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Booze fuelled excitement in modern motorsport means Kimi Raikkonen getting a bit squiffy in a club. But it wasn't always like this. Real racing drivers used to stack away the juice like George Best and an early leader in the hard driving/hard drinking art was all-round splendid bugger Duncan Hamilton.

Unlike modern racers, Hamilton didn't start in karts because he was busy doing proper work, serving his country in the Fleet Air Arm. During this time, a naval fleet ground to a halt because vital paperwork had been misplaced. In actual fact, Hamilton's dog had eaten it.

And that's the kind of corking anecdote that seemed to make up Hamilton's life. You would expect nothing less from a chap who once got so sauced he tumbled from the top of a lamppost and had his fall cushioned by a passing policeman.

But let's not forget that Hamilton was also a fine driver, winning the 1953 Le Mans 24 Hours in a Jaguar C-type, averaging over 100mph for the first time in the race's history and bringing it home despite a 130mph bird strike breaking his nose.

Tales of Hamilton's win often claim he was sozzled when the race began, but the truth isn't quite as rum. After Thursday practice his Jag was disqualified, bizarrely, for being on track at the same time as another car bearing the same race number. Disheartened, Hamilton and co-driver Tony Rolt immediately went to the pub to give their sorrows a bloody good dunking.

By the time the team found them and explained that the race ban had been reversed, they were lashed. A hurried regime of coffee and cold showers was enough to get them back in the car for Friday's practice session, and by the start on Saturday afternoon they were on form to clinch an historic victory.

Hamilton's antics are a timely reminder of an age when racing drivers didn't stomp back to their Monaco penthouse for a massive sulk. They accepted bad news the way real blokes should; by getting hog-whimperingly drunk.

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