Yesterday me and twelve other brave souls went out on my stag do. To celebrate one of my last days as a single man I decided that we should go karting, drinking and eating (in that order).

The karting venue was an unknown quantity but thankfully it was a nice little track and the majority of the karts were in good shape. We all got a practice run and then a number of heats to decide the starting line-up in the two semi-finals. The top three from each semi made it through to the final round.

The track staff had a fairly relaxed attitude to safety which meant I was able to wear the ‘attachment’ Steve had built for my crash helmet. Performance varied from kart to kart so everyone got a chance to do a bit of overtaking in at least one of their heats. In the final were me, Jeff, Duncan, Andy, Matt and Richard B. I fell back to last as I exited the first corner due to a game of chicken with Jeff in which neither of us yielded. I battled my way up to third with a bit of off-roading but was unable to catch Duncan and Andy in front of me. Andy’s prize for winning? A trophy and a bottle of Charlemagne! Andy – you seem to have left the Charlemagne at my flat… I’ll save it for when I next see you!

For our evening meal we went to the excellent Banana Leaf (pictures soon) before heading off to the pub. Avoiding the first pub which had some ‘Croydon street theatre’ outside, we ended up in the Oval Tavern.

Thanks to everyone that was able to make it – I had a really good day. Sorry that James couldn’t make it – get well soon James.

I edited some of the footage together… here it is in pixelated youTube glory.