This Rye House Speedway buff has blazed a full-throttle trail of pie-demolition since the start of the season, commanding the top of the Pie and Mash League with an unprecedented 200-plus points at the end of round 5.

Clark's of Exmouth Market provided the festive arena for the exploits of the Pie and Mash Speedway Club.

The youth team were keen to get stuck in.

Here's my old mucker Ben Hayes, looking like he's just clocked out of Santa's Toy Factory for his lunch break. In the snow globe of my mind's eye I can just discern a Pie and Mash Shop at the North Pole, offering succour to weary polar explorers and over-worked elves.

Tom Leader looks more distinguished and Dickensian each time I see him; perhaps it's that time of year. By contrast his pals, pictured far right, looked like they'd just wandered in off the Arctic ice cap. Here are Ian Jentle and Jean O'Reilly.

Jean O'Reilly we met before, at the end of last season. I thought she hailed from Canada, but Jean assures me she is 110% all-American. From the strength of her averral, I can only imagine she swears allegiance to the stars-and-stripes each and every morning before breakfasting on a stack of pancakes and syrup. That said, beneath her outdoor apparel, Jean sported a distinctly liquor-ish hoodie and a healthy appetite for London's traditional vittles, suggesting that her banner might be pie-spangled.

Ian Jentle takes his pie and mash dry. I was pleased to capture the look of discernment and enjoyment as he allowed full and uninterrupted play of Clark's complex and meaty harmonic progressions over razor-sharp taste receptors. If I may be so bald, the Clark Pie is an essential 'Umami' index upon which other savouries can be measured.

The occasion was enlivened by a green-themed dream team: the Liquor Brothers, a.k.a. James Tanner and Richard Carr, both of whom figured on the league's first ever scoresheet back in '94.

Not for the first time did Tanner blot his copybook by taking an incoming call. Minus 5 points.

[Right] There are no points for cutlery sculpture.
Is it an indictment of London's brutal new Shard-dominated skyline?

[Far right] Mister Potter shapes up for a quick deconstruction.

Young Stanley develops a taste for Ben Shaw's Cloudy Lemonade.

Ed Mosse got his Santa hat on for the dessert course; in this case a suite of sweet carols, specially scribed by Mike Goldwater for the club. The shop resounded to the sound of sonorous baritones from the rear booth:

I’m dreaming of a pie Christmas
Just like the ones I used to know
Where the pastry glistens
And people listen
To hear sleigh bells in the mash
I’m dreaming of a pie Christmas
With every Christmas card I write
May your meals be merry with pies
And may all your Christmases be pied

The carolling continued outside, to the amusement of onlookers:

Deck the pies with fillings of mincemeat
P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE
Tis the season to be jolly P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE
Eat we now our pie n’ mash P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE
Troll the ancient eating ritual P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE

See the blazing pies before us P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE
Strike your plate and join the chorus P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE
Follow me in merry measure P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE
While we eat a London treasure P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE

Fast away the old meal passes P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE
Hail the new pies and mashes P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE
Sing we joyous, all together P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE
Eating loads of pie and mash P.P.P.P.P.P.P.PIE.P.P.PIE.PIE.PIE

Elsewhere in the neighbourhood petty larceny was rife. Caught on camera: high horse-rustling and miniature mince pie mugging.

Cobbles of Clerkenwell.

Merry Edmosse everybody . . . Pies on Earth and Good Eel to all men.

Ed reads from the good book . . .

. . . Exmouth Market at sundown.

Happy New Year from Team Pie and Mash.

St@