Gadfly - 25.06.09

25 June 2009 | By Gadfly

Summer means sport, and sport means hospitality. So fresh from a liver transplant, Gadfly has been squeezing as many events as possible into an already packed diary.

Last week Traffic Broker dusted off its stretch limo to take Gadders to the pink champagne taste-fest that is Ladies Day at Ascot. Gadfly was half-expecting the Traffic Broker crew, including the normally mild-mannered MD Neil Hutchinson, to shout, “Move your bloomin’ arse!” as their chosen nags came down the home straight, but everything was frightfully restrained, right down to the green jacket and black fustian trousers client services director Martin McNulty picked out for the occasion.

Earlier in the week Gadfly popped along to the swanky Berkeley Hotel to help Monocle magazine celebrate its annual ranking of the best cities in the world. He was a little confused not to find Willesden, let alone London, in the pecking order, but was assured by Monocle editor Andrew Tuck that it was all to do with something called liveability. Pah!

Editor-in-chief Tyler Brule went on stage to explain that he and Tuck chose Zurich over Copenhagen over a couple of glasses (or was that bottles?) of rosé, which seems just as valid a decision-making technique as any other. Expect copious amounts of Mateus Rosé to fuel the next new media age Top 100 Interactive Agencies guide.

Brule rather impishly told his guests that Monocle isn’t on Twitter, believing the best way to network is face to face over a glass of champagne. Mind you that hasn’t stopped him investing in Dopplr, whose co-founder and CEO Marko Ahtisaari was among the international style cognoscenti. Given the importance of serendipity to Dopplr, it was fitting that Ahtisaari ended up talking to BBC London presenter Amy Lame after she trod on Gadders’ foot.

Once recovered, Gadfly went, courtesy of his mates at LG, to watch what might turn out to be the last ever British Grand Prix. While LG marketing director Andrew Warner was in the paddock with Lewis Hamilton, Nicole Scherzinger from the Pussycat Dolls and, to cap it all, Vernon Kaye, Gadders was fulfilling a lifetime ambition and playing at being pit crew. Vodafone McLaren had issued a challenge to change a wheel on an F1 car as quickly as possible. This gave Gadfly a chance to handle some hefty power tools that unfortunately sent his nuts flying. If only the organisers had allowed time for the AA man to show up.

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