Into the Valley
A marshal's tale
So it's 11 o'clock Friday night and I'm standing on the sound-mixing platform half way down the main marquee. I can view the whole crowd from up here and the band has got everyone jumping and gyrating, it's been like this since 8 0'clock. We're 500 up on last year's gate and the place is rammed. Friday nights at the Valley are usually comparatively quiet, with people arriving late after finishing work, meeting up with their mates, wandering round the site and chatting with friends they haven't seen since last year's rally season ended, before wandering back to the campfires to make ready for the weekend ahead. But not tonight. Tonight, the crowd are manic.
We'd opened the show with a 'warm-up' band called the Jalapenos. Warm-up, they set the place alight! What a band, they exploded into their set and didn't stop for an hour, banging out wave after wave of some of the best music I've heard in a long time and all linked with superb guitar and drum solos. It was a wall of sound mixing fast and slow numbers at just the right pace to let the audience catch their breath between crescendos, but only just.
After a short beer-break Emerald hit the stage and picked up the pickled from the peppers, lifting the crowd even further with one rock classic after another. Air guitarists lined the front-of-house barriers; with the po-goers bouncing around behind them backed up by a sea of arm-wavers all the way down to the sound stage. Couples and small groups of friends filled the remainder of the marquee, occasionally craning their necks to one side to shout in each other's ears. All around are smiling faces, a good weekend ahead I thought, and then I spotted the first nodder of the evening.
Nodders are the ones to watch when you're marshalling at a rally. They are placid creatures that stand and lean on the marquee support poles around the periphery. Anyone can become a nodder, just drink so much beer that you can't stand un-supported, and then lose your mates.
Usually harmless, they stand alone, clutching a half-empty pint glass; eyes un-focused, jaw hanging loosely and they nod. Not necessarily in time with the music you understand, they just nod. Sometimes stopping to lower their heads in order to stare for a few seconds at the bottom of their glass. At this moment it can go one of three ways for the nodder; firstly, they may try to take a drink, this involves the nodder lifting his head (they're usually Blokes) and leaning slightly backwards. This act almost always results in the nodder sliding backward down the side of the marquee where custom and practice is to wave an arm or raise a leg in a half-hearted attempt to stand up before falling asleep. The second way it can go for the nodder is what we marshals refer to as the 'Oohfukamgunnaspewonsumbugger' manoeuvre. This is when the nodder realises he is about to vomit, leans over forward and flings his arms out sideways to alert the immediate crowd, showering all with the residue of his glass before slowly going onto all fours to accommodate the emptying of his stomach.
Traditionally, the nodder will then sleep. The third, and most dangerous scenario for the nodder, after the glass stare, is when one has an idea. This (luckily) doesn't happen very often but when it does we marshals are trained to look out for the following signs. The nodder will slowly raise his head and not nod. The eyes focus and, as the jaw gently drops, a facial expression slowly begins to form. Imagine a surprise inspection from your proctologist and you'll get the picture. This is the nodder at his most dangerous.
So it's 11 o'clock Friday night and I'm standing on the sound-mixing platform half way down the main marquee when my local nodder has an idea. He walks the thirty feet over to the sound desk (in reality, five feet but he was obviously trying to dodge a sniper). "Hey mate, He-ey mate! He-(hic-burp)-ey Mate!!" I pull out an earplug and crouch down. "What's up Buddy?"
"Can you get on the my (hic-huuurp) mi-cro-phone and tell Colin I'm here?"
"Who's Colin?"
"He's me maaate, avlostim."
Now, in the alcohol-addled mind of the nodder, this is an idea of such brilliant simplicity, such Machiavellian genius, that it simply cannot fail. The fact that this is the sound-mixing desk, the place where the sound is mixed, not made, hasn't registered in the formulation of his cunning plan but it matters not. I know from years of experience that reasoning with a nodder is futile. No matter what I said he would be convinced that a microphone was up here somewhere and if I didn't make the announcement, he would get up here and do it himself. It's at times like this that your marshal's training kicks in. Quick reaction is the key. I size up the situation; the nodder is (just) standing, clutching his pint in his right hand and supporting himself using the waist-high barrier rail with his left. I'm crouching down on the mixing platform so we're at the same eye-level. I've seen nodders jump barriers before so I know I've got to take him out fast and clean. And he's a big lad. I shift my weight, ready to strike. "There's Colin!" I exclaim and point behind him, he turns, letting go of the barrier and falling flat on his face. A classic takedown.
Saturday morning and I wake in my tent, remove the earwig from my nostril and crawl outside. I'm in the marshal's camping area and an angel called Sarah presents me with a bacon buttie and a tea. I'm off duty 'till 4 o'clock, finishing at 8 tonight so I spend the day mooching around the site. It's a beautiful day and the sky is blue. The custom show in the main arena is coming together, surrounded by traders and eateries and littered with small groups of bikers, drinking eating and chatting. Smoke is rising from the campfires in the afternoon sun as I make my way over to the main marquee for the start of the comedy show. It opens with a joke about having anal sex with a dead nun but quickly degenerates and I spend the next couple of hours crying with laughter.
Coffee in the MAG stall, then a walk around the custom show making ooh and aah noises, trying to look like I know what I'm doing whilst Phil Bond points out every modification on each bike for the judges. Judging over, it's time for my early evening shift. 4 'till 8's a doddle and I spend the time catching up with mates and swapping stories from rallies past. The music from the afternoon band fills the air and as my shift comes to an end I notice a group of Geordie hen-night lasses running across the site in the early stages of drunkenness. They remind me of Gazelle, sweeping majestically across the Serengeti plains (Honest). I say a silent prayer of thanks to the god of marshalling rotas that I'm not on duty tonight.
Ten pm and a group of around ten of us have been drinking for a couple of hours. I'm filling up with beer and decide a kebab and a good snog will give me a second wind.
Eleven pm One kebab and several slaps around the face later and our crowd are down to five. The bands have been fantastic, the company fantastic, the banter fantastic and I turn and give my best mate a hug. Never met him before and he only speaks Swahili but after this much beer I can hardly remember who I am, never mind who my mates are.
Twelve pm went to the loo then the bar. Can't find anyone I know and I'm a bit unsteady on my feet. I've got no chance of making it back to my tent alone so I decide to lean up against one of the marquee poles for support until I can work out what to do. Looking down into my half empty pint glass, I suddenly have the most amazingly brilliant idea...
A marshal
Extracts from another review, this one by Rocky Sharpe, of Gold Wing Alp touring fame.
Hiya,
We are back from a great weekend at Into the Valley 07 they moved the site as it was getting way too muddy even for us die-hards! We were at stately Sledmere House near Driffield in Yorkshire. Quite a few of these places rent out the grounds to help pay for the up keep of the place, in return you get a great field with beautiful surroundings!
We set off in bright sunshine on Friday noon, I had loaded the HONDA 500 up, Julie wasn't too sure, "it looks heavy" she said, "bollox" said I! "It's just the sleeping bags, a few clothes in the throwovers and the cooking stuff is in the top box, it is fine once you get rolling, trust me" I mused. We could stop once we get on the site I said and I'll ride yours to our camp spot. He, Liar Liar Pants on Fire! I had the 125cc loaded to the fekkin gills! I had the tent, ground sheet, airbeds, and two foldaway chairs strapped on behind, the front end felt air a few times so I just sat more over the tank to keep the front wheel on the ground, no worries!
Julie was grinning now, I know why, coz I too was grinning, she had that feeling of riding onto the site on the first day... everybody feels it, it's like entering 'Never Never Land,' a special place for special people. You could feel your spirit lifting as we cross the threshold! Bikes arrived all Friday and Saturday in singles, pairs to gather with friends already set up in little enclaves, also came en masse various tribes from 'oop north' and 'darn sarf.'
We picked a spot on the up slope, just at the tree line. I leaped off first, my bike started to topple, a nearby biker grabbed it with one hand (only a todgy 125cc)! "Ya bikes gannin doon marra" he laughed I rolled it level and turned to put a piece of wood under Julie's side stand, otherwise it would sink in a topple over, all bikes with a side stand would fall over, this is why everyone downs the first can quickly to flatten the can and use it under the side stand, nothing to do with greediness or the need to get drunk ASAP. We were camped amongst Geordies who were using loads of good old Anglo-Saxon words. I'm sure they would be a county of mutes if the word had been banned! It's a real leveller being amongst the soul of Britishness, it shows the political correctness machine is just so out of step with the people. We went to the big white tent around 8 O'clock to get a spot and get settled for the night's entertainment. The traders were doing rich business, Johnson's the army surplus folk were doing a brisk trade in warm combat clothing.
The bands were good, they did their magic, we sang along, did a form of dance and jigged along. We all got merry and warm until the end came at some point when we scoffed chips and noodles and did that miracle that we all do, we ALL find the correct tent in the pitch blackness, we bikers are so special arn't we? Except for one lady who was howling for her man for ages! ANDEEEEE! ANDEEEEEE! she kept shouting, Hurry up Andy I'm trying to get some kip, I muttered through my drunken haze. Finally I heard him come to her rescue. I feel places like this are the safest in which to lose someone, everyone is in the same mind. That woman would have been offered sanctuary by someone. Anyway all ended happily and I fell back into deep slumber, and then it was Saturday!
The three bands tonight were well chosen, these tribute bands are so full of talented musicians, even the most ardent sober, self conscious statues loose their inhibitions and before long are foot tapping and nodding in unison. Some go straight to full blown abandonment, the mood is most infectious, even the 'Car People' are looking the business and the ladies booties are in full swing. And then suddenly it was Sunday. Boy, it's funny how that seems to happen so quickly.
These days more folk are bringing the whole tribe with them and us older bikers finally bow to bodily comforts and towed trailers full of 'proper' tents and fold away chairs. Oi! don't mock, it comes to us all! The kids are our biking future so are wholly welcomed and tolerated, they are safe to run round the camp site, collecting empties for a few pennies and hopefully getting a taste for a great future in biking. Oh how I wish MAG was around when I was a youth. I wasted so much time on street corners back then. But hey I'm still 21 not 49 as my birth certificate indicates, so bring on the next weekend away!
It's time to return to The Rat Race, iron a shirt for morning, clean shoes, pack lunch box, but not before I drink that one last can I found in a side pocket. I'll cook a little something, "Julie put some Bon Jovi on will you honey and turn it up!"
Rocky Sharp
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