Tonight, The Stig climbs into a bucket of hot wallpaper paste.
Richard sorts out public transport and James gets beaten up by a boat.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Hello! Hello, and we start...we start with something strange.
Cos you see, last year, you couldn't buy a BMW unless you were a cock.
LAUGHTER But then all of a sudden,
people with huge watches and stupid Oakley sunglasses, people who
tailgate you on motorways, suddenly started to buy Audis instead.
No idea why, don't really care because, what this means
is normal people with normal watches can buy for the first time ever,
what, if we're honest, has always been
the best sports saloon of them all, the M3.
Some people are saying this new model
is too soft and too squidgy, but I'm not one of them.
The fact is that last year we showed the two-door coupe version
was way faster round the track than its rivals from Audi and Mercedes.
And now, your children can have their spleens crushed as well,
because this is the new four-door version.
It has the same equipment as the coupe we tested,
has the same butch front-end and despite the extra weight,
the performance is almost identical as well.
Of course, with the two extra doors and a bigger boot, incidentally,
you would expect the saloon to be more expensive than the coupe.
And it isn't, actually.
This is 49,000, so it is £1,400 less.
This, then, is a brilliant car.
The obvious choice for the family man who has a light...
but wants to keep it under his bushel.
Or is it?
Because now, there's a new kid on the block.
This - the Lexus IS F.
Now, driving a Lexus has always been like sitting in a bucket
of warm wallpaper paste reading a Jane Austen novel.
But with this one, they claim they've built an M3-killer.
TYRES SQUEALING
It's certainly very high-tech.
For instance, it has a support vehicle integrated management system -
whatever that is - and airbags for your knees.
What's more, full lock-up control is used in second gear
without the tongue converter.
Hmm, Jane Austen could only dream about such things!
Happily, however, most of this Japanesey PlayStation stuff
is buried under a wall of brute force and noise.
ENGINE REVS AND TYRES SQUEAL
It has a massive 5-litre V8 engine.
Which produces about the same amount of power as the M3,
but more torques.
It is, however, 100 kilograms heavier.
So let's see how the two of them get on in a drag race.
ENGINES REV
TYRES SQUEAL
Wow!
I am ahead.
Oh, he's coming back.
Come on!
Eventually the heavy Lexus would win.
Because while the BMW is limited to 155 mph,
the IS F will keep going all the way to 168.
It is a quick car, but what happens when you show it some corners?
TYRES SQUEAL
Wow!
Well, as you can see, I'm now behind the M3
which is being driven by touring-car racer, Tom Chilton.
So, let's see if he can get away from me.
TYRES SCREECH
This is so completely out of character for a Lexus.
It's like Mr Darcy coming out of the lake
and machine-gunning a fluffy kitten for fun.
Oh, he's hard on those brakes.
These brakes are good too, to be honest.
Understeer just kills everything and then the weight coming out -
you see, he's already got 100 yards on me.
That BMW must be exciting, look what it's done to his hair!
TYRES SQUEAL
I can keep up but I have to work so much harder
because this is just not quite as composed as the Bimmer.
So what about price?
Well, the Lexus is £1,000 more than the BMW,
but it comes with more stuff as standard,
so it is slightly better value.
The Lexus also has slightly more space, a slightly bigger boot
and a dashboard from the pages of science fiction.
On paper then and on the track,
this really does seem like it could be an alternative to the BMW.
But it isn't.
Firstly, it has eight gears,
and that's too many because it's always changing its mind.
HE IMITATES GEARS CHANGING UP AND DOWN
Then there's the styling.
The normal IS is a fine and handsome thing,
but with all its puffed up bits and pieces,
this is a bit of a mess and those tail pipes are fakes.
There's more. This may have more torques than the BMW
but they're all at
And that's like putting them on the top shelf in the kitchen,
you can never really reach them, they're never there.
The worst thing about the Lexus, though, is the way it rides.
The BMW manages to be sharp AND comfortable, this doesn't.
It's hard, really hard.
When you're driving normally,
a sports saloon should soothe your brow, not attack it with scissors.
To sum up then, the Lexus does a lot of things brilliantly,
but the BMW, that does everything brilliantly.
In the past you had to be a cock to buy one,
now though, you're a cock if you don't.
APPLAUSE
INAUDIBLE
Let me make sure I've got this absolutely right.
Cocks are now driving Audis?
Yes, I had one right up my chuff this morning on...
LAUGHTER
What?
..on the A3 on the way down, it was this close.
What do you have to be to drive a Lexus? A dork.
So, to drive an AMG Mercedes you'd have to be an arse, a big arse?
A big, tall, actually slightly fat arse?
LAUGHTER You're being Captain Horrid.
Yes I am. We haven't time to explore this new trait of your personality
because it is time now to put the IS F round our track
which of course means handing it over to our tame racing driver.
Some say that one of his eyes is a testie...
LAUGHTER
..and that he was turned down for I'm A Celebrity
because people have heard of him. LAUGHTER
All we know is, he's called The Stig.
And away he goes... TYRES SCREECH
..in a biblical pool of smoke
and strangely that was from the exhaust, not the tyres.
Even The Stig can't access that top- shelf torque straight off the line,
but he can torture the tyres, by the sounds of it.
MORSE CODE BLEEPS
Stig, he's still listening to Morse,
no idea what it's saying, but I'm sure the internet will tell us.
Heaved it round Chicago, now coming up to Hammerhead...
Squirming under braking, that gives away the sheer weight of this thing,
perhaps because of that 5-litre V8 up front.
Now, that's tyre smoke!
I suspect this car could do with
a proper limited slip diff - an electronic one.
MORSE CODE BLEEPS
Labouring his way up all eight gears...
through the Follow-through, that's looking fast through the tyres.
Two corners left, all the way down the box again, getting sideways.
This really isn't as easy as the M3 to drive quickly.
Now, Gambon, still looking frisky and across the line.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Not a bad time. Not a bad time.
Ready... It did it in 1:26.9,
so that's pretty quick.
Look at that, about the same as a Lotus Exige.
The thing is though, earlier on we put the BMW round.
It did it in 1:25.3, look at that!
It's the same as a convertible Lamborghini Gallardo.
So, really we have a Top Gear top tip.
Um, if you are an employer and you take someone on who has a Lexus,
he'll be late for work
and he'll be a dork when he gets there!
LAUGHTER
Unless you employ somebody with an AMG Mercedes,
in which case they'll arrive in a cloud of smoke
and then they'll be an arse when they get there.
Speaking of which... LAUGHTER
Nothing... It just came up in conversation.
Are you wearing that for a bet? No.
No? No.
LAUGHTER
Right, shall we do the news? Yes, we'll ignore that.
Let's kick off with this Infinity,
a new brand to the UK and it is to Nissan what Lexus is to Toyota,
a kind of posh version of it.
They are coming over with
This is a V6 engine, 3.7-litre convertible.
All I want to know about this car
is why have they styled it to look like the Lexus SC 430? Look!
That is undoubtedly the most vile and hideous car ever made,
why make it look like that?
It is vile but it's completely academic
because you never see one of those in the real world.
You do, go to Cheshire, they're everywhere! Are they?!
They're always being driven by those women that have faces
actually made from leather.
LAUGHTER
Whenever I see them, those women driving nice cars,
I really do want to stop them and just ask, I want to beg, "Why?!
"Why did you buy that," because it's an expensive car.
It's like getting every travel brochure,
choosing your summer holidays next year, 180 countries you could go to
and saying, "Yes, Germany." Yes! LAUGHTER
"Not Mauritius, not Mauritius, Dortmund is where I want to go."
It's that bonkers a choice, it's that terrible a car.
The thing is about the Infinity... Can we see the Infinity again?
That is actually just a Nissan with a posh name.
It's like people who buy a normal house
in the middle of a road, number 22, but then give it a name.
No, a friend of mine did that.
He lived in the Midlands, I think it was Lichfield.
It was 22 Acacia Avenue or whatever it was and he called it "Sea View".
LAUGHTER That's quite good!
Hey, hey, you know Porsche is always saying
they don't ever really restyle the 911
because they want to maintain that sense of purity and tradition?
Yes. I don't think that's true. I think they don't restyle it properly
because they can't, they have no idea at Porsche how to restyle cars.
If you think about it, the 4-wheel drive, the Cayenne, isn't it?
The Cayenne looks like a 911 that's been reversed into a shed, yes?
And now, they're doing a four-door of a car, OK,
which is called the Panamera, which sounds like a hat, OK. Look at this.
It's just woeful. It is. JAMES COUGHS
All right? Excuse me, no, I'm going to die now.
Is it this, has this made you feel sick?
It's exactly what it is,
I looked at that and it nearly killed me, it's so awful.
Can I make an observation about this car? What?
That is an Austin Maxi.
Do you remember the Maxi? Have we got a picture of the Austin Maxi?
Look... It is! LAUGHTER
It is! That is an Austin Maxi.
A Porsche Maxi.
The only difference is, of course,
that the Porsche Austin Maxi is going to be nearly £90,000.
What gets me is who's going to say of this,
"No, I don't want the Maserati Quattroporte"?
Or you know that four-door Lamborghini we had in last week?
Who's going to say, "No, I want this instead"?
That's like being offered the choice of marrying two women,
one of them unkind and ugly and the other beautiful with a heart of gold
and saying, "No, I want the brutal minger."
LAUGHTER That's is the brutal minger!
JAMES COUGHS
Excuse me. Are you a nurse?
I am. Could you come and kill him?
LAUGHTER
Have you got anything in your bag which is like lethal?
Seriously.
I've got a syringe and some water.
A syringe and water?
Come on, I've got worse.
All she needs is a syringe and some water to kill someone -
is she a nurse or a ninja? LAUGHTER
Anyway, I want that to go away. I don't want to see that car
ever again as long as I live.
And I never will, because nobody's going to buy one.
What are we going to talk about now? I'm going to talk about this.
I went on the internet this week... Oh, God.
I thought you'd stopped doing that. No, no, no.
Here's the clip that I found.
A man in a Range Rover, and pause it there.
Now, James, what do you suppose happens next?
Well, as I see it, he's going to crash into the post.
Post? No, he'll skid into the wheelie bin there.
The wheelie bin, OK. Play the rest of the tape, let's see who's right.
Oh! LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
It's just unreal. I bet that made him jump.
He's standing there going,
"How the hell did that happen?" "The world's gone wobbly,
"I've driven through it!"
If you look, there is no way of telling, is there?
I'd do that now, having just seen him do it. I'd still drive in.
I'd park on this one - I bet it's the same thing.
OK, listen. I was driving a Volvo XC60 this week, the new one.
The front of it is all full of radars and sensors,
cos the idea is you can't actually crash it.
Don't ask me how. Anyhow, I was thinking,
there must be a simpler solution to not crashing.
And I think I have come up with it. Oh, God.
For once, bear with me on this, OK?
Just imagine if you had on the front of your car a magnet,
everybody has one, with the north pole facing out, OK?
You'd come along, head-on accident...
LAUGHTER
You could never have a head-on crash.
This is one of these windy-up cars, so I won't even cheat. Ready?
See? LAUGHTER
You see? APPLAUSE
Have I just solved road safety? Apart from the big cliff.
you're right about that.
Listen... Backing from Captain Maths!
No, but the only slight drawback is on full-size cars you would need
extremely, I mean EXTREMELY large magnets.
Yes, we'd get extremely large magnets.
You haven't thought this through. At some point there'll be...
Here's a car parked at the traffic lights,
and you'll come up behind to the other end of his magnet,
and that's his north pole, and you're gonna have a crash.
Because... No, that's his south pole.
Yes, south to north, bang, you're going to have a crash.
Utterly, utterly hopeless.
We'll all be killed. These are small details, OK?
LAUGHTER Think of the fuel-saving.
Seriously... ..What? ...A puncture.
Why wouldn't I get a puncture? INDISTINCT
Ah-ha!
The man here doesn't look bright...
LAUGHTER
He's just pointed out, you could be driving along, every screw and nail,
doonk, doonk, you'd never get a puncture.
Along with the manhole covers and signposts!
And the railings. And traffic lights.
And dogs with metal collars on. And skips. You are just nit-picking.
I will admit there are one or two things I need to address.
What, like the laws of physics, for example?
Yes. But I will find a way around them, don't you worry.
OK, you know Boris Johnson, Mayor of London?
When he was voted in he said he was going to review what sort of
buses we used in the capital city of the United Kingdom.
As Jeremy pointed out last series,
Boris has been rather faffing about on this one.
So we figured it was about time for some Top Gear help.
Whether he wanted it or not.
To find out what sort of bus is best for a busy city,
obviously you should form some committees and a focus group,
and then do some intensive studies into running costs,
safety, passenger usage and environmental impact.
But all of that takes time.
So instead we're going to sort this
using the ultimate crucible of excellence, motor sport.
For anything on four wheels, this is the white heat of the anvil
of the spearhead of evolution.
If you want to improve the breed, you go motorsport.
Second is the first of the losers.
You have to win to win, etc etc.
Our testing ground is here, Lydden Hill circuit in Kent.
A place often described as the Monza of southern England.
By people who've never been to Monza.
It's normally a rallycross circuit, so it is a challenging mix
of hairpins and fast sweepers, tarmac and loose gravel.
Much like central London, in fact.
So, let's meet the candidates for the next London bus.
Representing the double decker, a 1987 Leyland Olympian.
Representing the single decker, we have a 1993 Dennis Dart.
Then, on behalf of the current London champion,
we have the Mercedes 0305G.
This of course is a bendy bus,
and that means it'll probably spend the day causing crashes
and bursting into flames for no obvious reason.
Which is why we've got two of them.
Finally, representing the compact hopper bus,
we have a 1997 MetroRider.
Now, because there is so much at stake here,
we can't leave the driving to any old bus driver.
So we brought in our old friends, the touring car drivers.
Their precise and delicate touch
certainly got motorhome racing off to a great start last year.
So, please welcome touring car legend, Anthony Reid.
Touring car legend, Matt Neal.
And, for the second time tonight, hairdressing legend, Tom Chilton.
To be honest, they're not that good on passenger usage per mile,
but if you want to sort out the other important bus stuff -
understeer, lift off, oversteer, then these are your men.
Each driver went for their preferred mount,
leaving me with the blue and yellow bendy bus.
Last time this got together with the motor homes, to be honest,
it all degenerated into a bit of a demolition derby.
But this time, because we carrying out important research,
they have promised me absolutely no contact. Yep...
BUZZER SOUNDS
This is it. We are off. Let the investigations begin.
Interestingly, both bendy buses, 57 feet in length,
but his is mid-engined, mine is rear.
So a good race should sort out whose is best.
'True to their word, the touring car racers avoided body contact...
'..for at least half a lap.'
This is their sensitive touch?! That cost me a mirror.
Thinking about it, we have missed one thing out on this test.
Cyclists.
We should have had bicycles on the circuit,
perhaps being peddled by bus drivers.
'After two or three laps,
'I realised that finding the best bus
'would be harder than I thought...
'Because all of them had their good and bad points.'
The double-decker, aluminium body, air suspension,
it should have potential here on the track.
But it is compromised in other ways.
No low floor means poor disabled access.
Wow, look at the single-decker go! What a manoeuvre!
I don't believe it!
That was majestic.
Mind you, he's only licensed to carry 24 seated,
And that is where the bendy boss comes in. Licensed to carry 98.
And the seating is pretty flexible.
'So, with all the buses putting forward a good case,
'if we were to find a winner, we'd have to turn up the wick.'
A common, everyday scene from London streets.
This is important work.
'First to suffer was the little hopper,
'which didn't do too well in the "I'm a bus driver, when I pull out,
'"I never use my bloody mirrors" manoeuvre.'
Aww, that's an evil move being pulled on the diddy hopper there.
'Thankfully, nobody would dare mount such an attack
'on a bus as big as mine.'
Where did he come from, you bloody idiot?!
'I was limping and frankly, the other bendy
'was scoring low on passenger comfort.'
'The final lap.'
Oh, my word. Double-decker coming through.
'The last few corners were a straight dual
'between the single-decker and the double-decker.
But then...'
Ignore that bit.
Just tell the mayor that that was a crash test or something.
'Our investigation was complete.'
We have been thorough, comprehensive.
I've just driven over that man's bonnet,
but we can announce a decision is made.
'The best bus for London and any other city
'is the good old single-decker, because it's quick.'
I think what we should do now is collate all those findings
and get them straight to the mayor's office.
Yeah. Well done, everyone.
Well done, you. Nobody could accuse us of dumbing down!
No, that was serious work.
Just highbrow research from start to finish.
I honestly thought that was like watching Melvyn Bragg
presenting the Open University.
No, I think we covered all the bases there. It was thorough.
Now, we have to move on.
You see, this week,
my guest is quite simply that bloke off Grand Designs.
Ladies and gentlemen, Kevin McCloud.
I've waited a long time.
Have a seat. Thank you. Nice suit! That one!
Ladies and gentlemen, a genuine car fan has come among us today.
Yeah, it's a guilty secret I have, but it's true.
It's a bit annoying cos I'm going to want to spend most of the time
talking about interior design, you'll want to talk about cars.
I don't know much about interior design, so let's talk about cars.
Looking through all the notes and your past interests and so on,
do you have a passionate interest in V8s?
Yes, my father was an engineer. I'm looking at one now.
You are, I was going to say, is this coffee table turning you on?
The Porsche. I'm stroking it with my toe.
Looking at past cars you've had... Yes.
..the SL Mercedes, V8, Maserati Coupe, V8,
Ferrari 355, V8, TVR Cerbera, V8...
Now, look, the V8 thing. Food blender.
Oh, my V8 food blender? Yeah, yeah.
Which was frankly an out-and-out failure!
LAUGHTER
The blades need a bit of work,
but it's already being converted as we speak into a vacuum cleaner.
LAUGHTER
I think what you should do is combine the two great male
obsessions and get a V8 to power a power shower.
Power shower? No, male obsession is internet pornography, surely?
I don't know how you can have a V8-powered internet porn connection.
Maybe you could.
Maybe that would deliver everything that anybody's ever dreamed of.
So where does this love of how things work come from?
My father was an engineer, a rocket scientist.
And so, I... What, a real one?
A real one. Really? He designed stuff that went into space.
I grew up with a house where the boiler was always in pieces,
there was always a car in the middle of the kitchen in bits.
I have serviced most of my own cars.
I've done lots of bioethanol petrol mixes,
experimented with fuels on them.
But I'm interested in this idea that you can service your own cars.
Of course you did have a TVR? Yeah.
The point about the Cerbera was that it was a kit car in reverse,
in as much as you bought a new shiny object and you parked it at home
and slowly it, sort of, disassembled itself!
LAUGHTER The gear lever would come off.
It did drive me up a slope once with the headlamps and the washer
and the windscreen wipers and the horn all working at the same time...
It drove itself! With none of them actually turned on?
No, it turned them all on by itself.
LAUGHTER
Have you ever had a Saab?
I have had two Saabs.
I had a Saab, a big estate Saab that ran on bioethanol.
And years and years ago
my second car was a big orange, jelly mould Saab, the 95.
Oh yes. You must have done. You can't be a designer without that
A quarter-inch plate, that car, it's fantastic.
You could crash into anything,
and you'd leave a Saab-shaped impression in it!
Did you ever try? Yes! I had it in my 20s, in London.
I'd sit and read the paper in the car on a hill
and suddenly find myself glued to a Cortina.
LAUGHTER
They're not architects' cars.
You're a designer but same sort of thing.
You are interested in the aesthetics? Of course.
I'm interested in efficiency, in design,
I'm interested in aesthetics, in ecology.
I've gone green now... And don't smirk!
I was gonna say... My one ambition today was to come here
and use the word eco on Top Gear!
Let's listen. Say it again. Eco.
CROWD BOOS
There was a ripple of applause from the corner!
Eco! You call it the green bug. We think of it as a disease.
LAUGHTER
I tell you what really excites me, is the idea that...
Actually, when we use the word, eco,
it is useless calling cars eco cars or houses eco houses.
The reason I love Aston Martins is that the Aston is beautiful.
They are beautifully put together. They're beautifully made.
98% of them ever made are still on the road
and how sustainable can you get?
It's the business of having an Aston Martin
and keeping it in the garage and it lasts 50 years,
and you only drive it a 1,000 miles a year...
A Toyota Prius with nickel batteries is going to do more damage,
if you believe that cars are damaging the environment.
Which I do. Which you do.
And you are entitled to come here with this opinion,
and not be killed in any way! LAUGHTER
I'm just going to figure out my exit route from the studio now.
Exactly! Now, I want to get on to your lap, if I may. Ah, yes, yeah.
How was it? It was addictive.
I mean, I've never done it before, and I'm going to do it again lots.
Really? You enjoyed it? I loved it.
I never thought you'd get so much pleasure out of
a little one point... Whatever it is.
Who'd like to see how Kevin got on? ALL: Yes!
Here we go, Kevin. Let's see.
TYRES SQUEAL
Tame that wheel spin nicely.
Oh, my God. Jesus, Mary and Joseph!
You actually looked terrified.
That was a little dab of brakes there, halfway through the corner.
Keep the front in check.
It looks so tame. It looks so tame here.
as you're making out.
That's well done.
Aww, baby, I think it's gonna hurt.
Do you ever actually blink? You haven't blinked as...
Ooohhhh....
I've never seen countryside move so fast.
Still haven't blinked.
I have only one devout wish,
and that is to beat Terry Wogan.
You couldn't get much closer to those! Come on, baby.
Now, that looks brilliant...
I've never seen that done better.
That was cos I was driving at 15 miles per hour. No, you weren't.
That second to last corner was phenomenal.
LOUD APPLAUSE
And no spins.
I've never seen anyone do that...
Normally, people cut the corner or go too far and run wide.
It was the penultimate one, though.
I'd finally got my act together by the ultimate corner.
That's the trouble. Anyway, to establish how fast you went round.
There's the board. Where...
I can't believe it. This moment, I've been dreaming of.
I'm looking, as you can see, at the bottom 10.
Well no, you went faster than that. OK, so maybe Keith Allen?
Where's Keith Allen? He's there.
He's down there. So, dry track.
You did it in 1 minute..
..40... Yes?
5... CROWD DRAWS BREATH
What's the fastest ever? 45.8.
APPLAUSE
I've got a new career. Unbelievable. That's Cowell.
No!
The eco-mentalist!
I can't believe it! That's amazing. And actually...
We actually have... The specific time is 1.45.87.
Yeah, yeah. Jay Kay was 1.45.83.
So you're only half a second off Jay Kay.
I don't know how you're going to be able to live this down, Jeremy.
That you have the eco-mentalist come on the show and...
LAUGHTER
Thank God for Jay Kay! If the eco-mentalist had gone to the top...
You're really... You're barking up quite literally the wrong tree.
You have a natural gift for it, there can be no doubt about it.
That's an amazingly quick time. I can't say any more.
I'm a bit overcome.
You can hold your head up high. Ladies and gentlemen, Kevin McCloud.
APPLAUSE
And now, I'm very, very pleased to announce
that it is time for the Cool Wall. Yeah.
CHEERING
I'm going to start. You're going to start? I am.
This is the Nissan GTR. There's loads of technical reasons why
it's so clever and brilliant, but the simple facts are,
it is faster round the Nurburgring than the Porsche 911 Turbo.
And it is half the price. Which means it is cool. No, listen.
When you're a kid, you want to impress girls. You learn the guitar,
not a Casio keyboard.
No girl's interested in a man in...
All the buttons, very clever, not cool.
That's a very good point, but you don't have to explain it.
You just get in and drive it like a proper car.
So, what are you driving these days? A Nissan... Right. Thank you.
Uncool. Now, may I just do this one? Please. This is the new Sirocco.
Basically underneath, it's a Golf GTi.
You pay £100 more for the Sirocco, and you get a bit less practicality.
And that's a good thing.
Who here married their wife because she was easier to wipe down?
LAUGHTER
What?! That's why this is a cool car.
It might even be super-cool. What do we think?
Hands up for super-cool?
Hands up for just cool.
They are wrong, you see.
They were momentarily correct. I think that is a super cool car.
You? Alfa Romeo, the baby Alfa, small Italian car.
Anybody here got an Alfa? SOME IN AUDIENCE SHOUT OUT
There's two people. All the others are in a cloud of steam on the A3.
That's cool! What's yours? It's a Sportwagon. 156. Excellent.
And you didn't buy a BMW because? I wanted an Alfa.
Because you see, he wasn't a cock. And who else had an Alfa?
Can I just say, I'm his son, and yes he has. What, he is a cock?
What do you drive? I don't at the moment.
Clearasil will help with that, by the way.
LAUGHTER
Do you find him attractive? I came with him. You came...
Is everybody all together?! They brought me here.
What the hell accent's that?
LAUGHTER
American.
You're American? You can't be, you're nowhere near fat enough.
LAUGHTER
You're American?
Welcome. Welcome to the free world, you'll like it here.
Did everybody come in one group?
Where were we? It's nice to have the colonies here.
This Alfa is called the Mito, M-I-T-O,
because it was designed in Milan and built in Torino, Turin.
I'm thinking, what if they'd designed it in Twickenham
and built it in Attercliffe? LAUGHTER
But they didn't and it's a cool car, and that's an end of it.
Ah, wow, yes.
This is a Morgan AeroMax and I have a question.
What kind of monumental moron would spend 100,000 of their pounds
on a car as catastrophically ugly as that, Richard Hammond?!
It is utterly beautiful and it's as English
as the Malvern Hills amongst which it's built.
It combines cutting-edge technology with proper, traditional,
old-fashioned craftsmanship. Uh-hu.
Yes, in yours, I couldn't help noticing
there was a wooden beam down the roof.
Yes, it does have a beamed ceiling. It does.
When you open up the handbook, does it go, "Hear ye, hear ye!"?
What do we think of this car?
Uncool.
Cool.
I like it. Correct, well done, sir. Stand up to him.
He's a big oaf, just keep going.
Would you be inclined to sleep with this man if he had that car? No.
No. Would you sleep with him?
I have to. You have to?
LAUGHTER
Anyway, mate... I know. ..you know the rules of the Cool Wall.
If we have one of the cars, it goes there, and that's an end of it.
Our hands are now empty and you think the Cool Wall is over. It is.
However, I have a theory that the Jaguar XKR convertible
which we said last time we did this,
was the coolest car you can buy in Britain today,
may have met its match.
Really? In this box here...
Yes, I really do believe this, the Volvo V70 estate.
You're saying that's...? This is now the coolest car in Britain.
I think you can tell
by the stunned silence in this room, you can go too far and that's...
We know, and I'll whisper this slightly,
people who like cars are quite dreary.
Yeah. You go to a party, you sit down,
and you say you are interested in cars, you can see them moving away.
Yeah. It's like a club. We are car bores. Terrible.
You can drive this great car
but you can pretend you're not interested in cars.
This is a box for carrying airbags. Driven by men with beige trousers
and a problem stopping when they've finished weeing.
It's just a dismal, dreary, safety obsessed...
It's like turning up on Bondi Beach with a lifejacket already on.
Who is the worst-dressed man in the world?
Our studio director, Brian. He comes to work in a piece of faux sealskin,
with turquoise twine and you go,
"Brian, that's rubbish". He goes, yeah, but it's Dolce and Chanel
or whatever. As though that's an excuse.
This has no badge. It's just a blue turtleneck jumper.
No, that has no badge, just like it has no genitals.
It says, "I've given up, give me my Volvo."
You're wearing Volvo shoes! No, I'm not! They're not! You are!
Look, stout soles... They're RM Williams, they're just boots!
Australian Volvos. A little bit of a heel at the back.
LAUGHTER
You can tell a lot about a man's car from his shoes.
All right then, what are they if they're not Volvo ones?
They're Lancias. They can't go through puddles.
You must be American.
LAUGHTER
This is somebody with a Nissan Micra.
Perfect.
And I'm guessing here...Jag.
A6. A6? God.
And then...oh my God! What kind of an idiot?
Hello, James.
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
I'm going to put this on the board.
I'm prepared to nail it there if you go near it.
And I'm glad you're here, James, because it's time to move on.
You see, this year, a motoring icon is celebrating its 40th birthday.
Richard Hammond?
No, he's 38. Same as he was last year, and the year before.
It's his birthday next week, isn't it? It is. Then he'll be 38.
Yes, all right. Funny.
38 year old, Richard Hammond. I am, thank you very much.
This motoring icon, it's an important one.
To celebrate its birthday we had to go somewhere really special.
To here, in fact, the Riviera.
The legendary stretch of coastline which for decades
has been the spiritual home of Playboys,
movie stars and the jet set.
Which sort of makes it the perfect place
for one of the all-time great jet set cars.
The Ferrari Daytona.
It may take its name from a racetrack in America, but trust me,
the Daytona is the absolute essence of pure European supercar.
Drop-dead gorgeous looks, stunning speed,
born in Italy.
I'm going to take it for a drive now, from here, Portofino,
which is a sort of Italian Whitby, along the coast to Saint Tropez.
And even though it's 40 years old,
this is the perfect machine for the job. No it isn't.
Yes it is. Well, it isn't.
Well, it just is. That is why I'm here with it.
It isn't. Not any more.
What is?
Well, it's a boat. Not that one.
This one.
What we have here is the XSR48,
or in plain English, the only way to get around on the Riviera.
Not only is it stunning to look at,
it's also the world's fastest diesel production boat,
with a top speed of 80 mph.
James, this is from the future.
But you're from 1948.
I know you think that,
but I like modern intelligent engineering solutions.
And this is one.
This is a carbon fibre racing hull
that's won World Powerboat Championships, and then they've put
some nice seats and switches...sat nav...
James was adamant that this wasn't just some rich man's vulgar toy.
So. What? Mr May...defend this.
Ah, yes. I was hoping you wouldn't... That is a carbon fibre bog.
Yeah, it is.
To prove to James, of all people, that the old ways are the best,
I offered to race him to Saint Tropez.
and me in the greatest grand tourer ever made.
How much is that worth, by the way?
That one? £200,000.
One-and-a-quarter million. Chav.
Move your scrap off the harbour.
The start of the race wasn't exactly dramatic.
There was a three knot speed limit in the harbour,
and my car was, well, 40 years old.
These old Daytonas take a while to warm up.
You have to sort of skip second gear,
go straight to third for a while,
until the gearbox is up to temperature,
otherwise it sort of explodes.
While his 215-mile route was 40 miles longer than mine,
Hammond was convinced he'd be able to maintain a higher average speed.
But once my cabin cruiser was out onto the open water,
it would turn into a ferocious powerboat racer,
and for that reason, I couldn't drive it on my own.
This is Peter, he's a many times World Powerboat champion,
holds powerboat endurance records.
He's doing the tricky throttle and trim stuff, I'm doing the steering.
And the nav.
How fast are we going? Nine knots?
Need to go in the right direction. Going the wrong way at the moment.
It's that way? Yeah.
The autostrada beckoned.
This is it.
The Daytona shouldn't really have to defend its honour on its birthday.
But if James wanted a race, he'd get one.
4.4-litre Italian V12, unleashed.
Ha-ha-ha-ha!
Right, here we go. 1600 shaft horsepower.
That's more than one-and-a-half times a Bugatti Veyron.
That's 45 knots, so 50 mph.
And here's a tunnel.
I have to open the window a little bit. I'm sorry about the wind.
Oh, that really is spine tingling.
70 mph across the water - that's fabulous.
This boat has been conceived like a supercar.
very agile, has just enough trim
and creature comforts to make it bearable.
But that's all, it is a hardcore performance machine.
My supercar doesn't have a space-age khazi,
but it does have infinitely more pedigree.
What's odd about the Daytona, is that if somebody says
to you "Ferrari Daytona" even if you've never been in one,
if you've never even seen one, it sounds right -
you know, with a name like that, it's not going to be a minger.
These days it takes many months and many millions to design a new car.
seven days.
And just look at it.
It's...
absolutely sublime.
On the water, I had no time
for Hammond's misty-eyed Mills and Boonery.
Old towns just racing by.
I know exactly what's going on in Richard Hammond's mind -
he's got a romantic vision of Sophia Loren and all those people.
But it's different now.
This place is full of Puffy Dad and New York Hilton.
This is the modern way to do it.
As long as I'm not driving.
Your ten o'clock. Go behind it. I've got it.
When it was launched in 1968, the Daytona cost £10,000,
making it the most expensive Ferrari ever.
But not everyone thought it was worth the money.
A year earlier,
Lamborghini had brought out the Mura,
and that was impossibly futuristic - mid-engined,
really showing the way forwards for supercars.
And yet it was Ferrari, with a front-engine car.
In its day, it was seen as a bit of a dinosaur.
But the Daytona had the last laugh.
Because of the Mura's front-end lift at high speeds,
it started to go very light,
cos aerodynamically it didn't quite work.
It could never get near its top speed.
This could. 174.
30 miles into my journey, the water was getting a bit choppier,
but I wasn't worried.
My feet here are suspended
with suspension units off a Paris-Dakar racer,
and the technique, apparently, is to relax
and let the seat take the battering.
Ohhh!
40 miles into my journey,
and something rather perverse was happening.
You're watching a man go through the process of falling in love.
It's not perfect, this new love of mine -
I'd heard stories about incredibly heavy steering, the clutch...
It's a bit like a big Italian V12 engine truck.
And all those things are true.
The steering wheel is like turning a hatch wheel
on a submarine in a World War II film.
But the Daytona brings back the glamour.
It reminds the Riviera what the Riviera is all about.
Oh.
Ohhh.
Wow!
On the ocean waves, life was no longer so jolly.
My situation report - it's becoming very choppy,
so we've had to reduce our speed by ten knots or so.
And on top of that, the Dakar seats weren't really helping.
Ahhh!
Meanwhile, in the Daytona...
Ahh!
Ahh! Ahh!
# I love you baby
# And if it's quite all right
# I need you baby, to warm the... #
You all right?
The camera was broken.
I was broken, and the rough seas had forced us down to 25 knots,
which meant that Hammond would be roaring ahead.
God, how much further is it?
About 100 nautical miles.
Ahh!
Marvellous.
I was indeed ahead, and as I neared the French border,
I was now so in love with the Daytona
that I might have been babbling a bit.
Everything that it was, it still is. When you drive one, here,
the mechanical interface between you and it, it does take you into its...
Mercifully, my doe-eyed dribbling was then cut short. POLICE SIREN
Oh, I think we've just been pulled by the police.
Oh. Yes.
He's waving his arm at the cameraman.
Er...
I think the rest of this film may not look as good as the first bit.
I'm in a Daytona, and I'm wearing shades, so I'm absolutely fine.
Despite Hammond's setback, we had to keep going
as fast as our spines would allow, if we were to stay in the race.
We're back up to 41, 42 knots,
which is twice as fast as we were going half an hour...
It's much better than a Max Mosley party.
The shades haven't worked.
The Italian police weren't convinced
that we had rightful possession of the Daytona.
He wants the documents for the car.
Documents for the car. Erm...
Sort of no.
I don't have them.
72 miles to go.
How do we know when we're in France?
Does the sea become even rougher, like the roads do?
Whoa, this is enormous! Ahh!
This was bad.
My lead was now being destroyed.
Right, I'll go and sort this out.
Right. They've told us to follow them to the police station.
Out on the sea, my body may have been taking a battering,
but at least I didn't have to worry about the rozzers.
SIREN WAILS It's the police.
Oh, God, he wants to see documents.
Hello. Hello, how are you?
I've been stopped by the police. You haven't.
Yeah, the sea police.
You know the Riviera thing, the grand tour?
It's not what it was, is it? No.
It's not all Sophia any more.
There's more paperwork than Brigitte Bardot would have been doing, and does.
Finally, we were both released.
Right. Saint Tropez.
But because the police had stopped Hammond for much longer,
I had now closed the gap.
We are now going past Monaco, which is on the right.
50 nautical miles to go.
It's anybody's race.
But then, at motorway speeds, it soon started to go my way again.
The final stretch of motorway to Saint Tropez. And I'm home and dry.
I am probably the most low rent, lowbrow chavvy urchin
ever to pedal one of these along the Riviera.
Over 50 knots. Yeah.
With a considerable lead over James, I was now off the motorway,
on the A road, and just 20-odd miles from Saint Tropez.
This is where the car just comes alive now.
Yes, it's not a nimble, tiny, lightweight sports car,
but it feels lithe and supple...
And now, to complete a truly excellent day,
I shall win the race in the Daytona,
have a little gloat, and then, I think, a beer.
Blister.
55.
60 knots there.
I was getting really close to Saint Tropez.
Land of glamour, here I come.
Any minute, the Daytona would be back
in the world of Mick and Bianca, where it belongs.
60 knots there.
I was now entering the fabled town itself.
Some of the signs and advertising hoardings have got a bit bigger...
But, you know, modern world.
OK, this is getting a bit...snarly, now.
Fair dos.
The land you can see to the left, we'll head for that now.
As James powered on, I was discovering that Saint Tropez
wasn't quite what I imagined.
CAR HORNS BEEP
Oh, no, this isn't right.
Holiday homes for sale.
Burgers...
Traffic.
The car's still brilliant, but the world's changed.
I was just 15 miles from the finish line.
15 miles at 45 knots is 20 minutes.
Mini golf.
If this car overheats...
Well, it will. It's old and Italian.
On HMS Carbon Khazi, we were flying.
61.
Ha-hey! 65!
Wa-hey! 2.5 miles to run.
As I got closer to Saint Tropez, the traffic started moving again.
And I was heading for the finish line - a bar in the port.
Speed humps.
Speed humps in a Ferrari Daytona, that's not right!
Less than a mile. Beer! Beer!
Got to be close now.
This is it. Sorry, everybody, about the car.
He's not here.
Oh, hang on.
Yes, yes, yes.
It's a pleasure to win.
Do you know what? What?
I don't care. Because I said it was the perfect vehicle for the job.
I didn't say fastest. I said perfect. And it was.
I mean, look at it here. It's all over it.
It's beautiful. Tell me you don't agree.
Bloody gorgeous.
HE LAUGHS
There's something I want to ask you. What?
Can I drive the car back? I'm broken.
Please? Yes, you can.
APPLAUSE
Can I just say, James -
man, you were green. LAUGHTER
No, that was just the camera. I was black and blue.
LAUGHTER
Can I just say how nice it was that, for the first time,
I got the comfy, luxurious option, and it was just magnificent.
Can I just say how nice it was that you two
got to spend some time together,
on the Riviera, in the sunshine,
because next week, I get to drive
a mid-range Ford Fiesta in Basingstoke.
LAUGHTER On that bombshell, it's time to end. Thanks for watching,
goodnight!
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd transcript:chocolate/sync:innuit