Didcot

Two listeners have sent in questions.

James from Ecclefechan in Scotland and Deb's in Didcot, Oxfordshire, England.

We don't see the questions before we press record, you know the drill by now.

What's James's question? James in Ecclefechan, it's

Yeah.

I knew that was a good one.

Anyway, let's move on to Debs in Didcot, Oxfordshire, England.

So nothing else to say on James'

I'm no problem.

Jason, where are you, sir? Where are you? You're heading to Didcot.

40.

M40.

Yeah, I got...

No, I'm M40.

M40 and then I go through some villages on the way back to beautiful Didcot.

Uh-

very widespread, though.

It's playing in my local cinema in Didcot.

You know what I mean? And it's like, and there's a lot of, who's going, is it you that's booked to go to eight in the morning?

I had, yeah, before we had all this invite, I booked to go.

It's a whole big thing.

But anyway, Head was quite concerned because he had a factory in Didcot with Frank Williams, and a payroll to meet.

An outside engineering contract funded by somebody else's board was insurance against the sport he was in ceasing to exist.

Austin Rover signed the authorization in February of 1981.

Everything else, the boxed arches, the air dam, the rear wing, that was all glass fibre and Kevlar.

The aluminium roof was bonded on with aerospace adhesive, which in 1982, even if you forget this is an Austin Rover British Leyland Metro, was close to science fiction.

The first chassis was finished at Didcot in December of 1982 and shipped to Cowley, the factory that we talked about in the recent Montego

episode.

But, I mean, I'll be honest, the amount of, you know, I have to do quite a lot of work and research to go into an in-town show.

I'm not, I don't mean to be rude, I'm not going to put the same amount of research into doing an eight-minute interview on Radio Didcot.

Radio...

I love the way you're working through the Ds.

Radio Dundee.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Didcot, actually, I mean, probably subconsciously I mentioned Didcot because one of my favourite lines ever in a book when I was doing a sort of local version or a live version of the radio show And I was trying to find out a little bit about each town before I went.

And I sent off for a book I saw on Amazon.

I, I know Gaz met up with you guys, but you, you, you was at...

Was it Didcot you was at last week?

Didcot, yeah.

Yeah.

Didcot Railway Centre.

We were displaying some Lego and sleeping on a train.

That was pretty fun.

[coughs]

... from Didcot in Oxfordshire.

No need to keep me anonymous.

Wow.

Table.

Great Western, London to Didcot, 1849 speed miles per hour 56.

Great Western, London to Swindon, 1884 speed miles per hour 53.

Northwestern Euston to Wolverton, 1849 speed miles per hour 37.