the right-hander well, clipping the apex of St. Mary’s before using the entire track width as he leaves on the adverse camber.

Of course though these days aren’t just about the adrenaline rush, there’s also the strong social aspect as well. Milling around in the Paddock, drivers and non-drivers alike chat, eat and drink, tinker with their vehicle or discuss their previous track session. There are ample great facilities too with hot food and drink being served throughout the day and professional photographers on hand to capture your day on track. And what a track it is! Goodwood, still retaining its charm of the 50’s and 60’s golden years of racing, just reverberates history. Statues of famous drivers adorn its lush grassed embankments, posters and portraits too in the Jackie Stuart Pavilion.

As we scream down the Lavante straight towards Woodcote corner and The Chicane, I can’t help express my amazement in the performance my driver and the MG has displayed and how little my car and I would. As he cuts through the last two corners he highlights how far my statement is from the MGs-on-track philosophy, “you would be surprised by what a standard car can achieve… the only thing holding you back is your confidence.” As we pull back into the Paddock passing everything from an MG BGT V8 to an MG ZS, only one question remains… when can I go back on track?


For more information about the fantastic opportunities provided by MGs-on-track please visit: http://www.mgs-on-track.com/.

“Professionalism drives you to do enough to fulfil a code of ethics.
Enthusiasm drives you to do as much as you humanly can.” – Tom Francis.

Tom Francis, staff writer and former disc editor of Pc Gamer, is not the type of person you would expect to find working on the biggest selling PC magazine in the UK. In many respects he has had an unconventional rise through the echelons at Future Publishing and, as will be become apparent, it appears so have most of his contemporaries.
Francis started his career after graduating from the University of Southampton with a first in both Mathematics and Philosophy. Both of which are “more or less completely irrelevant”, to his job he notes. As for the other “writers on the magazine a couple have degrees in the sciences - two have
English degrees, but I don't think anyone actually did Journalism at University.”

In fact Francis is quick to highlight how little geared toward journalism his education and training was. “I hadn't worked for any other publications before joining PC Gamer, but I joined as a Disc Editor and graduated to a writer by contributing to the magazine on the side.” He also cannot write in Shorthand. “I'm not very old-school”, he admits.

So what did get Francis what must be one of the most coveted jobs in the games press? Francis recollects on that fateful interview: “I originally applied for a Staff Writer position at PC Gamer and didn't get an interview. When I was interviewed for the disc editor position a few months later, fairly late in the process, then-editor Mark Donald and technical editor Mark Sutherns were already pretty sure they'd found their candidate before I applied. I also wasn't terribly impressive on the technical questions, and I could feel myself bluffing appallingly on one.

But then they asked what sort of games I liked, and my answers… got us talking about games in general. From there the interview went wildly over schedule, the question-and-answer format disintegrated into a mutual exchange of bizarre tales of weird and terrible things we'd each done in games, and I laughed more than I did when I'm just hanging out with my friends. I was sure I'd flunked it on the technical questions, but I discovered later that that conversation clinched it.

Eighteen months later, Mark Donald took me aside and said he thought I'd be better used as a full-time writer. I didn't bring up that this was exactly what I originally applied to do, or that the application didn't get very far.”

Pc Gamer is based in Bath; to be precise a rather dull and uninteresting building on Monmouth Street, near the heart of the city. The Future office itself is not exactly what you’d call Ugly Betty material, open plan and cohabiting with four other magazines, it has a particular informal and close-knit vibe. Intrigued I ask him what it’s like to write for such a high profile magazine, and particularly, one in which you love the subject matter.

“We work to a four-week deadline for each issue, and everyone's pressure level varies during that”, states Francis. “My editor, art editor and production editor all work late and come in early for three or four days near the magazine's real deadline, when pages need to be proofed and signed out, and the cover needs to be finalised. My own section needs to be completed very early in the issue, but to
no hard deadline, so there's little pressure there. The pressure in my job is when reviewing an important game late in the issue, because the thoroughness of the review, the amount of copy produced, and the quality and balance of the copy all need to be at their peak at the same time. I typically stay late, take the piece home, and carry a printout of it to re-read with a fresher perspective first thing in the morning, then redraft a lot. The first draft usually reads fine, but I'm rarely happy that I'm doing the game justice or striking a fair balance of praise and criticism, and that's what I spend most of my time trying to get right.”


Indeed, for Tom this is clearly an issue of extreme importance and his writing is testament to it. I ask if a good example of this process could be seen in the recent Pc Gamer review of Bioshock. “That one was redrafted until 4am the night before deadline. Generally the better the game is, the longer I obsess over whether I 'm doing it justice”, he replies.

To be a good magazine journalist you need “clarity and enthusiasm” he adds. “You don't need to be a very funny or very clever writer - in fact, most bad articles are the result of someone trying too hard to be one or the other at the expense of actually getting to the point. Others just focus on one detail or point without explaining the information a reader needs to understand or care about it. You just need to be able to look at what you've written with fresh eyes, and see where you've failed to give a complete picture of what you're talking about. It's surprisingly difficult, and we all get it wrong now and then.

Enthusiasm is important partly because it always shows through, and that makes a more entertaining and exciting article, but also because it has a knock-on effect on how you go about your job. If I was writing about something I don't care about, like football, I'd always be looking to get the job done with the minimum effort. But because I'm writing about something I love, I'm more interested in the story itself than in going home on time at the end of the day.”

“Perseverance makes a good journalist”, he notes as we arrive at the finale of our interview. “As for how much I’m paid”, he takes a sip from his mug… “well I just don’t know if I can tell you that.” Today I’ve been interviewing BBC script writer Ian Kennedy on his life and times as a journalist and, more importantly, what makes one good. Both Ian and I are ahead of ourselves though, let us retrace our steps.

“Working freelance is hard,” Kennedy notes as he opens the front door of his flat and removes his white overcoat and thick rimed hat. “I don’t freelance as often as I use too mind, well you know, since I got the job at Silver Street, I haven’t had to.”

Kennedy is a script writer for BBC Birmingham and freelance journalist. Indeed for a spirited 26 year old, he has an impressive resume; writing not only for the BBC Radio 4 soap The Archers but now also for Silver Street, the premier soap on the BBC Asian Network. “The Asian community is right behind Silver Street, specifically in the Midlands… the Asian Network is very popular”, he notes as we move into his sitting room.

Ian started out his career in journalism at the Birmingham Post, the largest of five regional papers in the Birmingham area, shortly after leaving Nottingham University. After two years at the Post, he spent a few months writing freelance before, through what he tells me was a lucky coincidence, picked up the job at The Archers.

“Writing for The Archers was excellent for me”, he recollects as he enters his kitchen and turns the kettle on, “but it just never supplied consistent work. They hired you as part of a smaller team that would write in monthly blocks and… basically you normally only got a couple of months work from the show a year.”

Leaning back in a large armchair Ian explains. “Funnily enough I had actually gone back to Nottingham University for a lecture from one of my old professors; it was in many respects the last place I’d expect to find work. Basically the then producer of The Archers had come into the University to talk to students about making it in the industry and after the lecture I got chatting. Next thing I’m having drinks in a bar a few days later and starting a job on the show. It was really quite odd!”

As Ian pauses for breath I quiz him on his salary but he is uncomfortable and jokingly declines. That is, until he takes a sip from his mug. “Well, now I earn about 17 thousand a year… when I started out on the post though it was more like 12.” As I scribble down the paltry sum, Ian reclines somehow further in the armchair.