France ride: 200, 2000

( If you have not read the prologue, start here ) It was the first time grime on a car had ever felt passionately alive. The dirt was all on the front, the kind that tells you this thing had been running and running. Maybe it was melted rubber from other cars’ tires. It was pitch black. During my first week in France, I visited Le Mans, a city already charged with anticipation for the 24-hour…