Tag: Richard Hammond

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Top Gear

Exclusive: Top Gear enlists for Tour of Duty

Top Gear in Vietnam

*updated—15 December* Confirmed by Jeremy Clarkson at the end of Episode 7 last Sunday, the Vietnam Special will go to air in the UK on Sunday 28 December.

*updated—12 October* Pics of the Top Gear team filming in Vietnam have now surfaced on Facebook. There’s a few more included below, or follow the link from Gaz in the comments section for more [Edit: The Facebook album is no longer accessible]… Extra pics have been removed at the request of the original photographer. For all the latest on this episode, keep an eye on the FinalGear forums.

Series 12 of Top Gear (UK) is expected air on UK screens in November, so it was with great anticipation I heard some interesting news about what to expect in the new series. As this article is being written the Top Gear crew are in Vietnam preparing to film their next in-country challenge. Firm details are sketchy, but it is expected that Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May will be using motorbikes, instead of cars, taking a route from Ho Chi Minh City in the south before finishing up in Hanoi in north, with a visit to the World Heritage site of Halong Bay along the way.

Top Gear is developing quite a body of work for its in-country challenges, with the United States, Botswana and Japan just some of the locations the lads have tackled. No doubt this Vietnam Special, with the potential of seeing the three hosts riding motorbikes, will provide great entertainment. I understand there’s a very interesting powered watercraft waiting for the guys, which is bound to see one of them taking a swan dive.

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Top Gear

Top Gear – Series 11, Episode 6

The final episode of Series 11 already! Yes, I’m afraid that’s it for a few more months. The show kicked off with James May testing a couple of Japanese oddities from well known manufacturer Mitsuoka. Hmm, fair enough. Richard Hammond took us down “Hardcore Street” behind the wheel of the Gumpert Apollo S. A car which proves to be as effective as it is, well, ugly. How effective? You’ll need to check the video above to find out. Jay Kay made his long awaited reappearance on the show to see if he could knock off Simon Cowell’s lap time in the Star in a Reasonably Priced Car segment. He did. Predictably, by 0.1 second. All looked a bit of a setup, so much so that the producers must have asked Jay Kay to see if he could act a bigger wanker than Cowell as well. Which is a shame, as Jay Kay was pretty good value when he first appeared on Top Gear all those years ago. He has a bloody nice car collection, so we’ll forgive him!

Top Gear v DMotor

The show closed out with classic shoot out between the Top Gear crew against Germany’s DMotor crew, featuring Sabine Schmitz and Tim Schrick. The usual “don’t mention the war” banter followed and, of course, Top Gear won the day. Although, one suspects when the film airs on DMotor that there may be a different result, haha. It was all pretty good fun really with the highlight being Jeremy and Sabine lapping the Zolder circuit in a couple of MINI Cooper Ss and Tim Schrick and The Stig duelling in a race going Porsche and an Aston Martin DBRS9.

Top Gear should be back in October with 8 episodes to close out the year. Fifth Gear will return to UK screens on 11 August.

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Top Gear

Top Gear – Series 11 teasers

TopGear logoRecent reports about the new episodes of Top Gear have fans even more excited about the series return on 22 June. From the Top Gear blog, Andy Wilman, the show’s Executive Producer, says “most exciting for me is that we’ve finally come up with another big race – you know, car versus something or other … this one is back to basics, more hardcore, mega car, mega opponent, with a solid premise. And a clue for the geeks: we did it in Japan.” My tip is it will feature the Mazda Furai, or a Nissan GT-R. Or both, perhaps!

Giving further clues as to what we can expect Wilman states, “we go to war, literally, with a German version of Top Gear (which incidentally means Sabine is back) and there’s a very exciting shootout with the RS6 against the most suicidal of skiers”

One thing that Wilman doesn’t state, however, is the Veyron feature filmed in Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates. This has been revealed on the Releaselog website, which has a few spy shots of the the Stig captured during the shoot.

All in all, it is shaping up to be a great series, or at least, the fans hope it will be. So far there has been nothing to indicate anyone will be disappointed. Keep reading AUSmotive for more updates, or check in to the FinalGear forums for more leads.

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Top Gear

Top Gear – Series 11 expected to air on 22 June

TopGear logoInternet speculation suggests that Series 11 of Top Gear will go to air on UK televisions on 22 June. Keep an eye out for more updates as they come to hand. In the meantime, to help you get by during the TG off-season see below for one of my favourite Top Gear challenges. The £1500 Porsche Challenge from Series 5.

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Top Gear

TopGear t-shirts

TopGear t-shirts

If you’re not a fan of the BBC’s TopGear, then you should be. To show that you are, get yourself one of the great official t-shirts available from Amber Promotions. I have three t-shirts from their range and they are well made and of a very high quality. Delivery to Australia is no problem and if you can get a group of mates together bulk ordering and discounts may be available as well. I dealt with Doug at Amber Promotions when coordinating the purchase of around 25 shirts in 2006 and he was excellent to deal with. If you’re keen on some of these shirts, shoot Doug an email and tell him Liam from Australia sent you.