It was a fantastic place to be - the last round of the season with the championship in contention and only a few points separating the contenders. Being lucky enough to watch from the garages and pitlane helped, as did the heat and sunshine of the French location.

We were crossing fingers for British hope James Toseland who went into the round 4 points behind arch-rival Laconi on his home turf, with a whiff of possibility of the Ducati works team management having an unspoken bias against our JT. He proved himself worthy of the trophy with a win in race one putting him ahead by 5 points and a second place ahead of Laconi securing the title. Well done James Toseland.

Chris Vermeullen was out of contention after electrical problems caused him to retire disappointingly in both races - a sorry end to a great season for them, but he and his team Ten Kate still acheived fourth in their entry year to the championship.

Leon Haslam pulled off a 7th and 6th place whilst still nursing the injured wrist which has been plagueing him for the last few races, placing him on a No. 8 plate for next year. Chris Walker pulled to 8th places to take him to 11th in the championship.

Troy Corser's pole position didn't play out for him in the end, with a retirement in the first race and a 7th in race 2. He has already announced his spilt from the Foggy Petronas team.

The party Sunday night involved food fights in the Ducati tent (Davide Tardozzi had cream cakes layered on him by the sporting Regis Laconi, water fights outside to wash it all off, pole dancers in the Suzuki Corona tent - Frankie Chili does like to dance! It's a shame I didn't take any photos that night.