Sent to the TES in the hope that our un-paralleled photographical and mechanical skills backed by a formidable mastering of the English language will prove just too much of an opportunity to turn down. Catapulting me and Dave to giddying heights of celebrity and stardom as we enthrall the English speaking world with tales of daring and the crisis management of incidents brought about by a general lack of preparation and a propensity to do daft things in front of a camera... despite being 26 and knowing better.


A good friend of mine and myself are taking part in the 2007 Plymouth to Banjul Challenge, a 4000 mile unsupported drive departing from the UK on the 17th of December and heading to Banjul in The Gambia where the cars we make the journey in will be auctioned and the proceeds donated to local charities identified by the challenge organizers.

In addition we have been raising money for Pageant a charity supporting educational projects in the Gambia.

Through Pageant we have established links with Sinchu Balyia, a primary school of 3000 in The Gambia. During the summer I met Omar Janneh, the science co-coordinators from Sinchu Balyia whilst he was on a 6 week Pageant sponsored visit to the UK. Omar's trip included visits to several UK primary schools which I was able to organise. Omar will be repaying the favour by taking us round his school, allowing us to take a lesson and introducing us to his family and way of life. He has also written an article for our website.

All the details of our preparations, sponsors, links to charities, Omar's article and the general story so far are comprehensively covered on http://www.ibrakeforcake.com/ The site is well established and contains a significant amount of constantly updated content covering motor sport, mountain biking, climbing, snowboarding, surfing, mountaineering, hill walking, lifestyle and the Banjul challenge and provides much more of an insight into our motivation for taking part.

My good friend Dave works as a professional photographer and I am an ex-motor sport mechanic working in development engineering. Between us we will be filming, documenting and photographing the entire trip for ibrakeforcake and will be centering on the delivery of a crate of educational resources, picked out by Omar and paid for by our fundraising, to Sinchu Balyia.

Having already gone to such an enormous effort and still harbouring a completely unchecked level of enthusiasm for the whole project we are hoping the TES would be interested in running our exploits over one or more articles. We would be more than happy to provide copy and photographs and have already generated a substantial amount of material on which to base one or several articles that could help highlight the lengths that the Gambian people are willing to go to to obtain a fraction of the education we sometimes take for granted.

The above is the briefest of summaries of the story so far and I would be really grateful for the opportunity to speak to you, to fill in the detail and give you a much better idea of the quality of material Dave and myself are capable of producing. Please take the time to check http://www.ibrakeforcake.com/

Kind Regards

Chris Lawler

picture remains copyright of team Rallyace, like you'd actually care!

Nice, said Dave. Jesus, just look at that boat race.

Financial sponsorship is finally kicking into action with Chris and I taking around £250 each from our work/freinds/small children that we held upside down and shook... Our parents have been roped in, in various ways to raise money/kit too. Well done them. Other important news is that Steph is making us a Crimbo cake to take away and eat in a carpark in Morrocco somewhere. Lovely. Also, as promised I finally did the GIF animation. Sorry about the quality and you have to click on the image... sorry, but it really is a feast for the eyes and mind.

We still have car seats, camping stuff and roof rack to sort, various bits of outstanding paperwork, Oh, and the route to plan! Chris will be doing a tour of Edison Schools next Friday and then it really will be pack up and go... I've finally got around to posting the picture of the roofrack and cans, thanks again to those involved. NB that is not my lounge in the picture, its a set... I have much better taste and some furniture!

Dave

.......and here Ed are the stickers from Mr Reynolds, Mr Reynolds is a geezor and helped fix the car that's taking you to Africa, say thank you to Mr Reynolds Ed.

Have got ourselves a sparkling shiny galvernised steel roof rack VERY kindly donated by Richard Grant, a freelance setbuilder/model maker that works with us at our studio from time to time. Thanks for relenting in the end and giving it away! Rich is a top bloke and very good at all sorts of carpentry and building projects and film work, so get in touch at www.rgproduct.com

Nice one.

picture from www.wikipedia.com


Just for the record, Chris and I had a conversation about the Trooper's Diff when we were at Leith Hill at the weekend. Now this could turn out to be nothing or could come back and bite us on the bum like a rabid dog, but the diff is making some grumbling clunky noises when turning - ie when equalling the drive of the rear wheels. Having discussed the work that was done with Steffis dad (an 'engineer' - a dangerous breed liable to melt parts of your bike or set fire to themselves (Mike's dad) at any given time) he said that we should double check what we'd done to the diff, as the pinion gear placement is critical and will, obviousely shred itself if misalinged...

Further talk with Chris and Rich at Vegantune ensued and the general advice is that there was no sign of wear on the oil that came out of the dif housing before it was tightened, old diffs clunk and another 4x4 that Rich had dealt with recently was suffering a similar sound and that it was exaggerated by running different size/profile wheels than those fitted as standard. We are running stupid wheels so we can expect this to happen!


This post is not intended as a 'whos right', but I have a feeling that we might look back on this episode and laugh/sigh for one reason or another!!! Anyone out there who has had similar experiences can get in touch:


chris@ibrakeforcake.com