Top Gear is Back June 26th

Top Gear will be back to creating awesomness on June 26th, according to finalgear.com. There isn’t much info as to what we can expect other than an adventure with May, Clarkson, the Nissan LEAF and Peugot iOn (that’s Mitsubishi i-Miev in Canadian speak).

I would imagine that the bloakes will take a few shots at Tesla for filing a lawsuit against them, May and Hammond will take a few shots at Clarkson for an alleged affair and a falling out with some locals and everyone will take shots at Hammond for being short. Also expect lots of crazy challenges, reviews of your favourite exotic supercars and of course stars in the reasonably priced car.

The only rumour right now is that the McLaren MP4-12C may have taken the top spot on the leader board for the fastest lap around the Top Gear track.

Can’t wait!

[Final Gear, photo credit: Daily Mail]

Top Gear Tries Electric Cars Again, Fails

I must say, Top Gear might very well be the best show ever made. Seriously. No car show has ever received the viewership or fanbase that they have and no car show has ever been able to lure people otherwise uninterested in cars before. With that said, a good chunk of the reason why Top Gear is able to attract such a wide variety of viewers is because of the dynamic between hosts Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond, but also because it’s wildly entertaining.

The latter should be considered when watching the above clip. Clarkson and May decide to have a go at the Peugot iOn and the Nissan LEAF – both full on electric vehicles. However, to ensure that it’s still entertaining they decided to see if they could trek across the country is said vehicles. Since most electric vehicles are designed to be city dwellers, this is obviously an attempt at entertainment. And knowing them, they succeeded.

May and Clarkson found themselves at the University of Lincoln as they stopped to ask where they could charge their cars. Inevitibly no one could point them to a charging station because there weren’t any. So then the duo decided to just drive around looking for a charging station until the cars ran out of juice and had to be towed.

This really seems like more of a middle finger to Tesla, who has filed a lawsuit against Top Gear and the BBC for allegedly rigging the test of their roadster which gave the impression that the car is useless because you have to charge it too often. Even though Tesla wasn’t involved in this video, it’s clear that Top Gear are not fans of the electric car industry in general. However, James May has actually written a column saying that electric cars aren’t all that bad and can work in certain instances. Obviously in this instance, they aren’t ideal.

[The Lincolnite]

It’s Been A Bad Week For Jeremy Clarkson

Yikes.

A lawsuit, vandalism and accusations of having an affair have all been plaguing the popular Top Gear host this week.

First, electric-only automaker Tesla has filed a lawsuit against Top Gear and Clarkson for allegedly rigging the test drive of the Tesla Roadster. Clarkson was at the wheel for the review back in 2008, and in the film, he claimed the Roadster was all fine and good, but was fairly useless since it only had a range of 88 kms; a far cry from the 320 kms Tesla claims the roadster can go between plug-ins – even if you drive it like you stole it. A shot of Clarkson and the Top Gear staff pushing it off the track, according to Tesla, gave the illusion that it’s fairly useless and has damaged its reputation. Top Gear has yet to respond but has said it will defend itself in court.

Secondly, apparently Clarkson’s summer home in the Isle of Man was vandalized. Clarkson’s fence by a nearby path was damaged/torn down. According to reports, Clarkson has been in a dispute with locals over the path and its proximity to his property.

And now comes word that Clarkson is allegedly cheating with his wife of 18 years with a 42 year old blonde staffer at Top Gear named Phillipa Sage. The two were allegedly spotted kissing in public several times and sharing the same hotel rooms in Australia and Norway. Sage has written to the press denying the allegations while Jeremy, um, hasn’t denied the allegations at all. All he said was that he was shocked to find himself “the next Tiger Woods”. That’s not an admission, but it’s definitely not a denial either. Which is a bit strange.

Anyway, here’s hoping the next week shapes up a bit better for Clarkson. I personally don’t care about his personal life (i.e the vandalism and the affair), I’m more interested in the lawsuit since it has to do with cars. Check out the desputed Top Gear review of the Tesla Roadster after the jump.

[Autoblog]

Read the rest of this entry »

Speed: Love it, or Hate it?

Have you ever decided to see if the 0-100 time of your car is accurate but you had a squirmy passenger with you whose screams and pleads for you to stop made you wonder what the hell is wrong with them? Well, it turns out it’s all about how our brains respond to speed.

The BBC recently did a study and came up with some very interesting results. If you frequent this blog and call yourself an auto enthusiast chances are you’re the type of person that gets a permanent grin and a desirable response from your genitals when you stomp on the accelerator. That means that your body pumps out mass levels of dopomine when faced with speed. Dopomine gives you feelings of gratification.

If, on the other hand, you’re the type of person whose body freezes and the only noise you can make is a yell similar to that of a hyena when faced with speed, that means your body expenses generous amounts of serotonin. If the levels of serotonin get high enough, it can literally make your body freeze.

To help illustrate the BBC’s point, the always entertaining Jeremy Clarkson took his mother out on a rollercoster to show a real world difference between the two chemicals at work. Check it out the funny clip above.

You learn something knew every day.

[Youtube]

Aww Yeeaah Top Gear Yeeah!

Check out the trailer for Top Gear’s latest shananigans above! That trip to the middle east is going to be hilariously awesome!

What Colour Will The Next Stig Be?

There is definitely going to be a new Stig.

If you haven’t already heard, the Stig’s identity has actually been revealed as Ben Collins. I didn’t write any blog posts about it when all the hoopla was going on because I honestly didn’t want to know the identity of the Stig, so I didn’t follow it. But it’s next to impossible to shelter yourself from Top Gear news. I don’t know why Ben Collins decided to out himself as the Stig, but he has and it has cost him the best job in the entire world. Stupid, Ben. Just stupid.

Obviously the show can’t go on when everyone knows who the Stig is, so the Top Gear crew is currently seeking their new Stig. Jeremy Clarkson has come up with the idea of having a “Stig Farm” where stigs are cultivated on mass.  And since Ben Collins (or a man playing him in Stig form) will likely be killed off once the new season begins, the new Stig will have to dawn a different colour.

Hardcore Top Gear fans that have been following the show since it’s old format (like me) will remember that even before white Stig there was black Stig who met his untimely death once he got his identity revealed as well. Judging by the picture, a new coloured Stig is likely.

Which colour do you like? I’m thinking blue, but having a pink Stig would be quite hilarious.

[The Sun]

Top Gear Filming In Israel

There’s no doubt that Top gear is the best show on earth, and one of the reasons it’s so good is the challenge segments. This is where Clarkson, Hammond and May choose a car (under specific guidlines) and all go through a series of challenges to find out who bought the best vehicle.

Usually the challenge take place outside of the blokes’ home country of Great Britain, and usually it’s somewhere you wouldn’t quite expect. Case in point, the boys were spotted in Israel in what appears to be some sort of roadster challenge.

Richard chose a Fiat Barchetta, James took the wheel of a BMW Z3 while  Jeremy went with a Mazda MX-5. Jeremy’s car was even decked out with a hookah! I’m sure it was only used for legal substances.

What’s also interesting is the convoy apparently apparently went through the Isreal/Jordan border, which typically is for foot traffic only. Israeli officialy must be huge fans of the show to let them through, especially in unusual cars.

There is still no date set for the new season of Top Gear, but you can expect it sometime in late November.

[Autoblog]

Top Gear Caught Filming for Season 16 in New York!

Jezza, Hamster and Captain Slow were recently caught filming in New York for season 16 of Top gear. And by the looks of it, season 16 won’t be a disappointment (not that any episode of Top Gear is ever a disappointment).

The cameras caught what looks to be a supercar challenge. Having a self proclaimed Benz bias, Jeremy naturally chose the Mercedes-Benz SLS. Richard, also admitting a fond admiration of Porsches, unsurprisingly took a Porsche 911 GT3 RS to the party while James got the keys for the boner inducing Ferrari 458 Italia.

The boys can be seen attempting to manoeuver through a construction zone – no doubt highlight the impracticalities of actually owning a supercar. At one point Jeremy actually had to open the gullwing door to see where he was going. I can only imagine the hilarious/amazing moments they had on the trip.

I’ve been pumped for new Top Gear for a while, but this video makes me 10 times more exciting.

[Youtube]

Jeremy Clarkson Shows Us Why Three-Wheeled Cars Don’t Work

If you’ve ever been to Europe, you’ve likely noticed that the type of cars they drive over there are awesome. Sometimes, though, they come up with some pretty crazy ideas. Case in point, the Reliant Robin – a three wheeled car.

What is the point of a three wheeled car you might ask? Well apparently in Britain, if you purchased a three wheeled car back in the day, you got a 55 pound tax credit. Yeah, that’s pretty much it.

As you’d imagine, and as Jeremy hilariously shows us, three wheeled cars don’t exactly work. Yet shockingly, there seems to be quite  a following for them even today.

Check out Jeremy’s antics in the video above. Part two is after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

Would You Want Jeremy Clarkson To House Sit For You?

Apparently most people in the UK would.

According to a recent survey, the top Top Gear host was voted most wanted celebrity for house sitting duties.  The runners up included BBC presenter Christine Bleakley, singer Christina Cole, and home improvement expert Sarah Beeny.

As much as I love and admire Clarkson, I don’t think I would ever want him house sitting for me. I’d probably come back to find a Ferrari V12 bolted to my lawnmower or Ford GT memorabilia decorated throughout the house. Or judging on how much he loves to make stuff explode, I’d probably come back to my house on fire with bits of it scattered all through Dartmouth.

If I had to choose a celebrity to house sit for me, it would have to be Beyonce, for obvious reasons.

[Money Supermarket]

Top Gear Returns For Another Season!

The best car show ever made will indeed be making another go at ridculous challenges, Stig laced drives around the track, stars in reasonably priced cars along those lovable hosts Jezza (Jeremy Clarkson), Hamster (Richard Hammond) and Captain Slow (James May).

The end of the show has been speculated for a while now especially since, according to Jeremy, the series finale will be nothing spectacular – it will likely end the way every show ends: “thanks for watching, and goodnight”. This has made every petrolhead dread the last episode of each season because it could very well be the last ever and we wouldn’t even know it.

Season 15 will go on though, and there have already been reports of the three blokes being spotted filming next to an errupting volcano. The crazy ideas never stop at the Top Gear headquaters.

Expect the excitement to start in June!

Volvo Is Still In The Wagon Business: V60 Spied

After years and years of assuring us that they would never enter into the SUV segment (mostly around the time when most SUV’s Ford Explorers were flipping over right and left) for safety reasons, we now have two SUV’s offered from the Swedish brand. And what SUV’s they are too. The XC90 looks great and the most critical, brutal automotive journalist in the world, Jeremy Clarkson, is even quite fond of it. Of the XC90 he said, “It is by far the best of all the school-run-mobiles because there really is room for seven people, 14 legs and two dogs in the boot as well. No other car maker — and this is strange — has managed to pull off a similar trick without ending up with a bus…we should all have one immediately”.

Praise doesn’t get much higher than that. In fact, Jeremy has practiced what he preached and is currently on his third XC90.

Then you have the smaller XC60, which we can personally atest too, is at the top end of the segment. It can easily go head to head with BMW, Audi and Mercedes-Benz’s offerings.

So, why even bother with wagons when they can do SUV’s so well?

Read the rest of this entry »

BMW M3 vs. Lexus IS-F

After just writing the post below, we thought we would share this with you…. in case there was ever any doubt in your mind as to who is still king.

(Oh, and Jeremy Clarkson for President of the World)