Top Gear: Peel Visits BBC

Tonight: James drives a Rolls Royce, Richard drives a Bugatti Veyron, and I drive something that is neither of those things.

Clarkson: Good evening and thank you very much! Now, we start tonight with a letter. Dear Top Gear, Why, oh why, don’t you feature more cars aimed at ordinary people like me? Yours Sincerely, Mr R Abramovich of Chelsea. Well, Mr Abramovich, our man of the people, James May, was only too  happy to oblige.

We cut to a pier on a nice sunny day. May: Perhaps this is what he’s on about. No, not the gin palace, this. (We’re shown an aircraft carrier.) The new Rolls Royce Phantom Drophead. (The Rolls lifts onto the deck and drops its top quickly and smoothly.) As I’m sure you know, on Top Gear, if a car spends too long sitting around on the deck of an aircraft carrier, it eventually gets launched off the ramp-thing down at the end and this definitely won’t fly, because it weighs 2.6 tons. So let’s be on our way.

The doors are hinged on the back side, so it’s elegant when they open and easy to assume one’s rightful place in the drivers’ seat. May gets in and drives off. This quite large car costs 307 000 pounds, which is 50 000 more than a Phantom saloon. A passing motorcyclist gives May the thumbs up as he determines what the extra 50 000 pounds goes for. He concludes that you pay the extra for the extra metalwork that keeps the car body rigid–Rolls Royce’s adopted parents at BMW added 460 feet of welding at their Center for Aluminum Competence. ” I’m not making that up. That is what it’s called. They’re German.” The Drophead has the same 6 3/4 L engine, the same top speed and 0-60 rate as the standard Phantom, but the image is different from the saloon. May lets us know that the producers have him driving at night because they thought he’d be too embarassed to be seen during the day because it isn’t discreet. But isn’t that part of what you’re paying for? He isn’t embarrassed, though; he finds it exquisite, not vulgar. “This lot don’t let you have carbon fiber, but they will let you have this teak decking at the back, like you might find on a motor launch. And they’ll also let you have the bonnet finished in brushed stainless steel. Other car manufacturers are spending millions and millions of pounds on research into hydrogen fuel cells and hybrid drive, but Rolls Royce spends the same money in its ashtray design department. Look at that.” It is quite clever; the cylindrical metal ashtray slides out easily from the armrest on the door. He deems the car like a butler; it takes care of everything for you and you don’t even notice.

We get some shots of the interior as May drives through a tunnel. He tells us that Rolls Royce has its own ideas about luxury in a car: no sport packages or floppy paddle gearboxes, but they do have 44 000 shades of paint for a buyer to choose among, and when you put up the soft top, it’s lined in cashmere. Holy crap. Cashmere? Really?

He tells us that it’s “Wonderful to drive, beautifully made. But there’s something else. Here’s an amazing thing. Rolls Royce is the most established mark in the history of motoring. It has the most pompous radiator grill. It has the most ridiculous mascot, and yet, this car is very, very cool. I think this might be the coolest car in the world.”

We leave May with his dubiously cool car and rejoin Clarkson in the studio: So let’s move on to Ferrari. Now, in the olden days, they used to build their race cars with passion and enthusiasm, and then on lap three, often as not, they would explode in a passionate and enthusiastic fireball. But then a few years ago, they started building their racing cars with science and math, and since then, as we know, they’ve been top of the tree. So now Ferrari is putting science and maths into their road cars as well.

We get some up-close and personal car porn of the Ferrari’s badges and emblems. “This is the 599.” It’s a 6L V12 with variable valve timing on each of its four cams and has magneto rheological shock absorbers. It has lights on the steering wheel (cool!) telling you when to change gear. “When I pull this paddle here, the clutch disengages, the cogs are swapped, the clutch reengages; all in 100 milliseconds.” He tries it and checks his watch. “Yeah, 100 milliseconds.” He looks pleased and nods smugly.

In order to get this red beast off the start line, there’s an elaborate set-up which involves buttons and readouts and launch control. Once it revs up, the start is very nearly worth it; there’s a lot of tire smoke and it’s quick off the line. “That was hugely impressive. But I’ll let you in on a secret. Launch control is primarily designed for fat, useless drivers to impress their friends with all the tire smoke. But there’s another, quicker way of getting this car off the line. This procedure is about half of the length of the previous one, so it’s not that much simpler, but it does get Clarkson from 0-60 in 3.5 seconds, which looks like quite a lot of fun.

He checks out the cornering. “Normally what I do in a normal fast car coming round here is brake, turn in, you feel the grip, ok? And then you balance the throttle to hold in on the limit of grip, and then you call the tow truck to pull you out of the field.” Things are different with this Ferrari–you can choose what kind of cornering you’d like to do with a switch. The first couple settings–Sport and Race– provide lots of grip and no understeer. “Hold onto your spleen, everyone!” Then he has a fit of bravery and turns the system off altogether. The effect is dramatic and immediate: fiercesome understeer; he spins out in a big cloud of smoke and throws up his hands: And then it stalls. He’d rather be in a ’64 275 GTI–rubbish, but he adores it. It is heart and soul; it also has a clean, sleek interior due to the utter lack of technological toys.

Cut to a garage filled with shrouded cars. “In the past, this was the natural stomping ground of the Ferrari–under a cover, in a garage, and with good reason…” None of them were everyday drivers; they all had drawbacks of some kind. However, the 599 addresses most of them, providing a parcel shelf for golf clubs, a service interval of 12 500 miles, and because the engine is up front, there is a nice roomy boot. There are, of course, issues, and Clarkson is willing to point them out: the car is so wide he spent most of his time in a drive in either a ditch or a hedge to avoid oncoming traffic; the headlights resemble canned goods, the automatic wipers turned on after the rain stopped, the air conditioning had a mind of its own, and the ambient lighting system lit up the interior like a battlefield. It’s still not a daily driver, and more worryingly, Clarkson wouldn’t buy one at all.

In the studion, Clarkson: It is amazing. As a technical exercise, it’s just astonishing. The science and maths is phenominal, it really is. Hammond: And would you *really* have that old 275? Clarkson: Honest to God, I really would. Anyway, we must now find out jow fast this car goes round our track, and of course, this means handing it over to our tame racing driver. Some say that he gets terrible excema on his helmet and that if he’d been the video ref in the World Cup Rugby final, he’d seen that of course it was a try, you blind Australian half-wit! All we know is he’s called the Stig.

He’s off in a cloud of tire smoke. There’s some roll through the corners, but no understeer. The audio book today is on sixth sense and energy. He’s got a big drift in Hammerhead and fast through the tires, “super-tidy” as Clarkson puts it. He gets neatly through Gambon and finishes in 1.21.2. Wow.

Clarkson: My guest tonight holds an amazing record. He’s been seen in the flesh by more people than anyone else in the history of human kind, and that is because he is a member of a band called the Rolling Stones. Ladies and gentlemen–Ronnie Wood!

He comes out of the crowd looking much less embalmed and considerably brighter-eyed than Keith Richards does these days. Clarkson: I guess you must be unnerved by a crowd as big as this. 500 people here. Wood chuckles: It’s nice to be intimate. He reckons that more people see their tour every year than see the Pope. Clarkson: The Pope is nothing. Don’t see the Pope singing “Satisfaction.” Clarkson gets down to brass tacks immediately: he says that all the Stones have still got good hair and wonders how they could have known this when they formed. Wood replies that none of them wanted to be in Fleetwood Mac.

Fun Facts about Ronnie Wood: he’s the first member of his family to be born on dry land dating back to the 1700’s–he’s checked. He has two caravans, and has rejected Clarkson’s kind offer to destroy them for him. He has an autobiography out. Clarkson has read it: How are you still alive? Wood: Good question.

Through all the drugs, drink, fights, escapes, reescapes… He discusses escapings from rampaging groups of mods and rockers, and we learn that not only is Jeff Beck an outstanding guitarist, he’s an excellent getaway driver as well. Clarkson mentions some of his friends: John Belushi, Hendrix, all the people, they’re not exactly a Methodist bible group.

Another Fun Fact: Wood’s record for staying up is six days and six nights, courtesy of friend Keith Moon and a series of concerts. They’d play, go out, and then no point in going to bed when you’ve got a performance in a couple of hours…afterward they had a nice two day kip. He reminisced about how Keith Richards used to be armed a lot and once shot Mick’s guitar, which turned out to be a joke on him since Mick had borrowed it from Keith. Charlie has no license to drive, but enjoys sitting in in his collection of rare cars listening to them idle. Woods has a classic Mercedes Benz and a Chevrolet. We see tape of his lap, he’s off: Let’s go! Got to think lap times here! Slowest one ever! Ahh! He does very well, no understeer, everything under control, quite fast. Clarkson is frankly staggered, and reveals the time: 1:49:4.

As May speaks, he walks through the audience to where Hammond is sitting in a silver Lexus: Over the years, technology has d one a great deal to help old people. It’s given them the Stannah Stairlift, the electric tin-opener, and of course, the rubberized under-sheet. Hammond: But there’s never been anything to help old people park–until now. Because this Lexus LS 600 can park itself. May points out the sensors in the bumper and the camera. Hammond: Yep, it’s that easy. I just engage reverse gear, I can see the cameras here, I press some buttons and stuff, and then it parks! So here it goes! I’t going to go well.

Clarkson: Hammond, sorry to interrupt, but this is the instruction book that I have here. For the sort of command system. All of that (flips pages) is for the park assist. Do you think you can do it without reading it? Hammond: Well, yeah. Clarkson: Go on, see if I care. Hammond: Just press some buttons… He takes his foot off the brake and hands off the wheel: I’m not doing anything! I’m not doing anything! I’m not doing anything! It’s just the car! It is indeed going backward and turning by itself. “Oh, bugger!” He’s gone straight into the remains of the Cool Wall, which was a victim of the props fire between seasons. May laughs. Clarkson: You hit the Cool Wall! Hammond: Well, it’s new technology.

He tries again. He keeps it slow, foot on brake, to check the speed. May approves of this. And…it’s straight back into the Cool Wall again. Clarkson borrows reading glasses from an audience member and begins to read the manual; it’s full of equations: How can old people understand this?! Hammond admits to putting the green square on the screen on the Cool Wall, which is why the car keeps ramming it. He moves it to where he actually wants to end up and tries for the third time. “Please turn, please, God, turn.” It does! Rear end goes in first and it stops at an angle. May: That’s parked! Clarkson: That’s nearly there! The audience applauds the big car that nearly could park itself and they give up.

We’re now looking at an old blue Mini Cooper in a parking garage. Clarkson: Forty years ago, car manufacturers could sell you something much smaller. The original Mini, for example. Or the Bubble car. But even these aren’t small. Not really. Not compared to this.

We pan over a couple parking spaces. Oh, my God, it is a ridiculously ugly little three wheeled thing. It’s a mid blue with a solo headlight and comes up to about Clarkson’s waist. It is the Peel P50, 54″ long and 41″ wide, and in Guinness as the smallest production car ever. Contrary to possible expectations that he’s there to introduce Hammond, he takes a couple of tries and, incredibly, folds himself in to drive to work.

The Peel was built on the Isle of Man in the early 60’s and said to be almost cheaper than walking; it cost 198 pounds and got 100 mpg thanks to the 49cc engine from a Moped. It does have very limited top speed, is not terribly safe, and is very warm. “But realistically, even the skinniest, shortest chap with the whitest of teeth will struggle to get past 35.” It also emits tremendous amounts of smoke and doesn’t corner well.

At the BBC, he drives up a pedestrian walk to the doors, where he gets out, takes it by the rear bumper, and tows it through the doors. He carts it into the Top Gear offices, where the staffers crowd around it, get in it, shake it back and forth, and have a laugh. Clarkson is bemused by its popularity. As he is on the phone in his office (Can’t you just clean them? Really, 4 000 pounds to whiten them?) John Humphrys drops in and takes it on a little joyride through the halls, clipping the watercooler, chuckling and having a good time. “God, the power under this bonnet, it’s impressive.” He pulls up by the elevator, which is where Clarkson tracks him down: Please don’t just steal our things. Do you mind? Humphrys: Thanks very much indeed. Jolly nice of you.

Clarkson is summoned to an important BBC meeting and is running late, so he takes the car. He drives into the elevator, where Fiona Bruce does her best to ignore him, but gamely pushes him out at the lobby as he has no reverse gear. He remarks favorably about her bottom and makes the short drive to BBC Television Centre, possibly the most complicated building in the world.

Despite 20 years of experience, Clarkson gets lost and wanders through the cubicle farm in the car. Several people don’t even look up as he passes. He lets us know that several shows have been cancelled not due to low ratings, but because their presenters are still lost in the building. He’s really lost now. We see him drive behind the glass wall of a news program in which the readers are presenting current events. Nobody is diverted by the Peel. Eventually he does make it to the seminar, which has this entrancing title: How to Reduce the Carbon Footprint of Our Ethnically Diverse Disability Access Policy For Single Mothers. It’s already in progress when he drives in and parks at the foot of the table. The buzz words go on for hours, so he drives out onto the street. “I really do think that today I have seen the future, and it comes from 1963. The Peel P50 is absolutely brilliant. If it had a reverse gear, I would describe it as the ultimate of personal mobility.” As he’s going on stopped in the street, Dermot Murnagham picks up the rear bumper and turns him around so that he’s pointing in the wrong direction. Car horns begin to honk. The Peel’s only door opens and Clarkson’s foot emerges, pushing him out of the traffic.

In the studio, Clarkson to May: They really have a very big problem at the BBC with news presenters. I mean, just the other day, we were in the canteen. Paxman came through on a Harley-Davidson. It’s just out of control. May: Is this the best car we’ve ever had on Top Gear? Clarkson: Yes..I think it’s genuinely astonishing. The he whips a cloth off to reveal the sports version of the Peel; it’s got a bubble of glass for the roof. Clarkson: It’s just staggering. May: It’s the Jetsons. The twinset on stage would be Clarkson’s perfect two-car garage.

Hammond: Yeah. Now, a year ago, Jeremy raced James and me from Italy to London, James and I in his ridiculous airplane and Jeremy in a Bugatti Veyron. And annoyingly, he won. Then we heard from a bunch of aeroplane enthusiasts called the RAF. They said, “Why don’t you come up to our place and we’ve got a plane that will give your car a run for it’s money.” And well, seeing as how I’m the only hasn’t yet driven the Bugatti Veyron, I took on the challenge.

We cut to the Veyron rolling rather menacingly through the countryside. Hammond: Yes, the 1000 horsepower legend is back. And if I’m honest, I’m a bit nervous. Not because of the car itself, but because of the burden that now rests on my shoulders. Because when Jeremy drove the Veyron, all he had to beat was an incompetent James in a useless little aeroplane. And when James went to Germany and maxed it, the car didn’t even break a sweat. But this time, the Veyron’s honor really is at stake, because never before has it gone up against something like this.

Hammond continues:  The most modern, the most high-tech strike fighter on the planet. The Eurofighter Typhoon. (There’s some lovely airplane porn bathed in the sunset.)  And for once  when it comes to figures, the Bugatti is really well and truly top-trumped. Its twin engines develop 20 000 pounds of thrust–each. Punching the Eurofighter up to 65 000 feet at a top speed of over 1500 mph. This machine is the cutting edge of what a plane can do. It’s actually designed to be aerodynamically unstable to make it as agile as possible in a dogfight. So it needs 70 computers to keep in in the air. (Some lovely plane porn as it cuts through the sky.) And if they fail, it would simply fall out of the sky. It’s kind of a mix of science fiction and brute strength. He stands on a wing, discussing their strength, and notes that each costs 67 million. Each.

“Faced with the clear and present danger of the Eurofighter, the Bugatti Veyron really is the car world’s best shot at clinging to some honor. And nobody knows what the outcome will be.”

The Veyron and the Eurofighter face off in a hangar. The Veyron’s wing moves up, possibly in challenge. “In fact, Bugatti is so concerned, they sent over not one, but two Veyrons. Maybe they’re going to tie them together or something.”  The shootout will take place on the main runway at RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire.

The challenge: A horizontal versus vertical drag over two miles. Hammond sits with a toy car racing straight, a matchbox-type toy minivan, and a toy plane.  There’s a start/finish line–the Veyron will go up one mile, swing around, and return. The Eurofighter will go up vertically one mile, turn, and come back. “Or to crash into a million pound supercar that it didn’t expect to see and Youtube has a field day. Otherwise, it’s last one to finish is a vegetarian. Simple as that.”

The Eurofighter rolls out of the hanger. “Now, you might think that the plane is going to walk it. But don’t be so sure.” The Veyron swings into view. “The car should have the edge off the line. It’ll do 0-100 in 5.7 seconds, for god’s sake. And when it gets to these yellow dots, which mark the mile where it has to turn around, the Veyron has another advantage. Down here its awesome brakes should come into play. And then there’s the air brake as well, which on its own generates the same stopping power as you’d get in a normal hatchback. ” There’s a pause. “Straight line is a straight line. So the car does what it does there. But up here, I’ve got to brake as late as possible and lose as little time as possible making the turn before the return mile so I reckon it’ll be won or lost here at this end.”He looks tense. The dragsters line up. Hammond does a preflight checklist, reminding himself to go full beans on the throttle.

“As drag races go, you will agree that this is quite a good one.” A rabbit hurries across the runway. They’re off. The jet engines throw flame back. The Veyron charges across the line and actually beats the jet in initial accelleration. The jet lifts off and Hammond can feel the wash. “So I’m fighting for the Germans in a battle against the RAF.” Casually, he tells he camera, “If you’re watching, thinking this is cool, it is. ” In 18 seconds, he’s reached 188 mph and getting ready to brake. The air brake comes up. Overhead, the jet reaches the height and gracefully rolls over into its dive. Hammond floors it coming out of the turn. “This is the best race in history!” The jet is descending. “If I mess this one up, I might as well get a paper route.” Hammond’s up to 196 mph now–is it enough? he can’t see the jet–until it races past. “No!” The Veyron finishes a decided second. The jet does a victory roll. Resignedly, Hammond slows down, “I suspect I may get some abuse for this.”

Clarkson: You failed. You are a vegetarian and you failed and you are useless. Hammond, in a defensive posture: Yes. Clarkson relents a bit: You have to admit, though, it is quite a car. Hammond: Oh, it is staggering. But what a plane. And here is the guy who flew it–Squadron Leader Jim Walls. Everybody applauds. Clarkson: Must have been terrifying. Hammond: Well, it was, because I was–Clarkson: Not you, him. He had to wake up that morning; what am I going to do? Well, Richard Hammond is coming. He’s driving in a fast car in a straight line on a runway in the North. Hammond: Yeah. Wells smiles and says nothing. Clarkson: He’s not going to go, ‘Can I do nuclear war instead?’ So well done, mate–fantastic.

Next week, we are in Africa for a Top Gear special. Now the three of us are trying to drive across the spine of the continent in three ordinary used 2-wheel drive road cars. It is worth watching, trust me. See you then. Good night!