Clarkson et le Hamster Sont Interdits

I'm surprised not many sites have got this story.  None of the major newspapers have it, just a few motoring websites.

The story is this one:

It is from a Clarkson article so it will be in The Sun or The Sunday Times.

 

It will be hidden behind a paywall online but I wouldn't want to read either publication anyway since they are part of the odious Murdoch empire.

 

The gist of this is that Clarkson & Richard Hammond have been fined for speeding in France and banned from driving there for three months.

 

Being me, I am suspicious that if this happened, that it was just a publicity stunt for the DVD they were filming that will be out "just in time for Christmas" - the DVD that gets mentioned in the stories of the incident.

 

If it was though, it hasn't worked - yet.  Maybe it's just that nobody at The Mail has noticed it up to now.

 

They were doing 140kph in a 90kph zone that they claim to have thought was a 130kph zone.

 

There's no mention of James May - I guess Capitaine Lente would not have made that mistake.

Mutually Beneficial

The BBC should become the UK's biggest mutual company to make it more accountable to licence fee payers - so says former culture secretary Dame Tessa Jowell.  The BBC report it here.

Mutual companies do not have external shareholders but all members of the company are considered owners. Money is reinvested back into the company rather than paid out as dividends.

I would like to be a member of the BBC.

If I was a member of the BBC, I might have had a say in the disposal of the F1 rights which led me to declare that I'd had it with the BBC.

I might also have a say in commissioning a new motoring show for BBC2.

But, I hear you say, BBC2 already has a brilliant motoring show called "Top Gear."

I agree - it does.  In fact Top Gear is my favourite show of any genre on television - it's even better than QI.

But I also want a show that is a bit more about the cars themselves - and accessories and racing and motoring law - and the sort of things you might read about on a car blog named after a small car from British Leyland.  I've been watching a couple of the old Top Gears from the '80s and '90s on Youtube and I want a show like that.  Or like Channel 4's Driven before they made it juvenile.

It would have to be on the BBC for two reasons:

1. Impartiality - they mustn't be afraid of upsetting motoring manufacturers who could sponsor them - allegedly Toyota refused to let Jeremy Clarkson test-drive any more of their cars after he called the Corolla "dull" in a review.
2. Profitability - I don't believe that enough people watch ordinary car programmes to make then viable commercially.  This leads to daft competitions that cost £1.50 to enter and added contrived "entertainment" like they put in the otherwise enjoyable Classic Car Rescue - this can be really cringeworthy to watch but seems to draw in the viewers.

The new show would be called "Second Gear" (or "Fourth Gear" if they showed it on BBC Four) and would need some decent presenters.  Definitely not the ones from "I Want That Car" - my review of which has garnered a very large number of hits for some reason - no comments, just hits.

I liked the old Top Gear presenters, Sue Baker, Chris Goffey and William Woollard so wouldn't object to any of them coming back although dare I say they are probably a bit long in the tooth nowadays?  William Woollard's style with a foot on the bumper of the car he was discussing has led to an Internet craze which had passed me by until I read this from the Metro newspaper (no relation).

But the lineup I'd probably plump for would be former Driven host Mike Brewer as the front man assuming I could prise him away from The Discovery Channel. I've got a leather jacket just like that by the way: 

Maybe Jason Dawe (Used Car Roadshow and series 1 of the revamped Top Gear before they decided James May would be a better fit) for the more serious, practical items:

Tom Ford (ex of Fifth Gear and still of TopGear Magazine) for road tests: 

And Sabine Schmitz for the racy stuff:

A half an hour show every Thursday evening.  Just before "Dave Allen at Large."  Sorted.

 

Oh, and can we have "Gardener's World" followed by "One Man and His Dog" on a Friday again please?

I Want That Car

The second episode of I Want That Car was broadcast on ITV4 last night. 

 

It is ITV's new "Daisybeck Productions give you a male motoring journo & female racer presenting a show giving punters a choice of 3 cars to buy and after test-driving 2 of them they have to select one to purchase while telling you a bit about them and trying to get a good deal off the unseen seller while the car's number plate is covered with the initials of the programme" show.

 

I watched the first one last week and found it irritating but decided to give it another go.

 

This week, I still found it irritating.

 

It could be the music.

 

It could be the fact they go to a racing circuit to do the show while racing is going on but just show little clips of the same racing cars over and over again in the middle of the main element of the show.

 

But I think it's probably the presenters. 

Rebecca Jackson makes big deal of how she is a used car expert (a saleswoman perhaps? - after I suggested they may not exist - no, an "expert" - although judging by her own website, she's only sold one car) and how she races Porsche Boxsters - but she only looks 15 - and she and the cameraman refuse to stand still when she is doing her pieces to camera.  And she's overly enthusiastic.

Mat Watson, meanwhile, works for Auto Express.

He comes over as too chummy and his Brummie accent keeps slipping in and out.  He likes the punters to "floor it" on the test drives and then states that they didn't go over the speed limits.  I wonder if the producer was involved in making that statement.

 

At this point, I suppose, I'd have to admit that I'd be crap at presenting a motoring show, especially if I was an unknown - I'd feel awkward pretending that everyone should just accept me straight off and at least these two do have the right professional backgrounds.

 

But I'm not presenting a motoring show and they are.

 

The show doesn't even have its own Website.  The nearest is this which is really looking for people to take part in it.  They do have a Facebook page which doesn't have many contributions apart from themselves looking for people to take part.  The couple of people who have commented are mixed on the show but one person thinks it is better than Top Gear - idiot!

 

They also have a Twitter feed which doesn't have many contributions apart from themselves looking for people to take part. The couple of people who have commented are a bit pro the show but one person thinks it is better than Top Gear - idiot!

 

The first show consisted of a bloke who used to own a Lotus (we don't know what happened to it) looking for a suitable sporty replacement - he is offered a TT, an Abarth (sporty Fiat 500) and a Porsche Boxster - he chooses the Porsche.

 

The second show consisted of a bloke after a classic.  He is offered a Mini, an MGB and a Porsche 911 Carrera Targa - he chooses the Porsche.

 

Actually, I think I've worked out what irritates me the most, and why I probably won't bother watching the rest of the series - it is because it isn't Used Car Roadshow.  If you aren't sure what Used Car Roadshow was, it was ITV's "Daisybeck Productions give you a male motoring journo & female racer presenting a show giving punters a choice of 3 cars to buy and after test-driving 2 of them they have to select one to purchase while telling you a bit about them and trying to get a good deal off the unseen seller while the car's number plate is covered with the initials of the programme" show.

Quiet News Day?

Most of the car sites today, like Autocar for example, are going with the announcement of the Vauxhall Insignia Country Tourer - a four-wheel-drive family estate car.

Not particularly interesting, even for someone like me who drives a four-wheel-drive family estate car.

It's brown:

 The Telegraph have been running two non-stories since the weekend.

A pointless review of the first episode of series 20 of Top Gear.  Pointless because it is written by someone more interested in repeating the fact that he is "not the target audience" for the show and then telling us that he didn't enjoy it.  Well, what a surprise!!!  Prat.  Some of the reader comments are suitably scathing though.

Their second non-story promises us the Top 10 Long-lived cars still on sale.

Only it doesn't.

I was expecting a list of cars that haven't really changed much in many years like the Land-Rover Defender or Porsche 911 (OK the 911 has changed a lot, but it still looks the same).

But no.  What we were given were a bunch of car names that have lived on - like the Ford Fiesta.  The early Fiestas bore no relation whatsoever to the new ones.  Pointless journalism.


Meanwhile, Autoguide have got hold of the story that "Ferrari is limiting its employees to only three in-house recipients per email."

This will cause problems if Fernando Alonso wants to send an amusing jpeg of a cat to Felipe Massa and all of their mechanics.

He will probably have to send the email several times to groups of three each time.

I'm not convinced that Ferrari have really thought this through.

Making a Mokka-Ree

When Vauxhall let the British press loose on their new compact SUV thingy, the Mokka, it got absolutely slated for its ride and handling and consequently scored very badly in their reviews.  The name didn't help either, with lots of coffee jokes to go with the coffee-coloured car in the picture.

 

The mistake they had made was to give the journalists some early, European-specced cars designed for European roads - and with bits of sound-proofing missing.

 

Anyway, they seem to have sorted things out by letting the British press loose on much-improved versions specifically aimed at British roads.  The press were impressed enough - for example Top Gear reported thus.

 

A report in AutoGuide today, could reverse things, though.  It refers to a recall on the American-badged version of this car, the Buick Encore - the one in their picture is also coffee-coloured but that's probably coincidence.  The problem with the Encore is that the steering wheel might come off!

 

 This could be amusing if you are Lauel & Hardy or useful if you are a racing driver and have a wheel like the one here on the right.  But, if you are taking the kids to school, it may be a tiny bit dangerous.  (Incidentally, if you take a closer look at this particular racing wheel, it isn't quite what it seems)

 

There is no mention of whether or not the Mokka has the same issue as its American cousin but if it does, it'll be wheely bad.  No coffee jokes here.

 

 

 

Scooby Doo, Where Are You?

You're not in Britain, that's for sure.  Back in December, Top Gear had the story that Subaru were, due to dwindling sales, ceasing the sale of the WRX boy-racer special in the UK.  To mark this passing, the February edition of Top Gear Magazine had an interesting potted history of the model including its many forms dating back into the last century when it was better known as The Impreza.

Your average boy-racer who wanted a rally-inspired 4WD saloon always had two choices, the Mitsubishi Lancer Evo or the Subaru Impreza.  They were always very evenly matched so it became more a brand loyalty issue or just a case of going by the looks.

Not being a boy-racer, I never really considered either car but I did think that some of the Imprezas (like the one Richard Hammond took to find the source of The Nile) were very visually challenging.

Today, Autoguide have the unveiling of a new WRX Concept at the New York Motor Show - a foretaste of a car we won't be seeing on British roads until the importers catch on.

Autoguide claim it looks quite Jaguar-ish but I can see quite a bit of this car in it...

Quite an evolution.

Electric Car Racing

Caught this story in Autoguide today about McLaren supplying "electric engines" to a new racing series called Formula E.

They aren't electric engines, they're "motors".

Formula E had completely passed me by. Autoguide had covered it briefly in August but I'd missed that somehow. It will be an FIA fully sanctioned race series but it doesn't start properly until 2014 so I suppose they have a bit of time to get the word out.

They do have a Website but there isn't much on it - just some twitterings and a couple of annoying videos. And the reason they are annoying is a reason why this sport may not catch on with spectators - the racing just sounds wrong.

Hopefully batteries will have improved by 2014 because the current (ha current - electric - geddit?) plan is that "there will be 10 teams and 20 drivers for the 42 cars, as two cars will be needed to complete a one-hour race because of battery life." Either that or have some very long extension cables - or use the Top Gear Dodgem Car solution.

Until then, we can make do with these electric McLarens which don't sound too different to what we'll have in 2014.

X Marks The Ugly Spot

I was following a BMW X6 the other day.

I still think they look stupid.

And when I say "following" - I was behind it in traffic - I don't associate myself with anyone daft enough to own one.

Maybe it's something about cars that have names beginning with "X".

Autoguide today have this story about the Volkswagen XL1 testing in Spain. They use this still from a spy-video:

It is a diesel hybrid with a 2-cylinder engine so it sounds absolutely awful in their video but it looks beautiful in the picture.

So what about my argument about X cars being ugly?

Well, I give you how the car is meant to look:

That is pig-ugly and the only real difference is the covering of the rear wheels - a bit like the McLaren X-1 which features on the cover of this month's Top Gear Magazine.

Note the X name. It was built by McLaren as a one-off for a very rich, and presumably blind, customer.

Which brings us back, rather neatly, to BMW and their X1:

Quite ugly, although the earlier incarnation looks OK in this Top Gear story from 2009...

...although that may have something to do with the bikini.

Now, regular readers of my Blog will know that I, myself, drive an X car - a Jaguar X-Type.

This is clearly the exception that proves the rule.

If I was on television right now, I would turn to a side-camera, shrug, and say, "No, I don't understand that saying either."

As a child of the '70s, I like my cars to be big and square and I love the looks of my car even if some people think the X-Type boring. Mind you, designer Paul Smith (turn to side-camera and shrug in an "I've never heard of him, either" sort of way) was obviously inspired (or commissioned) to come up with this:

Enough said, I think.

Tiffany Dell

Who!?

Oh, you mean Tiff Needell!

When he first appeared on Top Gear many moons ago, I thought they were calling him Tiffany Dell.

Today, I have learned that his name is actually Timothy!

He doesn't look like a Timothy.

The more disturbing news is how I found out that his hame is Timothy - it's on the Discovery Channel UK Website under "Meet the Team" for the new series of Fifth Gear!

Whilst looking on the MSN Cars site today I found a preview for the new series of Fifth Gear.

And yet Channel 5 have been plugging a new series with this photo:When they put up that photo and the news of the return of Fifth Gear, I guess they didn't realise that Discovery UK had done a deal and would actually be showing it.

It is disappointing for me - it means that it has gone over to pay-TV like f1 did so I won't be watching it - at least not until they start showing repeats of it on Quest or Dave or, dare I say it, Channel 5!?

And should it be called "Fifth Gear" now? They called it Fifth Gear when it evolved from Top Gear and moved to Channel 5. Now it's moved to Discovery it should be called "Searching for a Gear" or "Finding the Right Gear" something to do with discovery anyway.

The good news is the return to Fifth Gear of Jason Plato - if that's his real name.

What's the Point?,,!'*-."

I saw my first VW Up! today.It looked OK - I quite liked the snazzy rear lights but apart from that it was unremarkable - so why does it get an exclamation mark!?

That got me thinking about punctuation in car names. Volkswagen weren't first to use an exclamation mark - the Scandinavians got there first with the mostly defunct TH!NK electric car that also used the rather shouty CAPITAL LETTERS too!

Alfa went with the full stop in their Mi.To while Top Gear's "Reasonably-Priced Car" is Kia's Cee'd.

It all seems a bit daft to me - marketing types would find it impressive but nobody else would bother.

So, to take my mind off it, I might go for a drive in my X-Type, perhaps to Westward Ho!




P.S. A note to my American readers - Westward Ho! is a real town in the English county of Devon - it doesn't mean the same thing as in America and has absolutely nothing to do with prostitutes.

Just like the Devon town of Ilfracombe.

Honda Uni-Cub

I'm not sure this should be in a Car Blog but Autoguide pointed me at it and it is about a Honda vehicle:It is a very funny video in a "this is laughable" sort of way.

The "thing" is controlled by leaning but can also be controlled using a little TV remote control unit that you hold in your lap. I suppose it could be fun if you got hold of someone else's remote control. It would probably also be fun to race a couple of them around a building - until you came to a set of stairs - which is where you get to the conclusion that I was reaching more and more as every second of the video passed.

WHY NOT JUST WALK!?

Really lazy people might think it is a good idea but I suspect that they would be too fat to use it. Would it benefit disabled people? Doubt it - I reckon there would be issues about staying on if you couldn't use your legs.

To be charitable, I suppose this is more of a research exercise - and it has to be admitted it is very clever how it works without tipping over but...

...if you want to drive about indoors, Jeremy has already provided us with the solution:

Top & Jerry

News today from Autoguide that Top gear USA is back for a third series.They've still only shown one-and-a-half series of it over here - they interrupted the run of series two to show repeats of Doctor Who.

Now I like Doctor Who - a lot - but not enough to watch repeats of it.

Anyway, today's story, on the back of the one about Top Gear (as featured on my Facebook Page yesterday) means that there will be plenty of Top Gear Action around in 2013.

The Autoguide story also covers a story in "The Daily" about a proposed new show which will be a vehicle (excuse the pun) for Jerry Seinfeld (big Porsche fan judging by the pictures of him in Google Images) to spend time with other comics discussing cars.
I hope it gets picked up here - I love cars and I love comedy...

...which is probably why I love Top Gear...

...and writing daft car-blog posts.

Madam, I'm Adam

Another stupid car-name story. This spy-shot has been released today by Vauxhall of their new baby car along with the announcement of its name:

The VAUXHALL ADAM!

Some sections of the motoring press have been having some fun with the name. Car Magazine covered it thus while Top Gear have been comparing it to other cars with people's names although some of their examples are a bit tenuous - like Cressida and Silvia - they didn't even think of Marina.

So who is the Adam named after? 1980s pop icon Adam Ant?or perhaps soap heartthrob Adam Woodyatt?or, perhaps more likely, Top Gear USA presenter Adam Ferrara?Vauxhall won't say that it is named after Adam Opel, founder of Opel but it is named after Adam Opel, founder of Opel.

Vicki's Take on Top Gear vs Fifth Gear

Back in June 2010, I posed the question "What's best, Top Gear or Fifth Gear?"Well, I found an article written by the lovely Vicki Butler-Henderson that appeared at the end of last month on the MSN cars website where she debates the same thing.

I was beginning to think that this was a moot argument because the Fifth Gear website had not been touched since February 1st with a car news item on the Ford B-Max. Now I know things motoring newsy have happened since then so I was worried that Fifth Gear might have been no more - it was threatened with extinction a few years back so I guess there is always a chance of decomissioning.

But today, the Fifth Gear News site points at a picture of Tiff and Jason and states that a new series is coming. There's nothing in the Radio Times about it but I guess we're not having to wait too long because Vicki in her article says that they are filming it. Still a bit of doubt as to whether or not Jason will actually be part of it - he must be quite busy now with his BTCC commitments.

Whether he is present or not, Vicki's conclusion is one I have to go with - and not a million miles from what I came up with back in 2010 - both shows are good - both shows are different - and long may both continue.

Now, what's best, Top Gear or Top Gear USA?

A Kind-Hearted Traffic Warden

That can't be right!

But it is. He took pity on a Falcon.No, not a Ford Falcon - the bird of prey type of falcon. He rescued it on New Year's Day in Birkenhead when it was knackered after being blown about in the gales. The story is covered here on the Liverpool Echo site with a nice comment added by a reader at the end. Being Birkenhead, it could be the same git who booked my wife a few years back when she was three minutes late getting back to her car with a load of shopping and two bickering children. I appealed against a £60 fine for three minutes but the Council weren't interested - and they wonder why traffic wardens need stories like this to try and boost their image. Here is the bird-loving one, his name is Lee Gallagher and he is releasing the bird back into the grey skies at Hamilton Square:
The BBC also had that story, but since I posted last month about how I am finished with the BBC - I can't really link to them now, can I?

Then, on Monday, I finally picked up the new copy of Top Gear Magazine which was delivered last week but I haven't had chance to look at, what with Christmas and everything, and I saw that the new series of Top Gear TV starts on January 29th. Yippee! Well, maybe not "yippee", maybe more "I'll quite look forward to that"

The Christmas special didn't grab me the way Top Gear usually does and I'm finding I'm enjoying Fifth Gear a lot more than TG nowadays - is my disillusionment with Auntie Beeb affecting my motoring televisual enjoyment - or am I just getting bored with TG? I don't know - I'll let you know after the new series.

Then, yesterday, I got my annual letter from Richard & James extolling to me the virtues of subscribing to my next year with Top Gear Magazine - they really ought to change that letter - it's getting very stale. Anyway, could this be a good chance to show my displeasure with The Beeb?

Damn it, I still really enjoy the magazine and I pay for it with Tesco Clubcard Reward tokens so they'll not be making much out of that so a new subscription it is.

I've given up on their blogs though now - I've found like-minded people (and so far no trolls) on Facebook which leads me, rather neatly, to the fact I've joined Facebook!

I've set up a Metro's Car Blog page but I'll just monitor how that goes along and see whether or not it's worth keeping it going. I've put my two favoutite pictures of Vicki Butler-Henderson on there for starters.

And, while we're on the subject of social networking, I think I finally understand why anyone who isn't Stephen Fry might want to Tweet on Twitter. "Friends" are actually interested and comment when you add stuff to your Facebook wall so it's the same logic. I've not played with Twitter yet - maybe a job for next New-Years but someone who does is NASCAR driver Kasey Kahne.

I'll leave you with this story from last week from Autoguide.com

The Mayor of London is a Buffoon

But a very likeable one.

Again, I can't agree with his politics but the people of London seem to appreciate them - unless they have just fallen for his personality - but that's their business.

He was always very funny on Have I Got News For You? and suitably amusing as the celebrity guest on Top Gear and he is always good value for money when interviewed by Jeremy Paxman - but then Jeremy Paxman loves to interview an idiot.

The reason I am discussing Boris today, after discussing his old school-chum yesterday, is this story about him using glue to catch pollution on the streets of London. It seems a bit expensive and far-fetched to me but they claim it is producing results. I'm not scientifically qualified to comment (not that that usually stops me) so read the article and draw your own conclusions.

I suppose that I'm only really mentioning it at all because it is a good excuse to print a picture of Boris. That can be a bit of a problem choosing because there is never a picture of Boris that doesn't make you smile - check these out.

Sometimes you just see a picture and want to publish it...which relates to this story. Check out the video on that too - it is brilliant!

Top Gear USA

"It's like being aroused with a gun pointing at you."

BBC Three showed the first edition of Top Gear USA this weekend - or, as it's called over there, Top Gear. I knew there had to be a good reason for BBC Three existing.

It has the same basic format as the orginal (and best!) version with 3 middling aged blokes and a Stig. Their Stig seems less of a mythical creature though.

They still have "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" but they call it "Big Star, Small Car". Their big star was Buzz Aldrin but the interview was very poor - it just seemed to be them listing previous cars he had owned then showing his lap. He seemed to have some trouble finding fifth which implies they are using a manual - this flies on the face of my earlier posting, Automatic For The (American) People. I suppose that they may do what the British version does and have a second, automatic car that can be used with guests who can't use a stick-shift.

Their presenters have much stranger names than ours:

Tanner Foust seems to be their equivalent of Richard Hammond.








Rutledge Wood must be the James May equivalent because he isn't the Richard Hammondy one and he isn't the front man. Also, if you type "Rutledge Wood" into Google Images, on the third row of the results, you get a picture of James.




This leaves the one that concerns me a bit:

Adam Ferrara. He is described as a "renowned petrolhead" which always rings alarm bells for me. When it comes to presenters of car shows, I have always believed that the best ones need to have a racing or motoring journalism background - Adam is a stand-up and a comedy actor. He does have a relatively normal name though.

It's still early days yet and the banter seemed quite forced. The jury is still out. They will need time to gel and establish a pecking order. I'm guessing this must have happened because they are on Season 2 over The Pond. I'll certainly keep watching with interest.

Indycarn't

Saw this F1 story yesterday in my new favourite car news site, Autoguide.com. It claims that "many companies associated with the commercial side of the sport are very concerned about a decline in popularity" possibly as a result of rule changes such as reducing the number of engine cylinders and the max rpm.

I don't see these changes affecting the popularity of the sport - maybe the engine notes won't be quite as roary - but that won't affect the majority of spectators - ie viewers at home. Those at the circuits may survive longer before deafness kicks in as well.

As for the reduction in engine revs, it's already having a positive impact with considerably more cars finishing races. Mind you, the cameras do enjoy a big engine blow-out and cars skidding on dropped oil.

The biggest threat to the popularity of F1 at the moment is Sebastian Vettel winning every race. Last year was much more exciting.

The promoters are considering moving over to Indycars.

This may be fine if they are American-based but the rest of the world is not interested in Indycars. It's a bit like the sport Americans call "Football" and the rest of the world calls "American Football".

Looking at the official Indycar Website, they have a lot of drivers, currently led by Britain's own (OK Scotland's own) Dario Franchitti but the only other ones I've heard of are Danica Patrick and Takuma Sato. They do, rarely, travel outside of the US but only as far as Brazil, Canada and Japan.

I don't ever see Indycar rivalling F1. A1GP tried and failed to do so - they will never have the magic of Monaco or Silverstone or the personalities or the glamour.

They've managed to find an awful picture of Bernie for the article - nearly as bad as his black-eye pics. He seems to have some sympathy for the argument. I don't.

I think I generally like Bernie - he is a ruthless businessman - but not a Rupert Murdoch. He was good fun on Top Gear last week directing Jeremy around the Monaco circuit. I don't even hold it against him that he is a co-owner of Queens Park Rangers Football Club - although some QPR fans might! He also sometimes gets it wrong like when he was reluctant to postpone or cancel the Bahrain GP - as time goes on, it still looks very wrong to go there.

There is one thing that Indycars has over F1 though...

I bring you back to one of the three drivers I'd actually heard of, Danica Patrick.

Some Say... ...He's Disappeared off the Face of the Earth

Last September, I reported how Ben Collins had joined the BTCC. Then, a week or so later, I reported how he had also joined Fifth Gear.

Now, both of these fine events are back in full-swing for 2011 and there's no sign of Ben in either. Well, almost no sign - he was interviewed at the last BTCC meeting and said how he was hoping to compete next season.

He also popped up briefly - as himself! - on a repeat of Top Gear I caught on the Dave Channel the other day. It was the episode where they played football using Toyota Aygos. If only we'd spotted the clues at the time - the other competitors were Russ Swift and his son - an obvious choice for throwing small cars around impressively - and a load of touring car drivers. As they were being introduced, each one's achievements in Touring Car racing were being read out, then they got to Ben who they quickly skirted over.

For those of you reading this and thinking, "Who The Hell is Ben Collins!?"

You obviously haven't read the post from September!

Well, I'll tell you again, but only because I'm such a nice person.

Ben Collins was Top Gear's tame racing driver, The Stig.

Not the first Stig, the black one - that was Perry McCarthy.

And not the current Stig, born in a stable (or cattle-shed depending on your favourite Christmas Carol) in Bethlehem. I'm not going to speculate who the current Stig is but I will confidently say that it isn't me.

Or my wife.

Or Sir Terry Wogan.

Or Ben Collins.

Now, where was I before you interrupted me asking who Ben Collins is?

Ah yes, what is he up to nowadays?

According to his Website, he's doing some Le Mans racing and some Volvo driving. He did mention the Le Mans stuff in the BTCC interview - he's working with RML who are Jason Plato's BTCC Team although the car is Honda based so Steve Rider wanted to talk about Matt Neal's team.

Apart from that, he's been promoting crisps - hence the photo above.

It hasn't done Gary Lineker any harm.

Mexican Stand-Off

Question: What does a Mexican have under his carpets?
Answer: UNDERLAY! UNDERLAY!

Now, is that joke racist? I hope not - I don't like racism or racists. I particularly don't like people who start sentences with "I'm not a racist, but..." Anyway, unless you are a fan of Warner Bros. cartoon Speedy Gonzales and also know a bit about floorcoverings, you probably wouldn't get that joke anyway.

I get the odd hit on my Blog from Mexico and I've noticed a couple this week possibly as the result of some Google searches on Top Gear. This would be due to their show last Sunday when a torrent of abuse was aimed at Mexicans - the BBC covered the furore (that's not a new car from Pagani) thus.

All the presenters joined in with the abuse but it seemed to be Richard, not Jeremy, who had the harshest words. However, at the end of the day - I DON'T BELIEVE FOR ONE SECOND THAT THEY ACTUALLY MEANT IT! Unlike the Sky Sports pundits the other week who thought they were off-mike and said what they really thought. I don't believe the pundits should have gone but that's another argument for a football or feminism blog - or maybe a media or legal blog since Andy Gray was pursuing damages at the time for 'phone hacking from another bit of Rupert Murdoch's empire - ooh controversial!

The team, usually Jeremy, love to wind people up and get publicity in this way - they always have and they always will - and long may they continue. Maybe a carefully worded apology is in order because the attack was sustained and brutal but I am very suspicious that the Mexican Ambassador would have actually been watching - that would imply he was a fan. And any fan knows what to expect from Top Gear.

Two weeks ago, they implied that Scousers stole cars or their wheels at least. The Mail, an evil paper which is so right-wing it makes Jeremy look liberal, reported it thus.

I thought the show was very funny, John Bishop took it in good spirit and most of the comments from Scousers agree too. Any true Scouse TG fan knew what they were doing and would be happy to be part of the joke aimed at us. As usual, the Mail was trying to stir up trouble/hatred/fear - it's our equivalent of Fox News.

As for the Mexican car they were talking about, the Mastretta (not "The Tortilla") - it looks suitably supercar-ish Although I'm not so sure of the front view:










That makes me think Smart Roadster:





At this point, I'm supposed to say, "I'm not racist against Mexicans - in fact some of my best friends are Mexican." Unfortunately, I don't think I've ever knowingly met a Mexican but I do own three Ford Escort Mexicos. Here's a picture of one identical to one of mine: