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Hello, hello, thank you,
Now, there are lambs in the fields
£2,000 and told us we had to spend
the cars we'd bought down
where we'd be given a number of challenges.
This is what I bought.
It's a 1987 BMW 325i convertible.
According to the mileometer it's
done 94,000 miles which means the one
thing you can be sure of is it
hasn't done 94,000 miles.
But on the face of it, pretty solid car.
Best of all, it only cost £1,600.
CAR HORN HONKS Oh!
Oh, no.
That's awkward.
That is a 3... Yes.
32... Yeah.
325? Yes.
325. Yes.
How old?
'87. '88. How much? 1,600.
19,950!
How many miles?
94, it says. And?
This "says" 137,000 miles.
I'm pretty pleased with this, at least they
didn't fit stupid after-market wheels on it unlike...
Mine. Yours comes from a good area,
I can tell. Anyone who's got these.
Extra locks. They don't live in
Bourton-on-the-Water, do they?
It's not a Cotswoldian feature, no.
More St Pauls in Bristol, I'm thinking. Yeah.
This is, well, just superb.
So many different shades of black
on there, it's unbelievable.
He's taken care of his car.
Oh ho ho! There, you need that.
Was he delivering paving slabs one at a time?
No.
Why is that there?
Because it improves handling.
'At this point, James arrived in his
four-seater convertible.'
Oh, dear. Oh!
Oh, God! I don't suppose by any
happy chance that's the 318, is it?
It's a 325, sir. Yours?
325. Is it? Yes.
325, yes.
What year is yours? 1989.
How much did you pay? £1,900.
Yours looks pretty standard. It is.-
Except for the rust obviously.
Mine's nice.
Don't do that! I've just fixed that.
I barely touched it!
'So none of us had bought an Audi or a
Ford or a Merc and that looked like a ***-up.
'But then I realised that actually,- it wasn't.'
I think this is brilliant.
Well, not really. We've got the same car.
We're always being asked,
people come up to us and say is a Golf
a good used purchase, or a Volvo or
whatever and we always say it depends.
So what we've got here are three cars,
they were made in the same factory by the same robots
at roughly the same time and they've all been driven
in the same- country by the same sort of people.
So they should be the same. Ah.
But I bet you, I bet you they aren't.
'So we decided to bin the
challenges the producers had devised
'and dream up some of our own.'
Where's Hammond?
Don't know, I think we've lost him already.
CAR IGNITION FAILING,
CAR ALARM SOUNDS
JEREMY AND JAMES LAUGH
No, listen, it's...
Let me hear that sound again.
CAR ALARM SOUNDS
Oh, dear. It keeps doing that.
JEREMY AND JAMES LAUGH
Stop doing that!
'Hammond's cheap after-market alarm
matched his cheap after-market wheels.'
They leach into dry rot,
they leach into the system.
There's wires going everywhere.
Can't you just take it all off?
No. No, because otherwise you could've
stolen a car by just taking the alarm off.
They weren't that stupid in the '80s.
CAR ALARM SOUNDS That's got it.
'Jeremy and I decided to abandon
Hammond and have a race.
'From nought to 100 and then
back to nought again,
'so that we could test our cars'
power and brakes.'
Here are the vital statistics.
2.5 litre straight-six, 170hp,
at least when it was new,
it may have lost a few.
Jeremy has a 2.5 litre
straight-six with 170 horsepower,
or at least when it was new,
he may have lost a few since then.
The difference, he's got a
big slab of concrete in the boot.
It's not the paving stone in
the back I'm worried about,
it's the automatic gearbox.
Doing a drag race with an auto is like doing a
100 metre sprint in wellies. Full of tadpoles.
Yes!
Bit of steering wheel wobble coming in.
No concrete is the answer.
There we go, nought to 60,
that was about 25 seconds.
RICHARD'S CAR ALARM SOUNDS,
FAILS TO START
90!
Must be able to do 100.
And there it is.
There it is.
No brakes, no brakes.
It's just not stopping.
Please, stop!
'The gap between our supposedly
identical BMWs was staggering.'
77, 78, 79, 80, 81.
281 yards.
There is another conclusion we can
draw from this. Which is what?
That as you'd expect,
I've done this properly and I've
proved myself to be better than
you at buying second-hand BMWs.
Well, your brakes are better.
And my engine's better and my gearbox is better.
Speed isn't everything.
Is it not?
RICHARD'S CAR ALARM CONTINUES TO SOUND
After the race, we got
Hammond's car going again.
And went to a Waking The
Dead-style- forensics lab
to find out in great detail what
sort of life our cars had had.
You know the company
we're using to do this... Mm-hm.
..Are called Manlove Forensics.
Are they? They are. No, they are.
Why are they called that?
Yeah, the boss is called John Manlove.
Oh. Not many fond school-day
memories for him, I bet.
They've actually already discovered- that your car
used to belong to a Muslim man from Birmingham.
What, they can tell that just
from swabbing the seats?
No, they found this letter in the footwell.
Oh, yes. Addresses to Jamir Masjid,
it's from a mosque in Birmingham.
They're good, they are good. They're good.
'But the test they were doing went far
beyond looking for old envelopes.'
Do you know what I'm most worried
they'll find in my car?
What? Gentlemen's relish.
I quite like gentlemen's relish.
Oh, you don't mean the stuff from the jar.
'After many hours, the boss
came over with the results.'
Hi, I'm John Manlove. Can we stick to John?
Otherwise we're just going to get giggles.
This vehicle here. This is mine.
This had crisp fragments in it. Crisps is
fine, nobody's worried about that.
There was a little bit of vegetation. Leaves?
Bits-and-pieces such as that
and some flakes of skin.
There'll be mine.
So that's not too bad then.
No, not too bad, fairly standard.
Let's move on, James's car.
Lots of skin in this one.
Including some nice, large flakes of
yellowish skin with some blood staining on.
A scab! Somebody's picked a scab in your car.
Full of scabs. Go on. Seriously?
Anything else worth note?
Quite a lot of nasal mucus.
That's bogies, he's talking about bogies.
Were they smeared on the
seat or the sun visor?
Little balls in the footwell.
Shall I just finish James's car?
Was there more? The last one was
that the steering wheel was stained
with a chemical that can be present-
in high quantities in saliva.
Gob. So basically if you're talking and
driving, that's what you may well expect.
So Roy Hattersley owned it? Picked his
scabs off, spat all over your steering wheel
and dropped bogies in large
quantities in your footwell.
I don't even want to look at your car now!
But then Mr Manlove came to Hammond's car.
First of all, there was some black sports type-tape
with what turned out to be blood staining on it.
Whoa, whoa, whoa. Sports tape with
blood on the end of it?
Somebody's been bound.
And murdered.
Again the steering wheel had what
appeared to be saliva staining on it.
And lastly, we had *** hairs and faeces present.
I'm sorry, did you say the word "faeces"?
What certainly appeared to be faecal matter, yes.
That's poo, isn't it?
That's poo. Your car's got poo in it.
Is that normal?
It's like driving around in a Moroccan prison,
isn't it, really? In the front of his car.
'After the forensic tests, my
colleagues were very distressed.'
Oh, God.
So we decided to pull over and see
which of our cars- was the most thief-proof.
This meant finding some thieves who
insisted that we pixelate their faces.
Unfortunately the pixelating was done
by a man who'd just had his car nicked.
Our thieves with the pixelated...
chests will now see how quickly they
can break into- the cars and drive them away.
Are you ready, chaps? Here we go.
Three, two, one, go!
'I felt sure at this point that thanks to
the double locks and the immobiliser,
'my car would finally start to come good.'
I think you'll find they'll take a while getting in.
He's into mine. Oh, he's into yours!
Yeah, but even though... OK, he's in,
but I think you'll find...
HE STARTS CAR,CAR ALARM SOUNDS
That's ridiculous! That was honestly,
that was just no time.
Your car is now on a cross-Channel
ferry on its way to Uzbekistan.
It really is quite tense now.
Come on, Jeremy's thief.
Come on, James's thief.
Come on, Jeremy's thief.
However after 20 minutes, both our
cars were still where we'd left them.
So we decided to call it a draw.
Unsurprisingly, the thief decided to
return my car which meant he could
explain the reason it was so
easy-to-steal is the ignition barrel is all
worn smooth inside so you could start it with
the handle of a teaspoon or a lollipop stick.
I think it has done more than 94,000 miles.
So far then we'd proved that our identical
cars were in fact completely different.
And that Hammond's was full of
someone else's *** hair.
APPLAUSE
And that Hammond's was full of
someone else's *** hair.
APPLAUSE
I've washed my hands,
I've washed my hands.
I mean, honestly... Not nice.
Just knowing that. Isn't it extraordinary when
you buy a used car, you'll do checks-to
make sure the gearbox is working,
the differential isn't all brokenbut you don't do
anything to check the state of the interior.
It's really weird because I could cope if I
thought a car had missed a service or two
or something like that but once I found out that one
was full of nasal mucus, I'd have walked away.
Has anyone here bought a used car recently?
Nobody's bought a used car?
So you bought a used car?
Yes. And did you check it out for...
Scabs? Scabs? Blood? No. Faeces?
Nothing, no.
You're from Liverpool? Liverpool.
I said bought, anyone here bought!
Oh, here we go again! You have?
Did you check out if it's got any
finance owing on it?
Finance. You did finance, you did
checks on the mechanical components?
I did. Did you see if there were anybody else's
bottom mushrooms growing in the carpet?
No. You didn't. I'm very surprised,- I'm really quite
surprised. Anyway we're going to pick it up later on.
Now we ought to do the news.
Can I just talk about speed
cameras, does anybody mind?
You know Oxfordshire Council
announced recently, last year,
it would turn all the speed cameras-
off and when they said that,
all the road safety groups
were running around saying
everybody will be dead in
ten minutes as a result of this.
Well, six months have now elapsed and the
road safety groups are saying they don't know
what effect the switch-off has had
on accident figures.
How can they not know?
They say they're not in yet.
But I always know pretty much
immediately when I've had an accident.
There are clues, big noise,
sudden stop, that sort of thing.
The thing is they may not know but
I do because I've done some digging.
In a three-month period in 2009,
when the cameras were on,
there were 35 accidents at speed camera sites.
In the same three-month period when
the cameras were switched off
in 2010, there were 35 accidents
at speed camera sites.
No difference. No difference at all.
What about fatalities? Fatalities, there were none
with the cameras on and none with the cameras off.
Really? What's interesting about this is that you'd
think this made no difference and saved the council
a fortune by getting rid of the speed cameras.
They're now saying the police are going to take over
running them and turn them back on again in April.
I thought they said- they couldn't afford to run them?
No, the police are doing it.
But this is very good news because that must mean
they've solved all the other crimes. What, the police?
Actually, they haven't solved them all but they have
caught that bloke- who nicked the lead off my roof.
You had lead stolen from your roof?
All of it. Only you would be the
victim of a crime from the 1950s.
Was the villain chased by a black and white
policeman blowing a whistle by any chance?
Yes. Was he driving a Ford Zephyr?
The thing is I live in Oxfordshire and I was burgled
recently and they haven't caught her yet. Her?
I'm not sexist. Nice touch. Good work.
See? We're not.
You might have seen in the news Formula One
driver Robert Kubicainjured horribly in a rally crash.
He probably won't be watching but
his family in Poland might be
and we did want to say we wish youall the very best,
hope you recoversoon and get back behind the wheel.
Yes, he's a terrific driver,
really is, Robert, and I'm
sure everybody here will join in wishing
him a very speedy recovery.
Yeah, we do. Get well soon.
APPLAUSE
I'd like, if you don't mind,
to talk about magpies.
It's a car show, Jeremy.
Bear with me, because there's an
organisation called the Songbird Survival Trust.
They're calling for a cull on magpies.
They're not calling it a cull, they're
saying they want to do an experiment.
Is it an experiment to see what happens
to a magpie if you fire a shotgun at it?
Yes, it is, basically.
I agree with them on this but for different reasons.
They say if you get rid of magpies then we'll
have more songbirds because magpies- eat songbirds
but there's a better reason than that I can think of.
Magpies are a menace to road safety.
They look like they'd be bad don't they?
Stupid idiot, listen, drivers,- I'm not a superstitious man.
I can walk under a ladder,
put my head in a lion's mouth.
That's not a superstition, you idiot,
it's a bad idea.
I can put a hat on my new shoes, all
those things but I do salute magpies. OK?
The problem is because the magpie is
the only bird in Britain these days,
you're just driving along doing
this the whole time.
No, you don't just salute, if yousee a single magpie,
one on its own,-you have to say "morning, captain"
three times. Morning, captain,morning, captain,
morning, captain, salute three times, spit three times,
touch your right elbow with your left hand,
one, two, three times
and then lick your thumb and make a cross
in the top right-hand corner of the windscreen.
You don't have to do that. You do. Do you do
that when you see a magpie? Every single time.
It's quite a faff and it's difficult on the bike
but I do it. Morning, captain...
one, two, three, and then you carry on.
You've both got that completely wrong
because what you're supposed to do,
it's only the first magpie of the day and
you salute and say "morning, Mr Magpie",
and you don't do it in the afternoon
because that's bad luck
and you don't do the second one...
Rubbish! How do you know it's the first magpie
of the day? You don't join the Village People.
Is anyone here Jewish?
Yep. You are, where's Jewish, hands up?
You are? Do you know what we're talking about?
Yeah, Newcastle. No, no, no.
It's not Newcastle, I know where
you're going with that.
It's just that our studio director's Jewish
and has no idea what we're
talking about because he said,
perhaps Jews don't do it.
Is anyone else Jewish who has no clue?
You're Jewish, and do you salute magpies?
No, but we know about it.
You know about it but you don't do it?
Interesting.
So it could be a religious thing.
I don't know.
Do Jewish people have more road accidents
as a result of magpies? No, fewer.
Jewish people will have fewer road accidents
because they're not spending all day long doing this.
Anyway, look. To cut to the point here,
whether you do my simple salute which
is correct, or his full Morris dance...
Can't be too careful.
We need to stop it because
the advantages are huge
because if you get rid of magpies, you have
more songbirds so the air sounds nicer.
You've got *** and... Why did I say ***?
Sparrows and all that sort of
thing and that'd be brilliant
plus we don't have to do that
and that'll make the roads safer.
There we are, Top Gear Top Tip,
kill all magpies and kill them now.
Who told you about the eyes and ears and nose
and chin? I've accumulated them over the years.
For God's sake, nobody tell me any more
that I have to do or I'll add them to my routine.
What you have to do... No!
Take your trousers down,
look at somebody in the next car, preferably
a van driver, and go... That's a tradition.
Hey, listen, listen.
There's a new lightweight Lamborghini
Gallardo Spyder has come along. Here it is.
It's called the Performante.
That's- going to cost you a hundred and...
I can't read that. What's that say?
You poor, knackered old goat.
£188,000. £188,000.
Top speed I do know. 201 mph. Is that possibly
the best-looking car in production right now?
It is a fantastic-looking car.
The problem is it's getting quite old and compared
to the Ferrari 458, it just feels old fashioned.
The thing is, this isn't just a
duel now between the Italians,
because the British have moved
in with a new McLaren.
Yes, it's called the MP4-12C.
We've got it here in the studio and- this is the first
time we've been able to have a proper look at it.
It has McLaren's own engine,
a 3.8 litre twin-turbo V8.
It also has very sophisticated
computer-controlled suspension.
And, most interestingly, it was tested
here at the Top Gear test track.
We should stress we had nothing to do
with the testing or development of it at all.
No, nothing whatsoever. The thing that bothers me,
Hammond, is I've driven the 458 a lot, as you know.
I love it and I cannot see how this can be better.
I know, but what if it is?
There are a few pointers. For one thing,
it's cheaper than the 458.
You can't get in! I can.It's also more powerful,
592 brakehorse power, which is 30 or so more.
These are good signs. I like it in here because
they've made the steering wheel the steering wheel.
They haven't fallen into that trap of putting
buttons all over it to make it feel like Formula 1.
They don't make you choose on your instrument
panel between the speedometer and the sat nav
like Ferrari do. All that stuff they put here, and
your music, on a sort of iPad thing in the middle.
It's a fantastic place to be.
My only problem with this really is,- I like a supercar
to look a bit crazy, a bit mad, like a Zonda.
If you ask me, this is sort of plain.
You say Zonda, but
which Zonda do you mean?
Well, the Pagani Zonda as opposed to
the Kia Zonda or the Ford Zonda.
No, you see, over the years,
there have been thousands of them.
The saga began 12 years ago
when Pagani launched this - Genesis.
The very brilliant and very dramatic C12.
A year later, they introduced a slightly
faster version called the C12S,
and we saw that it was good.
Then there was the Roadster S
and the Monza, and the F,
and the F Roadster.
And then, just when we thought every
angle had been explored, the F Clubsport.
We imagined that this would be
the final Zonda, the final encore.
But we were wrong.
Welcome, everyone, to the Zonda R,
the last of the breed.
And by far the most confusing.
It looks like a pure-bred racer,
but you can't race it,
because there are rules and
regulations in motor sport,
and this meets none of them.
And if- you try to take it on the road,
a policeman is going to stop you and say,
"Sir, where are your indicators
"and why do you not have any tread on your tyres?"
So if it's not for racing and it's not for the road,
what is it for?
Well, this.
SPEECH DROWNED OUT BY ENGINE
Annoyingly, the R is so loud that our team of
sound recordists had to have a bit of a rethink.
What I was saying before I had this
microphone fitted is, it really is jolly fast.
Very jolly fast!
Nought to 60 takes three seconds.
Top speed? Nobody knows.
Definitely more than 230 though.
The main reason for all this
phenomenalness is the engine.
It's a six-litre Mercedes V12,
which produces 740 horsepower.
And it's being used to power a car
which weighs less than a Ford Fiesta.
That makes the performance
extremely dramatic!
The Zonda R recently blitzed their
own record at the Nurburgring.
It got round in six minutes and 47 seconds,
and from where I'm sitting, I cannot
work out why it took so long.
I can only assume the driver stopped
off halfway round to read a book.
Bruce Forsyth could get this thing round
the Nurburgring in less time than that.
All Zondas look like they will be more complicated
to drive than spaceships, but they're not.
They're easy.
And because this one has grippy,
slick tyres, it's the easiest of the lot.
You can whizz about at top speed
and you've got time and brain power to think,
"I really like the way they've got these air vents laid out."
That's a nice strap, kind of old fashioned
and modern all at the same time.
It doesn't really matter if you're not concentrating.
Because it doesn't weigh anything
and because its carbon brakes are so enormous,
it will go from 125 mph to a dead stop in 4.3 seconds.
Oh, yeah. Like that.
The only way to stop faster is to hit a tree.
And this is the first Zonda to have-
a flappy-paddle gearbox.
It isn't the most refined system in
the world, if I'm honest, but it is quick.
And it does mean that when you
floor it, you enjoy the fury
and all you have to do when the fury runs out,
pull the lever and it starts all over again.
Go! Yeah. Go! Go! Yes, go!
Go, go, go!
This car is fantastic.
An extraordinary example of what can
be done when there are no rules.
But for a toy, it is a bit expensive.
The car will cost you £1.46 million,
and because most British racetracks
have noise limits, which this breaches,
you'll need your own.
And the going rate for one of those these days,
about 6 billion. Billion!
One last go, come on.
Honestly, what a machine.
What a machine.
It seems a shame that we wave goodbye to
the Zonda with a car that is absolutely brilliant,
but also completely useless.
The people at Pagani obviously thought so too,
because they recently announced
that the R would not be the last Zonda after all.
They would actually finish by making
five road-going versions of it.
And then they'd really, definitely finish
with five convertible versions of those.
But like a 1970s rock band, they
don't seem to be able to end the song,
because they now say that there
will be another, one last hurrah.
This is it, the Tricolore.
Named after the Italian Air Force
aerobatic squadron,
this too is a quietened down,
softer version of the R.
It's heavier, slightly less powerful,
and thanks to normal - oops -
road tyres, a lot less grippy.
Ha ha!
Oh, dear.
But it's still a great car.
And still properly, properly fast.
Ho, ho, ho!
And because you don't need your own
track, it's about 6 billion less than the R.
That makes it good value.
But of course, what makes this
the best value of all is that I'm driving Revelations.
The final encore.
Bye-bye, Zonda.
Bye-bye.
APPLAUSE
Poor old Richard Hammond. The Zonda
is his favourite car and now it's all gone.
No, actually, because after I made that film,
Zonda announced they would make two
more Tricolores. Really? But then it's over?
No, because when they finish doing those,
they're going to make a new one called the 750.
Then that's the last Zonda? No,
because after that... I'm not joking.
They're doing one called the HH.
Then they're going to start
finally building the new car,
the... What's it called?
Huarrr... Yeah, that one. Huayra.
While they're dithering about, making up
their mind, it's time to find out how fast this one,
the R, goes round our track. Of course,
that means handing it over to our tame racing driver.
Some say his nipples are explosive.
And that he's recently had a Mexican...
I mean Brazilian! I mean Brazilian!-
Why did I say that?
I'm sorry, Mr Ambassador. Anyway,
all we know is he's called the Stig.
And he's off. I can't imagine
this is going to take very long.
V12 AMG fury powering towards
the first corner. Here we are.
So much grip in this car.
It is just gliding through.
Bit of a four-wheel drift there.
No stereo, of course, just
12 cylinders singing.
Actually, not singing, shouting!
Actually very wide through Chicago.
How will he attack Hammerhead?
Leaning *** those incredible
brakes. Yes. He's nailed it now.
Yes, he's through.
Really open the taps now.
Cuts a steady throttle through
the follow-through.
Unsettled a bit by the bump on the apex.
Stig not scared.
Two corners left. It stays so flat.-
It actually looks undramatic.
Oh, a spit of flame!
Into Gambon and across the line.
APPLAUSE
I have the time here.
He did it in 1:26.7.
No! No, I'm lying.
1:8.5.
CHEERING
The thing is, you may remember,
a couple of years ago,
Michael Schumacher came here and
took a Ferrari FXX round,
which is the same sort of thing as this, OK?
That was 1:10.7.
So that is 2.2 seconds quicker than
Schumacher in a Ferrari, on slick tyres as well.
Amazing. Either that car is
truly incredible... Or?
The Stig is rather underpaid.
Yes. There's one more thing we have- to do,
I'm afraid. Get rid of it.
Yes, of course. It's not a road has
no place on our board car.
It's the rules. It's the rules, I'm afraid.
Let me cheer you up, because it's time
now to put a star in our reasonably-priced car.
In fact, this week, two stars.
These guys, well, they've fought off zombies in London.
They've had a knife fight in a
supermarket in the West Country.
More recently, they've helped an alien
get back to its home planet.
So they're either actors or massive liars.
Let's find out.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Nick Frost and Simon Pegg!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Gentlemen! How are you?
I'm very well. Good to see you.
Look what we've got here.
Great to see you, guys. Great to see.
You two have known each other for donkey's years,
haven't you? Yes. 17-18 years. Met in a restaurant?
Yes, Mexican restaurant.
LAUGHTER I can never go back now.
They've ripped up my Golden Fajita Card.
You became friends because you
shared a love of Star Wars noises?
Yeah. That's kind of how we bonded.
-We met because Nick was interested
in being a stand-up comic,
I was a stand-up comic.
We met, went out a few times.
I did this.
HE BEEPS LIKE A STAR WARS ROBOT
Which is a noise that a smalldroid...
I can see you glaze over.
No, I'm quite good at Star Wars,
but I am struggling here.
That's why I fell in love with him,- because I
thought no-one knew about that except me,
and then he did it to me and it was like
he'd sprayed me with his nerd musk.
That was it, then. How loving.
It must be great working with your friends, I imagine.
I don't know, obviously.
We have the new film, which is out this week.
Valentine's Day. It's called Paul.
The idea was literally a spitballin the garden
when we were shooting Shaun Of The Dead.
The weather was really bad.Our producer said,
"Can't we shootsomewhere where it's always sunny?"
We thought of the desert, then because of
our nerd minds, we went straight to Area 51.
That became aliens. We said, "OK, there's two guys
and there's analien and they help him get home."
We've got a clip of the film,
which we can look at.
Put... the phone... down.
Ha-ha-ha!
What have you done to him?
I didn't do anything to him. He fainted.
Yeah, but you made him faint.
But it's not like I set my phaser to faint.
You've got a phaser?! No! Look, listen.
Hey, I really need your help, OK?
Can we get this guy back on your wagon?
HE GIBBERS
Are you an alien? To you, I am, yes.-
Are you going to probe us?
Why does everyone assume that?
What am I doing?
Am I harvesting farts? How much can I
learn from an ***? W-w-what?
I love the alien. He's great, isn't he?
A brilliant alien.
What gave you the idea to make
your alien smoke and swear?
We just liked the idea that he's been on
earth longer than Graham and Clive have.
He's less alien than they are, really.
They're two British guys out of their depth.
He's been hanging round, smoking
strong weed that he gets off the military,
that he claims killed Bob Dylan.
They do say there's aliens in Area 51,
don't they? Yes. Do you actually believe that?
I'm not sure we do. No.
It's very coincidental that people see lots of
flying saucers nearan experimental aircraft facility.
Logically, it's probably planes!
Did you go out to Area 51 to research it?
We did, we did the whole trip.
We got an RV and we drove from Los Angeles
right the way through Nevada and Utah.
Did you meet many lunatics?
A few. Lot of cowboys.
We went to a rodeo,fully Stetsons,
jeans, cowboy boots,
shirts with business on, felt completely normal.
Thought, this is fine, it's goodto wear
this stuff. I did not feel normal, by the way.
We didn't look like them, but like people dressing
up, pretending to be them. They could smell our fear.
That's because you had a
toy gun on your hip. Pow!
Did you get to drive your RV
across America?
We had to learn how to drive. This is going to
sound really BLEEP- but we had a driver.
What? Neither of us have ever driven an RV.
The point of it was that we would be
sitting, writing, while America
drifted past and we just thought,
"Let's have a driver."
He was the guy that did that
amazing-handbrake turn in Meet The Fockers.
De Niro's big CIA blacked-out RV.There's a
bit in that when it turns a full handbrake turn.
He was the driver? He left me driving...
We decided to take
a highway because we were running behind time.
He really needed the toilet, so he left me
at the wheel and I started to lose control.
Nick was going, "Small corrections,
small corrections!" "I can't! I can't!"
Steve came out the toilet, doing up his flies...
There was the old story of the guy that rented
one, an English guy rented an RV for his holiday.
It said cruise control,
so he put on cruise control. "Lovely!"
Nobody could work out, in the accident,
why he was killed with a kettle in his hand.
Doing 80 mph. Stupid idiot. Anyway,
so look, the lap, this is why you're here.
I know you were nervous, because you thought
that your size would count against you. Yeah.
Whereas you, of course... What do you weigh?
I'm 11.5 stone. My leg weighs that much!
But the thing is, are you very fit?- At the moment I am,
because I'm doing Mission Impossible 4
as we speak, and I'm sort of having to be...
I'm an agent now, so I need to be on...
I had a long conversation with MrCruise about
his appearance on this.- Still talks about it.
Does he? He is full of Top Gear. He has
such a shallow and empty life, obviously.
But he is obsessed with it.
Nevertheless, whose lap shall we see first?
Let's have a look, shall we,
at... your lap, Simon.
Come on, Simon. Let's see your lap.
- Here we go.
HE SPLUTTERS
I've changed gear.
That's a good sign. Yep.
Right, first corner.
Nice wide line in there.
New Stig does teach that line.
He does, yeah. Very... Ooh,
you're not using all the road, though.
Come on, you motherhumper.
Mother what? Motherhumper.
Motherhumper? Nice. Watershed language.
That's looking quite tidy.
Where are you going? Oh, Hammerhead.
Let's have a look. Whoa!
That's squirreling underbraking.
That is quite impressive.
Right. Keep it in between the lines.
Just about... Yep.
It's much sportier than the last one.
This is a great car.
See apostrophe Dee.
TYRES SCREECH
That noise. I know.
Ooh, that gives me a funny feeling!
Really?
Whoa! Almost had the back
wheel off the ground there.
Right, second-to-last corner is
where most people go wrong.
That is extremely tidy. Look at that.
And Gambon...
Looking very smooth through there.
And there we are - we've crossed the line.
Lovely.
APPLAUSE
Now...
Before we get on to how you did... Yeah.
..I think we should have a look at Nick's lap.
OK. Now, Nick, your practices
weren't entirely smooth.
No. I've sat forward already. No, I just
wanted to go for it and see what happened.
Of course, on the second-to-last corner...
Well, let's have a look at what happened.
This is ballsy.
Too ballsy, in fact.
LAUGHTER
That's a proper spin! What's that?
Hitting the kerb. You could have rolled!
APPLAUSE That's what I call ballsy.
I think the thing about being in a...
being a big guy in a
small car when you roll it
is there's nowhere for you to go so it's fine,
you just roll around. You're wedged-
in and your eyes go around. Yeah.
Nick, let's see how you got on.
ENGINE REVS
TYRES SCREECH
Right. Good start.
Ah, that rubber smell.
Reminds me of my honeymoon!
LAUGHTER
Helmet suits you, got to say.
I'm not going to talk about the
honeymoon, that's why.
Right, first corner.
That's a tighter line there than
Simon's and using all the road.
When it squeals, ease it off.
Just like a bag of pigs.
LAUGHTER
'I was trying to channel you.'
'I'm not even going to go anywhere
with these remarks in the car.
'A bag of pigs.
'Less aggressive on the brakes
than Simon was there.
'Now, let's have a look.
Does this look tidy?'
'Ooh, little chirrup. Slow.
'Looks slow. Could be fast, though.
- You never know.
'And on to the straight.'
You waved!
Why do I keep looking in the mirror?
Why did I keep looking in the mirror?
I don't know.
It's natural. It's in everybody they
must check the mirror.
Swing it to the right.
Past the wall of tyres.
No, left! Left, left! It's left on the wall!
I went out right... Oh, I see, to come in again.
My willy feels funny. LAUGHTER
That's a James May problem. He's always
saying he has this fizzing *** root.
Right, there we... Ooh,
so where are we going?
Whoa! Tom Cruise line! There we are,
we've crossed the line. APPLAUSE
That's two wheels!
That's dangerous, with me being
on the right, too. That could have...
Now that is... There's Michael Gambon,
Tom Cruise
and you have had it on two wheels
in that last corner. Good.
Awesome. But was it enough?
That is the question.
I can feel my heart in my ears.
LAUGHTER
Right. Simon. Yes?
You're first in the list, OK?
When you were last here, you did it in 1:48.05,
which actually is a very quick time, in that old...
It was a Lacetti, wasn't it? It was, yeah.
So where do you think you've come this time?
1:48.05 - where do you think you are now?
I honestly couldn't tell you.
Well, you did it in 1...
40...
4... Ooh! Wow.
..9! Wow! You...
APPLAUSE
..are there.
You'll be able to tell Tom Cruise you're right
on top of Cameron Diaz... This isn't working, is it?
I think it's working fine. Between
Cameron and Tom. That's great.
You are between Cameron and Tom.
Now, Nick, obviously the heavyweight.
Yeah. Are you going to put HW on mine?
LAUGHTER FF.
Ah! Aw!
He nearly killed a journalist in Birmingham
once for making a joke about his weight.
I did. Did you? I grabbed him
round his throat.
Really? Yeah. That's what the new
Ferrari's called.
I was talking about Ferrari.
I feel like Chewbacca now.
"Let the wookiee win." HE GRUNTS
Where do you reckon you've come
on that? I don't know. 1:49, maybe.
Well, you did it in 1...
40...
4...
Oh! ..point 5.
Oh! So that puts you third...
We did really well.
Well done.
Thank you, Jeremy.
Are you surprised by this? Imagine if I
weighed 11 stone. I'd get round in 1:08!
That is a remarkable performance. Have
you done track? You've been here before.
I've never done it.
You've never driven on a track?
I bought you a track day,
you never went. I never went.
You should try and take it up
because there's a natural talent.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Simon Pegg, Nick Frost.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Thank you very much.
Well done, man. I know. Brilliant.
Right, moving on.
Tonight...
Tonight we are engaged in a challenge
that was supposed to be
to find the best four-seater convertible
you can buy for less than £2,000.
Yeah. Sadly, though, we all bought BMW 325i.
So instead we're finding out how different
three supposedly identical cars
have become over the years.
Yeah. So far we've discovered that his
car is full of mucus and mine full of poo...
And *** hair. Yeah. Andspent
most of the time broken down.
But as we rejoin the action,
all three cars are actually working.
What you're looking at here is the Stig
setting a lap time in the
modern-day equivalent of our cars.
A time we shall try to match.
I'm, in some ways, confident. I have the
paving slab in the boot giving me better handling,
and yet not confident at all
because I have no brakes.
I wonder if my brakes are any good.
You don't know, do you? Not really, no.
Oooh, stand back!
1:35.09.
Right, now we just have to see
which one of us gets closest to that time.
Here we go.
Wipers not working.
OK, this, little BMW,
is when you win back your stripes.
It's been lowered.
I think you'll findit'll suddenly
emerge as the star.
TYRES SCREECH
Get out of the way, you incompetent,
long-haired old spaniel.
I think this is Chicago.
Come on, paving stone, do your work.
TYRES SCREECH
Holy moley!
These old 325is, they had
semi-trailing on rear suspension.
They were known as the third biggest killer of
yuppies because of the tail-happiness,
after Porsche 911 and accidents involving races.
Here's the non-braking Jeremy Clarkson.
I'll go get Hammond.
Ooh. I think I'm wasting quitea
lot of time being sideways here.
'Hammond was very easy to catch because whoever
had lowered his car hadn't done a very good job.'
He's got a wobble.
Whoa!
My car obviously isn't the fastest here,
but it seems to be the most stable.
TYRES SCREECH
'In truth,
'all of our ultimate driving
machines had lost their edge.'
Oh, dear.
'But Hammond's was in a class of its own.'
Oh-ho!
He's gone. He's so gone now.
Ha-ha-ha!
There's a simple rule when you're buying
a car, demonstrated by Hammond here.
If it's been modified, especially
if it's been lowered, walk away.
I'm beginning to think Jeremy's rather
crude handling pack might be the answer.
'With one lap to go, we all
decided to really go for it.'
No, no, no. Don't do that. Damn.
My seat's collapsed, badly.
'Still, could be worse.'
ENGINE WHINES
Yeah!
Right.
Well, I hope I got a quick time in.
We'd find out soon enough
because the results were in.
Here we are, these are the times.
Remember, the Stig did it in 1:35. Yeah.
James - 1:55.04.
Me - 1:55.03 is my best.
And, Jeremy, your best,
1:48.0 - which means you win.
It's a hollow victory.
Where's your car? Over there.
It's quite broken. What's wrong with it? Well...
the rear hose let go, sprayed water over
the electrics, which shorted them out.
The exhaust manifold is cracked
and the head's cooked. You've killed it.
Luckily for Jeremy, our next experiment
didn't involve any movement.
Over time, the roof on a convertible-
will get baggy and start to leak.
To see which of our cars leaks the most,
we've devised an ingenious test.
James is sitting in his car holding his
breath, because his car is full of gas.
Now if the car leaks, the gas will escape, and
when he needs to take a breath, he'll be fine.
If it doesn't leak, the gas won't escape and when
he needs to take a breath, he'll be in trouble.
So is it cyanide we're using?
No, helium. Helium?
Yeah. Pure helium? Yes.
That'll kill him. Yes.
JAMES EXHALES Here we go.
He's breathing. That's it, come on.
HIGH-PITCHED: Whose idea was
this test? Bloody stupid idea.
OTHERS LAUGH It's a very good idea.
We've learned about your car.
You sound like Donald Duck
because your car has done well.
Given the contents of his car,
Hammond quite enjoyed holding his breath.
HE EXHALES
NORMAL PITCH:
Ah, you see mine's had a new... Oh!
OTHERS LAUGH
Not a new roof fitted very well.
You thought you'd have a squeaky voice!
I was expecting a full Smurf and it's not worked.
Finally it was Jeremy's turn.
He's going to have to breathe. He's done it. Right.
HIGH-PITCHED: I just have to say that's stupid.
It's just a test of how big your lungs are.
After this we got Jeremy's car going
and went to see a group of BMW specialists.
Their job was to calculate the cost
of returning each of our cars to showroom condition.
These cars come from a time
when people fitted after-market stereos.
Let me talk you through this one.
Here's the radio.
STATIC That's Radio 1, Radio 2,
Radio 3, Radio 4... STATIC CONTINUES
..Radio 5.
STATIC CONTINUES
Don't know what that is.
Eventually the experts had
finished their assessments.
Who has the results for
Richard Hammond's sewage farm? I do.
£7,500.
7,500 to put that into showroom condition?
Sir, you have the results for James' car.
Around 5,500. So £2,000 less. Well done.
Did you just say well done? I did.
You're a girl. How much would mine cost to put into show?
Well, how many pence?
HE CLEARS THROAT Er...11,000.
That's pounds, not pence. OTHERS LAUGH
What a pile of junk! Why is it £11,000?
What possible reason is there for that?
Oh. Oh, there's a few reasons.
Oh, it's blown away.
Since none of our cars were really
roadworthy, we decided at this point
that the best thing we could do with
them was form a stunt driving team.
We began by watching the experts.
How do they memorise the moves?
That was a J-turn.
I can do all the moves individually, I think.
'It all looked terribly complicated-
and that was a worry,
'because the next day, we would be
performing in front of a live audience.'
Wow. That's quite good.
We're going to need to work on that.
'We began by planning our moves on a blackboard.'
That's the nose of the car that
pointing that way. That's
Over here, right, that's Jeremy.
Then here...
Those cars both have J on. They
both have J. So it could be... Oh.
'James took over.'
We have a numbering system,
so you go first. I cross behind you...
Everything goes through that point,
- the point of the performance...
'But his plans were a bit confusing.'
Sorry, I'm lost.
Which is my dotted line now?
That one. No, you were this one.
Yeah, it is that one.
'Nevertheless, we wet the track
to make it more slippery
'and got to work.'
Right, here we go.
'Initially, things didn't go well.'
This is just a lot of driving about.
Why have you gone over there? Sorry.
'Then, thanks to my awful brakes,
they got worse.'
I'm not stopping, I'm not stopping!-
MUFFLED THUMP
Oh, damn it.
'Despite everything, though, the
next day we were ready to perform
'at one of the most
prestigious venues in the country...'
In the wild, birds of prey...
'..The Essex County Fair.
'Our cars had been given a new lick of paint,
'and as zero hour approached,
'we were in our motor home
rehearsing our moves.'
Go. Right, so...
Turn, Turn, through. And I'm here.
Handbrake. Back forwards.
Face the other way by then. Through-
the gap. Round you. Handbrake.
OK, ready? And then now... Cross, I go first.
Over there.
It's going to be magnificent. Right, let's do it.
We're a bit like the Red Arrows. Pretty
much. It's quite an exciting moment.
Ladies and gentlemen, introducing from TV's
Top Gear, The Dukes Of Harlow stunt driving team.
'The capacity crowd was beside itself.
'As the music signalled the start of
our routine, we entered the arena.'
MUSIC: "Don't Stop Me Now" by Queen
We'd better deliver. Suddenly feel
this is quite a responsibility.
Right, left, down...
left, straight up.
Must remember that crossover.
Ready, steady, go.
And turn, turn.
Oh!
Now, it is a shame we can't
show you the rest of that film,
but we lost the tapes. Yes!
Can you believe it? LAUGHTER
You left them on a bus. And then the dog
ate them. Yeah. Dog ate them. It is a rotten...
It is a massive shame, because
therest of our routine was brilliant.
It's just a tragedy you can't see it.
I do apologise.
It does at least give us time to knock up a
scoreboard and see who bought the best car.
Yes. In the nought to 100 and
then nought again test,
James set the benchmark,
so he gets zero.
I got minus 281 and, Hammond,
you got minus 1,000.
I didn't even take part.
That's why you get minus 1,000.
Now, forensics, you get ten points off for every
disgusting thing that was found in your car.
Mine was crisps, leaves and bits of- my own skin,
so that's not really disgusting at all, so nought.
James, you were mucus, scabs and saliva.
You're minus 30.
Hammond, you, let's get this straight,
you were saliva, blood...
But there was no mucus in mine! mucus,
but there was *** hair...
Yeah, yeah. ..so minus 30 and then poo.
Yeah. That's 1,000...
Why do I get minus 1,000 for poo?
Because poo's really disgusting!
Of course you're going to
get minus 1,000 for that.
We don't make the rules. The thief test.
Jeremy... JEREMY MOUTHS: We do!
Your car wasn't stolen so you
get nought. Yeah.
My car wasn't, so I get nought.
Hammond, your car was stolen. Yes?
And you get minus 1,000.
Do I?LAUGHTER
How do you get to that?
It just is, it's scientific, this. Lap times.
You didn't get minus 1,000 for that.
They're there. The gas test.
Let's get this straight. No gas escaped
from my car so I get nought.
No gas escaped from your car,
James, so that's nought.
All of the gas escaped from
yours so that's minus...
Let me guess. Yes, you're right,
it's minus 1,000. Is it?
Is it really? Yes, it is. The restoration
test, here you lose a point
for every pound it would take to get
your car back to showroom condition.
Now, I, as you would expect,
did best at this,
so I'm minus 5,500 points.
It's like being on QI, this.
Hammond, you are minus 7,500 points.
And Jeremy Clarkson... Mmm-hmm.
..you are minus 11,000.
Ah! I might beat...
Well, not him but you, anyway.
What have you got, James?
I've won, obviously. That's a given.
You are...
minus 11,293.1.
Minus 11,293.1. Yes.
So, Hammond, this is tense. Minus 11,000...
Still hope, though. I can still do it. Oooh!
549... Yes!
APPLAUSE
I mean, well done, James.
But, really, two conclusions
we can draw from this.
One, all identical cars aren't
necessarily identical.
Some of them do have
*** hairs in them and poo.
And two, Richard Hammond, who buys
more used cars than any man alive,
is useless at buying used cars.
I am. On that bombshell, it's time to end.
grzesiek11 @ podnapisi
petala divide all the long text and fixed some spaces.