David Coultard's exit from F1

So farewell DC, or at least it soon will be. You can refer to his 13 GP wins if you like, or his amassed points that make him Britain’s most successful driver and the fourth best in history, or the fact that he has been a sponsor’s dream with his polished, professional approach to his sport off the track.

But for me DC represents a dying breed of F1™ drivers who oozed character and tried to live their wonderful lives to the full. As many in the sport know what has not (and cannot) be written about DC would make a best-selling book. He has left me some of the most outrageous voicemail messages ever. Only this week he reassured me that I will not collect a facial oedema climbing Kilimanjaro for charity this coming October – not unless I have sex with a yak!! Even when asked on national radio last week at Silverstone if he had any regrets, he had to come up with the following: “Well, there were a set of beautiful twins in Buenos Aires …” There was a time when the sport was dominated with such characters. Graham Hill was known to arrive at the track still in his tuxedo from the previous night’s cavorting. Just ask Niki Lauda, if you ever get the chance, to tell you some James Hunt stories! Gilles Villeneuve was another one and, more recently, Eddie Irvine, who once invited me to join him on his boat in Portifino, only to leave me sitting on the deck like a lemon until a beautiful girl dressed only in a shirt emerged. She just happened to be Miss USA, and when the scruffy Ulsterman appeared from the bedroom he asked me why “the f*** I was sitting on his boat!”

DC once forced me to cycle up a mountain side behind Monte Carlo, him one-handed as he made mobile phone calls, and me grunting and groaning with my backside in the air and both legs pushing down hard on the pedals. At Silverstone he told the world’s press that I had thrown up during this ride. That is a total fabrication. Nature called and I popped into the Best Western hotel near Eze and, shall we say, took some time. There, now the record is straight. I needed to shift that particular load off me, so to speak.