Thursday 3 January 2019

January 2019 - Happy New Year!

I don’t really do New Year Resolutions. I normally try to resolve to do things on the basis that they are worth doing, not that the rather arbitrary date of January 1st has been and gone. So the fact that I am writing on this blog in the first week of January after a hiatus of nearly a year has nothing to do with any “New Year, new commitment” malarkey. No, instead it is in recognition of my rather changed circumstances this year.

Readers may be aware that professionally, I describe myself as an IT consultant; and indeed, it is in that capacity that I have made (most of) my money over the years. However, I left that job at the end of December – of my own choosing, I hasten to add – and now am attempting to earn money devoting myself full-time to the sport that has been my passion for more than fifty years.

To some extent I have been doing this in my spare time, for Radio Show Limited through my commentary work on radiolemans.com and in various other outlets for many years. I also kept myself busy (although not well-paid) writing for dailysportscar.com. More recently, I have also made some money out of my contributions for sport auto magazine in Germany and of course sporadically for Racecar Engineering.

But I have finally decided to take the plunge and throw myself into this business full-time. I have various plans that I’m working on, which in the fullness of time I may get to share with readers on this blog.

First up, this year as for the last seven years, will be the Dubai 24 hours. A hugely popular race in a warm and usually sunny place in January can’t be a bad thing, and I am looking forward to a great race between some of the top GT3 drivers and teams, ably supported by a good variety of GT4 and Touring Car machinery.

I may be being a touch naïve, but I am also hoping that having some more time at my disposal (theoretically at least) will allow me to write more here. Several of you had made kind remarks about my various ramblings, and I am hugely encouraged by your appreciation. If the words here dry up, then it will mean that I am far busier than I anticipated, which hopefully will mean that I am earning some money in my enterprises.

On the other hand, if I find the time to post more frequent posts than I did in 2018, then that might be a sign of idle hands. So if you are one of those people who think: “We really need Truswell to do this for us, but he’s bound to be busy doing something else…” then drop me a note and I would be delighted to do that something instead of writing here. Especially if you’re going to pay me for it!

3 comments:

  1. Good luck with the career shift!

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  2. Best of luck with this shift in your career, Paul! Your insights always make endurance races extremely enjoyable. I admire your ability to focus your attention for the entire duration of a 24 hour race. Cheers from the USA!

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  3. If anyone in motorsport journalism has earned the title of "professional", it's you Paul. Your contributions are invaluable and I'm thrilled that we'll hopefully be hearing more from you!

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