Yeah Jim, I was thinking he meant flying across water overweight. The whole thing seemed nuts.

Tom, speaking of “they should make a movie” did you know that there is a movie coming out about Carroll Shelby?

It will be a hit here. I moved to this community not long after he died, but found out only recently that he was just one of the guys at the airport and knew most of my friends on a first name basis. He was born and lived only about ten miles from here. I really wish I could have known him. I hear great stories about him and he was basically just a good old easy going East Texas boy. I know a guy real well who grew up with him and they were very close friends.

My favorite Colin Chapman story was during the early development of the Esprit, the engineers were showing him the drawings of the rear suspension. He objected to a third member claiming that it was unnecessary. They showed him their stress calculations and he still insisted it was unnecessary. They eliminated it and got it ready for test driving. He came into town for a short time between formula one races. He jumped in the car and roared down the road. The engineers jumped in another car to follow. They soon came upon the car broken beside the road. The rear suspension without the third member had failed. They walked over while he was examining the structure and one of them said I guess we needed the extra member. Colin said something like; “that will bloody well teach you not to listen to me,” after which he jumped in the car they had driven up in and roared away leaving them to figure out how to get back to the shop with nothing but the broken car.