The Racers

By Deno Chapman

Paddy Doherty, a young English twenty-something, has loved motorbikes for as long as he could remember, almost as long as his best pal, “Mucka” O’Neal. But a chance conversation over a pint, on a sunny summer’s afternoon, buys him a one-way ticket into the insane world of motorcycle racing. Stoically partnered by “Mucka”, the pair embark on an adventure into the adrenaline-packed life of motorcycle racers. Rivalry, romance, disaster and success pave the track of this gritty, earthy, humorous adventure around the motor-racing circuits of the UK. From the cold winter’s morning of their nervous first race at Mallory Park, the racers progress through the ranks, making colourful friends, and dangerous enemies along the way. Paddock parties, crashes, tears and above all, laughter run rich throughout this genuinely funny and heartfelt adventure. But how will it end for them, on a podium with champagne, or in a hospital bed? The Racers unfolds in a climax of burnt rubber, all the way to the chequered flag.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Oct 31, 2022
• ISBN: 9781398401778

Deno Chapman

Deno Chapman is a motorcycle racer who competed in several UK club championships, and the UK National GP250cc championship between 2003-2009. Now living in Dubai, he continues his passion for racing by writing about it, which in truth, involves much less debt, and almost no visits to A&E departments. Deno currently manages an airline maintenance team but maintains his racing motto of 'The older I get, the faster I was'.

Book preview

About the Author

Deno Chapman is a motorcycle racer who competed in several UK club championships, and the UK National GP250cc championship between 2003-2009. Now living in Dubai, he continues his passion for racing by writing about it, which in truth, involves much less debt, and almost no visits to A&E departments.

Deno currently manages an airline maintenance team but maintains his racing motto of ‘The older I get, the faster I was’.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to three people, all of whom were inspirational in its creation.

Pindy Sanghera was my English Literature teacher in high school. She taught Shakespeare with such drive and enthusiasm, it engaged me and lit the literary fire that drove me ultimately to write this story. Pindy, you started it all, and I will be forever grateful for your passion.

Gavin Lupton started racing motorcycles at the same time as I did. Along with his fantastic wife, Hannah, our crowd all quickly became great friends. Long after I retired from active racing, Gav continued his passion, but sadly lost his life after a racing incident, in the Ulster Grand Prix in 2017. He was the epitome of a motorcycle racer; focused, dedicated and yet fun-loving and relaxed. Gav is woven into many chapters that follow. Speed on mate.

Mark Fuller and I met in 1999 working together as aircraft engineers. We hit it off right away, our mutual love of bikes centremost in all of our activities. Over the following years we raced, laughed and sometimes even bled together, but his steadfast dedication as a friend, chilled style and desert-dry wit kept me going through the toughest times. Mark Fuller is the real Mucka O’Neal, for every smile in this book, he gave me 10.

Copyright Information ©

Copyright © Deno Chapman 2022

The right of Deno Chapman to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781398401761 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781398401778 (ePub e-book)

www.austinmacauley.com

First Published 2022

Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd®

1 Canada Square

Canary Wharf

London

E14 5AA

Acknowledgement

Circuit maps kindly supplied by Racingcircuits.info

Nataliia Vasyliuk for her wonderful cover art.

Chapter One

The Beginning of the Start of Things

The clock didn’t so much strike six, more like grabbed it by the throat and beat it about the head, such was the ferocity of the alarm as it chased away night and ushered in another day. It was one of those old-fashioned clocks, with two huge bells on the top, loud enough to muster ‘blue watch’ down their fire-stations’ pole, so a little over-engineered if you like, for the simple task of bringing our man back to consciousness, but bring him around it did. With a time-piece of this magnitude, any return to the land of nod after the bells have been silenced, is of course impossible. Tick-tock, tick-tock, far easier just to get up, and get on, get out and get started. But today there would be no hesitation. Today was Thursday, more importantly day 4 of 4, the last shift day this week, the third Thursday in March, for our man, the start of summer. Someone should’ve told Mother Nature though; grey dreariness squalled around in the air and lashed down onto the windows without pity, drenching all it touched. The sky was moody, made worse by the fact that it was still dark out, and all the wildlife around the stone crofter’s cottage knew it, they were staying put, huddled in their nests and dens, as our man jumped from his bed, and made for the bathroom.

The cottage stood alone in half an acre of rural Leicestershire, on a quiet road, not a few miles from town. A pretty, rose bordered Country Life centre-spread, it was not. The whitewashed walls were long in need of paint, as were the flaking window frames, but this only mirrored the general state of the property. The pot-holed driveway stood it fifty yards or so back from the town road, behind unkempt hedges, wild grass, and abandoned farm machinery from a different age. On the left of the house, a short way off stood a pair of old outbuildings; brick built and sturdy they’d once housed horses which toiled the land around the cottage, back in the days before your grandad went bald. In more recent years the previous owner had converted them to a machine shop, and this is why our man had taken the old crofters’ cottage on; it wasn’t the Victorian build quality, sweeping countryside views, peace and quiet, or neighbourhood watch. He’d bought it for the big sheds, and what he could keep in them, for now they housed horse power of a different kind.

Patrick Doherty is what his mother would call him, but a sandy haired boy growing up in the industrial midlands, with Irish parents, would never be known as anything other than ‘Paddy’. To Paddy, his name carried none of the racial stereotypes that a thousand stand-up comics had attached to it, it was different, and strong, and different names were good, people remembered them, and remembered you. His wiry build was impressive, held no spare weight, born of the kind of metabolism weight-watchers’ clients would sell a kidney for. The man could eat a pie factory, and still look like he’d just run a marathon. I know what you’re thinking, ‘bastard’ but at 25, he was still young enough for that to change. Paddy dragged a Bic razor across his face, brushed his teeth, and then dropped down the cottage stairs 3 at a time. At this time of day, only caffeine would do, so he stirred up a cup of Nescafe’s finest, and pondered the day ahead, sat at the old kitchen table, which looked like it had been in that spot longer than the cottage itself.

The last day of a shift of 4 was always the best, whether it fell on a Monday, or a Sunday, and today was no exception. In fact today was going to be even better, because at 7 o’clock tonight, the weekend, and the summer officially started, as the motorcycle racing season kicked off. Our man pulled out his mobile phone and sent a text to a number familiar to him, it simply read…

Bring it on!

Nine miles away the recipient of the text was just pulling out of his drive when he read the words. A wry smile spread across his face, his emerald eyes betraying the excitement beneath.

Fuckin’ right! went the reply.

Paddy jumped aboard the Doherty express, a large old Transit van, sprayed in the kind of purple usually reserved for the set of an Austin Powers film. Inside, the van had had a low-grade camper conversion, which amounted to the fitting of carpets, and some bench seats in the back that doubled as stowage’s. Not the Ritz, more like an old porn set but you could live in it, well, for a weekend, or that was the plan anyway when he’d bought it a couple of months before. The heavy old diesel motor clattered loudly into life, but the cloud of black smoke didn’t hang around, whisked away by the fierce intensity of March at its best. So, off to work he went glancing briefly at the horizon, looking for some small glimmer of a distant sun. There wasn’t one.

The journey to work was so familiar to him; he regularly took the long route, just for a change, but not today. Today he went directly along the shortest route, and it being a week day, the familiar sites of people starting their day punctuated the journey like milestones along the way; same people, same places, same times. It became a long-standing game to guess who’d be around the next corner, doing whatever; down the hill into Gattesby high street, there’d be a milk float with its side lights on and an orange flashing beacon. Over the years Paddy had deduced that its progress up the street was directly proportional to a couple of key factors (in his experience); weather, (obviously), and day of the week, (people order more extras on the weekends, and so slow the driver down). Due to the driving rain and being a Thursday, he guessed it’d be pretty far down the hill, earlier on its round, around about The Duke of Lancaster pub. However, on turning onto the high street, there was no milkman to be found. This surprised Paddy, and he subconsciously rubbed sleep from his eyes with his free hand. Then his thoughts returned to the days’ task of getting work over and done with, so the important stuff could start; the fun stuff, the reason you go to work stuff, the stuff he lived for.

For as long as he could remember, Paddy had loved motorbikes. As a child in the terraced, working class jungle of the inner city, he’d sat all day long on the street corner, watching and listening for the sound of bikes coming from far off. Reminiscent of boys in the same city during the war; spotting aircraft and trying to decide if they were friend or foe, Paddy and his close-knit gang of mates entered their teenage years debating the audible idiosyncrasies of the Yamaha RD350LC, and the Kawasaki Z1000, then watching in awe as they sped by, their riders uniformed in the leather jacket, jeans and trainers of the day. Cars were for transport, for getting from A to B, they were the oxen of the roads. Bikes were for fun. So embedded was this principle, to soul defining depth in his psyche, that it had never occurred to him to even consider being without a bike, ’cos that would just be unnatural! He lived and breathed two-stroke fumes, petrol ran through his veins. Paddy was a biker.

‘Get work out of the way as soon as possible. Try for an early stack, then get back and finish the bike off, ready for Saturday.’

Simple.

The technicalities involved with preparing a bike for a race meeting were not complicated, more straightforward small modifications, which were all but complete. But for Paddy, this was the first time he’d done it, for this weekend would be his first race ever. The decision to start racing had been taken some seven months before, discussed over a cold beer, on a hot day. Back in September the sun had shone, and it all seemed like the most natural thing in the world to move from riding on the road, to racing on the track. On that sunny day, he and his partner in crime, Mucka O’Neal (the recipient of the text message), had been on a ride out through the lanes of the local counties, (strictly obeying the speed limits, and never wheelieing past Volvo’s, not at all!). After a while they had stopped at a regular countryside biker haunt, popular for its cold beer and cheese and onion cobs that burned the roof of your mouth. They’d sat outside on a wooden bench bathed in sunshine, contemplating the world…

Did you see the GP race yesterday? said Paddy.

Aye, affirmed Mucka. Superb, the guy’s awesome, no one’s gonnatouch him this year, not the way he’s going. His south Yorkshire accent Was a little alien to the area, but after 15 years in the midlands, wasn’t strong enough to stand out.

True, he’s on a different level that’s for sure. A bit like me back there. Paddy grinned as he looked sideways, implying Mucka wasn’t able to keep up with him. What kept you?

Ballocks! came Mucka’s reply. I’d kick your arse any day of the week, Wednesday being a fucking prime example. He referred to the open track-day they’d attended the previous week.

That don’t count, my gearing was wrong, anyway Snetterton’s a shit track, I hate it.

Yeah, I’m sure that works for Valentino Rossi too! Sorry I didn’t win at Donington today, Mr Honda, it’s a shit track I hate it!

The two of them giggled like school boys, one affecting the other with the infectious laughter, the other returning it with interest until they reached shoulder bouncing, half suppressed giggles which spilt a third of their beer and turned half the heads about them.

Some life though eh? surmised Paddy. Riding bikes, fast, for a living, earning shit-loads and all the women you can eat!

There was a pause.

You’re not supposed to fucking eat them mate!

Speak for yourself; they don’t call me Doctor Tongue for nothing!

More laughter. Then there was a pause in conversation while they contemplated the thought, whilst savouring the crusty bread, strong cheese, and moist onion, washed down with cold beer-always a thought enhancing combination.

Seriously though… Paddy broke the silence. Have you ever thought what it’d be like to do it for real?

What? Race?

Yeah. Thing is, on the road you’re always dodging coppers, man-hole covers and bloody Volvo’s. So, you go and do track days, and they show their arses if you overtake anyone. It can’t be that hard?

The two of them exchanged a glance which without words betrayed the fact they both knew that wasn’t true, a glance though that would shape their lives for many years to come.

I’d still kick your arse. Quirked Mucka.

Fuck it, let’s do it!

What was going to be a short pit-stop, turned into an impromptu planning meeting/feasibility study on how to start racing, from funding to equipment, transport, facilities, and not least of all what bikes to use. After leaving The Pig and Whistle two hours later, they rode back to Paddy’s place in business-like fashion. No long route, just straight home asap, so they could fire up the internet, and start researching data on their new project, and life-long ambition.

The smells of a summer ride home, in glorious sunshine seemed to linger in Paddy’s nose a second, before disappearing, as he rounded the corner at the bottom of Gattesby village, and steadily chugged off into the countryside toward the city road. Half a mile further on, he passed a milk-float, coming the opposite way, a youthful, baseball-capped driver at the wheel.

Aahh, stand-in driver that explains it!

Parking at work was never an issue, after all if you can’t park your car at a car production factory, where can you? Paddy had a usual spot, quite a distance from the entry door on the side of the maintenance facility, at the north end of the Silver shed (so-called because of the colour of the roofing material, but a ‘shed’ it was not, over half a mile long, it was one of the largest production plants in the world, British engineering made possible with Japanese money). There was also a ‘brown shed’ of similar size; hence, the necessary distinction between the colours. He’d always parked his van there to avoid all the usual stresses of parking an 18-foot vehicle in a 10-foot slot, and the associated ‘Gaffer’ induced aggro that it would bring with it. The ‘Katano’ car plant was an equal opportunities employer, but that didn’t stretch to those who were vehicularly challenged; hang eight feet of rusting purple metal into one of the ‘shirts’ parking spaces, and your approachable, mild-mannered middle-class manager got all territorial, and Feudal on yer arse. Better just to park over the back and walk the extra 200 yards to the door. There was a spring in Paddy’s step, and he half skipped to the facility door. Ten to seven, in plenty of time too. At this time of day, there were queues at all the other facility doors because of the delay involved in clocking on once through them, but not at ‘maintenance’.

Workers at the car plant were broadly speaking split into three groups; Production – the guys who actually pieced the cars together; Admin – the office/support/managerial staff; and Maintenance – the guys who kept the plant running and maintained the hugely sophisticated robotic equipment that helped assemble the cars. Paddy, and Mucka were both part of the ‘maint’ team, and damned lucky to be so too. Maint staff were the best paid and best trained of the shop-floor staff. Their jobs involved huge responsibility, and technical expertise, and Paddy relished the importance of it all, not to mention that all important distinction between them, and the rest; the production staff. Prod staff pushed buttons, screwed in dash-boards, and monitored paint finishes. All of which was conducted on a continuously moving conveyor belt, their lives likened to hamsters on a wheel. Maint staff were far more autonomous, and although they clocked in and out like everyone else, Paddy felt that their position, enhanced by their green (as opposed to the production blue) overalls, was a cut above the rest. Not to mention their impressive wages, this exceeded many junior managers’, a fact not lost on the toilet wall graffiti!

What kept you?

Paddy didn’t need to look up from the swipe machine, the Yorkie accent of his partner in crime all too familiar to him. Mucka sat on the end of a work-bench, coffee cup out-stretched in offer to his mate. Gratefully received, Paddy joined him, and they supped in silence.

What’s the plan? asked Mucka.

Get work out of the way as soon as possible. Try for an early Stack, then get back and finish the bike off, ready for Saturday. Paddy repeated his first thought of the day.

Good plan, Phil should swipe us out if we buy him a pint. What you got left to do then? My number boards are sprayed up, just got to space the fairing a bit better.

I need to bleed those fucking brakes again.

Still spongy?

Yeah, there must be air in the master-cylinder.

I’ll give you a hand.

Do you reckon Phil will swipe us out? There was a memo out From HR saying it was a sack-able offence. Paddy recalled.

He’s a 41-year-old, fat, ugly, greasy, alcoholic porn dealer, who still lives at home with his mum. He’d shag his granny for four Pints of ‘wife-beater’, he’ll swipe us out matey!

The lads chuckled in unison. Mucka’s offer of assistance was a regular one. Paddy was a competent mechanic, who excelled in the high-tech world of the plant, but Mucka, who often struggled with the complexity of the Katano plant machinery, was a brilliant hands-on mechanic who could make problems disappear in seconds, which would take Paddy hours. It was a ying and yang relationship; Paddy the thinker, Mucka the hands. A few more seconds passed, and the strong coffee began taking effect; gently nudging the two budding race heroes into the sobriety of their working day. Then the door opened; in came a man of large proportions both tall, and broad, (completely in contrast to the racing-snake physiques of Paddy and Mucka). He wore green overalls beneath an un-buttoned, dishevelled, fur-hooded parka, (the kind seen in every school bus queue from 1976 to 1982, which was when this one had been bought). The large framed man mooched toward the swipe machine, clutching an ‘Asda’ carrier bag, and paused before searching every pocket he had for the I.D. card which was actually suspended by a safety clasp around his neck. Paddy prodded Mucka, and they looked on in united mischievous mirth, at once seeing the I.D. card, and relishing the big guy’s growing anxiety. The big guy had half a week of dark-haired growth on his face, which incidentally had not been washed for some considerable time. His substantial beer-gut was testament to a prolonged programme of bodily self-abuse, the kind that to the touch was rock-hard and shouldn’t be messed with under any circumstances. Still struggling with the tricky, small, zip pocket on his left coat sleeve, he drew deeply on his cigarette, and brushed aside his matted and greasy long brown hair in a renewed attempt to locate the elusive I.D. The big guy’s aura screamed many things; council estate, working men’s club, Ford Cortina, rehab centre, dole queue. But his recessed and bloodshot piggy eyes (made large by the double-thick glasses he wore), belied a quick wit and intelligence not to be underestimated. However, he was not a ‘morning’ person. The lads sniggered out loud and the 41-year-old fat, ugly, greasy alcoholic looked up in annoyance, where his gaze was met in stereo…

It’s around your neck!

Bastards, came the surrendering reply.

Phil swiped as fast as he could, which isn’t that fast as having fingers like pigs’ tits can limit your dexterity a bit, and the machine beeped acknowledgement. He’d made it by seven seconds, which was his best margin so far this week.

You could have fuckin’ told us.

Here, have a brew. Mucka handed Phil his mug, filled to the brim with strong, very sweet tea. The lads were never too bothered which mug they filled for themselves when making a brew, as there were several stacked on the draining board, available for all the thirty-odd ‘maint’ staff. But by bitter experience, they knew only to ever use Phil’s mug; for Phil. Phil, and his relationship with his mug was an institution. The mug itself was a Katano original, issued in a ‘starter’ pack to all new starters at the plant in its inaugural year, and they were only issued in that year. This meant that Phil was on the original staff listing twenty years ago, and to him it was a badge of honour, a mark of seniority. Once upon a time the mug had been white, but that was a very, very long time ago, and the second reason why no one ever used Phil’s mug; it hadn’t been washed for two decades. Inside it was black with tannic acid, and smelled nearly as bad as Phil himself, who had at least seen a bit of detergent since the Bay-City Rollers were in the charts on seven-inch vinyl. To the big guy, the mug was priceless, and the lads could never physically survive the repercussions should any damage come to it; and they knew it. He might be a big, fat greasy porn-king, but he was as hard as a Pikey’s dog!

Phil mate, before we get crackin’, me an’ Mucka need to ask a little favour. Phil answered Paddy silently with a gaze.

We really need to get off early, about four-ish.

Four! exclaimed the big guy, in a faint attempt to open a well-rehearsed round of banter-laden bartering. What if that panel-riveter in bay nine goes down again, that’s a two-man job that? What if Mr Pomfret comes down from upstairs and wants to know where his love child is? (He referred to his pet name for Paddy) Phil’s tongue was about two sizes too big for his mouth which had the effect of causing him to drool heavily if he spoke for too long without drawing breath. The down-side to this was a spit shower for the recipient, and in this case Paddy, Mucka bit hard on his tongue to fight back the laughter at his mates’ discomfort; which was growing by the second.

That’s a big ask that, Paddy, sack-able offence. Phil left a pause to emphasise the sincerity of his rebuttal, which was shame facedly obvious in its transparency. Phil heard a familiar ‘chinking’ noise behind him, as Mucka placed a brace of four-packs of Belgium’s finest lager on the work-bench.

Ah, wife-beater; that’ll do nicely. He mimicked the old American Express TV ads, before silently, and swiftly placing the payment in his locker, not another word would need to be said of the previous conversation; it was a done deal. As long as nothing in the plant went wrong…

************

The post lunch work routine on day four of four was well-known to all the shifts working in ‘maint’. Before lunch all the routine work would be completed; the changing of oil, air filters and cleaning out of machines and their bays, the re-programming of software etc. This left after lunch free for paperwork, I.T. and ordering of any spares that needed to be handed over to the next shift, or at least that’s what Paddy and Mucka were doing. Phil was busy downloading video clips of a rather uninhibited Asian woman; keeping one eye on the door all the time. Then the duty engineer’s mobile phone rang. Mucka shot Paddy a sideways glance and Paddy answered it quickly.

Maintenance, duty engineer. The duty engineers’ phone was a bit like the phone’s used in the war to scramble squadrons of fighters during the Battle of Britain. Most of the time the call was routine; people offering to pay their lottery syndicate, asking the maint guys to wire up car stereos for them, and such like. But every now and then it was the real thing, a system failure that had stopped production somewhere in the plant, and now was one of those times, and it was just Paddy’s bad luck to be answering the phone. Maint staff were very well paid for a good reason. Not only were they well qualified and trained, they had to be damned good at what they did, and able to take the pressure that went with it. When production stopped in the plant, it would cost the Katano Corporation £50,000 to £85,000 every single hour.

Paddy, it’s Les in Ops. Unit 19 at the end of belt nine has gone tits up, the whole production in Silver shed’s ground to a halt!

O.K. Les confirmed at 14:51, we’re onto it.

When £85,000 per hour is in jeopardy, Paddy knew every minute counted, including recording the report time to the last minute, that way if ops had dragged their heels about letting him know about the problem, his team couldn’t be answerable for the delay.

Paddy reiterated the brief to Mucka and Phil;

It’s unit 19 on belt nine, the whole of Silver sheds backed up. His words, bore no panic, just business-like brevity, and were for the benefit of both the other men in the room, but were aimed at Phil. Phil’s eyes never lifted from his monitor, and remained focussed on Ling Mai, a 22-year-old actress from Bangkok with apparently no gag reflex. Despite his outward appearance, Phil was the most experienced engineer on the company’s staff, and his help would undoubtedly speed up resolving the problem; and he knew it. He was well-aware of Paddy’s intonation and replied in dead-pan tone.

Get fucked. You want an early bath, you sort the fucker out. The lads knew Phil well, he wasn’t joking, and he wouldn’t be moved on it.

I’ll stay here on back-up, an’ dig out the parts catalogue. Give us a shout when you’ve aced it dudes!

The sarcasm wasn’t lost on the dynamic duo, who grabbed their tools, lap-top and test gear and rushed out of the adjoining door, into the heart of Silver shed. They arrived at the last assembly unit on belt nine, 90 seconds later, leaping from their electric service van like paramedics at a bomb blast, almost before it had come to a halt. Belt nine was the last moving belt in Silver shed, and as it had stopped, it meant that everything behind it had stopped too. Unit 19 was the ‘brain’ that controlled everything on the three-hundred-foot belt from the pressure of the compressed air in the tooling manifold, to belt speed, height, even the inspection lights attached to it. This snag needed to be sorted; fast.

Working relationships between men are often likened to marriage, each of the partnership settling into the roles best suited to them. In this instance Paddy, naturally the more confident of the two in a pressure situation like this took the lead. He approached the machine operator who was doing his best to explain to a gathering crowd, that none of this was his fault.

Alright mate, what have you fucking broke then? His friendly manner put the operator instantly at ease.

It weren’t me mate, it’s been playing up for ages, keeps showing an amber caution for vibration on the Belt. We told ‘ops’ about this last shift.

The two men walked over to the monitor station of unit 19, which was lit up like a Christmas tree.

Anyway, the jobs fucked now; warning went red and It just packed up.

Paddy began calling up maintenance menus on the unit’s monitor, while Mucka booted up the lap top. While this wasn’t a regular occurrence, it was one Paddy was well familiar with; Ops were aware of a minor problem with a vital piece of equipment, but purposefully had not informed the Maint. Department, for fear of them needing to halt production to sort it out. If they had, the maint boys may have been able to sort it out quickly, with minimal disruption, but they hadn’t and now the clock was ticking at a cost of £23.61 per second, and Paddy and Mucka were on the spot.

Paddy I’ll sort reloading the software if you like?

Aye, might as well Matey, as good a place as any to start I suppose.

Any clues?

Nah, it’s showing belt vibration on vib. Sensor 5 with a week or so of history, fucking first I’ve heard of it.

Ops eh?

Wankers!

Wankers they may be me old southern mate, but I give it five minutes before the duty exec is down here wanting to know how you spell ‘Doherty’!

Paddy didn’t need to acknowledge the comment, it was a straightforward fact; any stop in production would mean the duty exec would need estimates and answers, within minutes. It is a sad fact in the world of production engineering that regardless of the reason for a mechanical failure, once established it is then regarded as a ‘maintenance delay’, even though the engineer hadn’t broken it!

Why him? Why today? Why couldn’t Phil have answered the bloody phone? Paddy was a man in need of a break, then the phone rang, and it wasn’t the kind of break he needed. Paddy balanced the phone against his ear with his shoulder, while he used both his hands to open his tool box. From the corner of his eye he could see Mucka plugging the lap-top into the monitor unit.

Maintenance, duty engineer. Paddy’s heart sank a little as a familiar, well-spoken voice came through.

This is Rupert Pomfret, the duty exec here, who’s speaking?

This was all Paddy needed. He expected the duty exec to be hot on his heels for an estimate on how long it would take to get back to full production, what he hadn’t expected was that the duty exec (a position rotated between the ten junior executive members of the board) would be the director of maintenance, engineering and support; Paddy’s ultimate boss!

Hello Mr Pomfret, it’s Paddy Doherty here.

Ah Patrick, what seems to be the problem?

We’re showing a red-level vibration on unit 19 on belt nine, Mr Pomfret. Mucka’s just reloading the operational software, we’ll try to re-boot after that.

O.K. Patrick, I’ll leave it with you, but I want to know straight away if it doesn’t come through, is that clear?

Perfectly clear, Mr Pomfret. Paddy leant over the console and shared the conversation with Mucka. Short but sweet.

Who was it?

Bloody Pomfret’s duty exec.

Shave a rats’ arse! exclaimed the Yorkshire man. That you can do without.

What do you mean ‘you’, there’s no ‘U’ in team Mucka. You mean ‘we’ can do without it.

Whatever matey. Mucka motioned to the duty mobile.

But you’re the one answering the phone, aint yer? He finished with a wink, in answer to which, Paddy turned to walk back to his tool box whilst at the same time tossing the duty mobile back towards Mucka, over his shoulder. Mucka instinctively caught it, and realising his mistake,