The final gathering of the year is the Annual Dinner where the club converts an ordinary-looking hotel function room into a Lotus shrine! Not only do members organise Lotus-related exhibitions but we always have three Lotus cars on display in the actual dining room.

This year we had a Lotus Seven, a Lotus 23 and a Lotus Eleven. Each table also had to build a model Grand Prix car then enter it for the ‘concours’ before ‘racing’ it – total disaster, but great fun! Ernie Unger led a pre-dinner Lotus discussion group while Andy Shepherd ran some stunning in-car footage showing a race at Castle Combe.

Medals and trophies were awarded after the meal then it was time for socialising and reminiscing about the year.