Top Gear

[AKBeemer]

I just finished watching the season finally of the British TV show “Top Gear”. If you are unfamiliar with the show, it is the top rated TV show in Britain and features three middle aged guys driving the world’s most exotic cars and getting involved in a variety of motorsport related adventures. They are normally given a set, and small, amount of money with which to buy a car and then have to compete in some sort of race. They have raced across Africa, Europe, the USA (with redneck slogans painted on their vehicles) and across the English Channel in home made amphibious cars. This week’s show entailed our three heroes riding motor bikes from Saigon to Hanoi, Vietnam in 8 days. One was on a Honda Cub, one on a Russian 125cc Minsk and one on a Vespa. This has become my favorite TV show and I cannot imagine a better way to make a living then to be one of the regulars on the show. If you’ve never seen it before, then I highly recommend tuning in on BBC America on Monday evenings. Is anyone else a fan?

[PAGoldsby]

I'm watching it right now. It's the driving test. This is by far the best episode ever.

[lamble]

Remember Clarkeson hates bikes. He detests them...but watch him smile going up into the mountains. Not a long term convert, but there's always hope.

Captain Slow and the Hamster are both bikers and car enthusiasts.

It's all very tongue in cheek, and I'm afraid that you ex colonials do come in for a bit of a bashing from time to time.

One correction, the slogans weren't redneck slogans, they were slogans intended to cause as much potential conflict as possible with, Rednecks, to see how "sensitive" rednecks are. I must admit that episode went a tad too far. Why visit somewhere just to be offensive or to see how angry you can make people before they are provoked to violence...didn't stack up?

Don't get me wrong, over here in the UK we were laughing like drains.

[Expatriated]

Don't get me wrong, over here in the UK we were laughing like drains.

Like "drains"? Whilst I fancy myself a bit of a wordsmith, I confess ignorance at this turn of phrase?:scratch :usa


BTW, I LOVE Top Gear. There was nothing better in television ever when they drove that vintage Rolls into the pool in front of all those expectant guests!:p

[tessler]

Watched it last night and loved the final bit where they had to outfit their bikes with floats and pontoons etc., and morph them into boats so they could "ride" to a floating bar out on Ha Long bay.

Clarkson is an awful, big baby, but the show was possibly one of the funniest, best Motorcycle-content new programs on TV (without a single reference to choppers or dirt, sportbikes). :laugh

[Paul_F]

Remember Clarkeson hates bikes. He detests them...but watch him smile going up into the mountains.

A back I posted an article about Clarkeson and his thoughts about riding a Vespa (motorcycle). If you missed it, the link is here. (http://http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/driving/jeremy_clarkson/article4963194.ece) I found it to be quite humourous.

[TexanRT]

Remember Clarkeson hates bikes. He detests them...but watch him smile going up into the mountains. Not a long term convert, but there's always hope. Captain Slow and the Hamster are both bikers and car enthusiasts.
It's all very tongue in cheek, and I'm afraid that you ex colonials do come in for a bit of a bashing from time to time.

One correction, the slogans weren't redneck slogans, they were slogans intended to cause as much potential conflict as possible with, Rednecks, to see how "sensitive" rednecks are. I must admit that episode went a tad too far. Why visit somewhere just to be offensive or to see how angry you can make people before they are provoked to violence...didn't stack up?

Don't get me wrong, over here in the UK we were laughing like drains.

I guess we're due for some ribbing from time to time -- but Jeremy and the fellows did produce a couple of cringe-worthy moments while bashing the colonists. But it's still great fun....

I expected one of the Top Gear blokes would get to ride the Stars-n-stripes bike across Vietnam, but it it never happened. Last night was a great episode -- loved the suits. This season was tops -- but too short.

My wife and I love to watch these guys -- how about the episode when Jeremy drove the ford off of the landing craft onto the beach during the military landing & assault?

When does the new season begin? I can't wait.

Edit: Watching Jeremy do power slides in expensive cars is some of the best TV ever.

[535is]

As a fan of Kitchen Nightmares and Gordon Ramsay's F Word programs (or are they 'programmes'?), as well, I've been absolutely loving the last few Top Gear episodes I've seen.

In the first, Ramsay was on to drive the cheap car lap. This is the newest cheap car and they apparently changed the rules slightly, but it was simply hilarious watching him flog the car ("Don't f***in' brake! Don't f***in' brake! Don't f***in' brake! ") for its fastest (so far) lap. Then, at the end of the extended Vietnam segment of Top Gear, they had Jeremy & Capt. Slow in the kitchen with Ramsay on a 20-minute version of F Word. What a hoot! ;)

[Bob_M]

Crazy funny show. I really enjoyed the episode where they powered a blender with a Corvette V8 engine. Or the one where found a remote control car that can operate on vertical surfaces and ran it up the side of the BBC broadcast studios and over the windows, while a news program was being filmed.

[AKBeemer]

There is no doubt that Clarkeson has it in for us American's. We are too loud, too fat and make atrocious cars. In a recent episode he was speaking to an attractive woman in the audience and when she said she was an American Clarkeson said, 'You can't be an American, you're not fat enough.' Remember the secret of good comedy is that it always has an element of truth in it. I find Clarkeson very funny despite his Yank bashing, and he did pile high praise on the last Corvette he drove to and at Bonneville. As I mentioned in my earlier post, these three knuckleheads have great jobs. They get to goof around like frat boys only in fabulous automobiles, in exotic locations at someone else’s expense.

[Visian]

those guys must have done something very right in their past lives to have a job like this.

[pffog]

Stay tuned, this week is a MOTORCYCLE show, based in Viet Nam, VERY FUNNY!!

AND two wheels!!

[108625]

I enjoy the hell out of it, and having lived in the UK before know to expect some "Yank-bashing". If you pay attention, everyone gets their share: the germans, the french, the italians, the japanese, and their home country (particularly the government). One of the funniest examples was the search for the best communist built car; which included a Morris Marina.

Even if you're not a car guy it's funny TV. You can't help but laugh at things like bendy-bus racing, Fiat Football, or the amphibious Toyota pickup with a huge Honda outboard motor bolted to the tailgate, losing to a Triumph Herald "sloop".

That, and the Stig ripping a Super-Seven (which I can afford) around the track quicker than a Bugatti Veyron? Priceless.

[lamble]

In fairness, the UK government does get lambasted at every opportunity. Watching the Minister for Transport answering questions on Speed Cameras was cringe making.
The French are dismissed and the Germans and Italians do get a smattering too.

[32232]

Even my wife, who doesn't watch anything except mystery programs, loves Top Gear. It's absolutely my favourite show on TV.

This week's episode on BBC Canada was where they drove Toyota pickups to the north pole, for real! (The Hamster went on a dog sled).

I've heard about the Viet Nam episode, looking forward to when it gets here.

[Oldhway]

Absolutely love it. Perhaps the funniest thing on TV in a long time.

[TandemGeek]

Simply the best...

Anyone else been watching long enough to remember the all-black Stig who came before the all-white new Stig?

Simply too hard to pick a favorite episode, challenge or schtick routine.