Is that a possibility?
I thought I saw a patch somewhere so that I could join a race meeting but watch it. Is that feasible??

You mean spectate? Of course you can. You enter specatate mode as soon as you join the server. You can jump in and out of the race as much as you want.

LfS Spectator is maybe the program you meant with "saw a patch". It allows you to follow the racing on a LfS (S2) server without playing on it.

You'll find the thread here:

http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?t=1578

thanks Kryten. I'll be loading up me flask and sarnies very soon...