Original subtitles

Tonight, James and Richard take some cabrios

to the wilds of Scotland.

I go skiing on the B4796.

And can you parachute into a moving car?

Hello, and welcome to this trio of sports cars.

Now, they're all small and cute, and they've got kind of puppy dog eyes.

So, to decide which one's best,

I think that's probably a job for Top Gear's resident hamster.

This is the Mercedes SL600. It's a German two-seater roadster.

It's got an enormous 6-litre V-12 twin turbo engine

that can do nought to 60 in 4.7 seconds.

It's clever, too. It's got climatronic air conditioning that even senses

how many people are in the car.

It costs £93,000.

But there is a slight problem here.

Because the moment you do that,

75 grand of that value is wiped clean away.

Gone.

You see, as soon as you've got the wind in your hair, you slow down.

So you don't need mega power. Your hair'll come out.

And so all the electric safety gizmos and the clever climate control are unnecessary.

And this is my point.

In the same way that there's a perfect time for boiling an egg,

there is a recipe for a perfect roadster.

It should be small, nimble, light, and above all, relatively cheap.

I can say this with utter confidence

because I'm British, and it was the British who invented the perfect roadster.

Through the decades, we've made oodles of them.

Jaguar SS, MGs, Triumph TRs, Lotus Elans, all perfect for scampering along.

Britain's twisty country roads. Our prowess with light sports cars even helped us

to become the dominant world force in motor sport. After World War 2,

our motorsport pioneers used the abandoned wartime airfields to develop light,

rear-engined machines, with which they were able to slay the heavyweight Ferraris.

This type of car, then, is in our blood,

and as is often the way with these things,

today the best British roadsters are Japanese.

The Mazda MX-5 is the car that reintroduced the roadster to a modern era.

And it makes no bones about pretending to be British,

even Alf Garnett would be fooled.

It's just so simple!

And that parpy exhaust note and snickety gear change,

well, they're nicked straight from the Lotus Elan. And that's it. That is an MX-5.

But perhaps most amazingly, the MX-5 is now about 15 years old, and in all that time,

they've hardly changed it!

But then, why would they?

Because it is still one of the best-handling little cars in the whole world!

It's fantastic!

But if Mazda have kept things simple,

that's nothing to what Toyota have tried with the MR2.

They wanted the MR2 to be light and focused, like a racing car.

So the engine is here, in the middle.

In fact, the engineers became so obsessed with perfect weight distribution

that they didn't want you messing it up with heavy luggage in the boot.

So there isn't one.

If you're planning a weekend away in one of these, it had better be to a nudist camp.

Like the Mazda, this MR2 hasn't forgotten the basic rules of the roadster.

The engine is only a 1.8,

there are no fripperies like a powered hood and electric seats,

and it costs less than 18 grand.

But where the MX-5 really is a bit of, well, a lot of frothy fun,

this is a bit more serious.

Of the two, it is probably the faster, but it's also the most hard work.

The Japanese don't have it all to themselves, though.

The only people with a roadster heritage as strong as ours are the Italians,

and they're still having a crack at it.

The Fiat Barchetta was on sale here about eight years ago.

I know, I bought one. Then it disappeared, and now it's back.

The Barchetta is not just pretty, it's also rare.

And that makes it cool, as do the cute little door handles

and the fact you can have it in a colour called "shiny grey".

Shiny grey?

That must have come from a Mafia suit catalogue.

When it comes to making you look more stylish,

the Fiat has the Japanese cars licked.

Which is a good job, because underneath, unlike the Toyota and the Mazda,

it's front wheel drive.

Okay, so compared to the dizziness and frivolity of the MX-5

and the serious determination and aggression of the MR2,

this is, well, nowhere near.

But it is kind of perky. It's more a brisk roadster.

But it does have one big, big advantage over the Japanese. The price.

Because this pretty, pukka, hand-made Italian roadster

costs 12 grand. That's five less than the other two.

But this, the MX-5, remains my favourite.

If money's the issue, buy a 12 grand second-hand one of these.

It's more fun than the Barchetta, it's prettier than the MR2

and it's even got a small boot, which isn't a lot to ask.

The fact remains that it just does everything right.

If Delia made a recipe for the roadster, this would be it.

I agree with you.

This is brilliant. I mean, it's been around now since,

well, the Druids were using these, weren't they?

Ramses III had one.

Yeah, his was, I think it was Laguna blue, his was.

Laguna blue. Well remembered, actually. Thing is, though,

of these little sports cars, the one I'd have is the MG TF.

I'm sorry, you what?

I know it's... You sit on it rather than in it, and it's got roly-poly handling,

and you have to have either a beard or breasts,

- but I've always had a soft spot for it. - It's rubbish!

You know sometimes when a thought pops into your head,

you should kind of leave it there and not put it out in the world.

Did I just say that all out loud, then?

Oh, yes, mate. Sorry, yeah. You did.

Got another thought's just popped into my head about how like the cat in Shrek 2

you look like.

I said that out loud as well, didn't I? No. Sorry.

Sorry.

It's okay, we can edit all that out and we'll go and do The News!

But, before The News, a quick reminder about the 2004 Top Gear survey.

The biggest of its kind, in the world, but only if you take part.

Now, 45,000 of you have so far, we'd like another 20 or 30,000 please:

Tell us how good your car is, tell us how bad it is. We'll share results in Autumn.

- Absolutely. - Yeah, do please help us out with that.

Of course, the big news of the week, is the "transport thing",

from our beloved Transport Minister, Alistair Darling.

Now, you may remember back in 1997, when Labour came to power, John Prescott,

then-Transport Minister, announced his 10 year transport plan, and said that if

in 5 years there weren't fewer journeys being made by car,

we could judge him a failure. Well, we've given him 7 years,

and the number of cars on the roads have gone up by 3 million. So that makes him...

- Well, a failure. A big one. - A failure.

- Big fat failure. - Huge.

The government obviously agrees because they've thrown his 10 year plan in the bin,

and come up with another one. We've got it here, it's a huge tome, and in essence,

it says that instead of a £165 flat rate, you'd be charged by the mile.

Now, some commentators are saying that could be as much as £1.30 a mile.

- That could add up. - Peak time on the M25.

So, in 150 miles or thereabouts, it'll cost you as much as a year's road tax does now.

- It's gonna hurt. - It's gonna hurt.

Essentially, what they're saying is that they want to reduce congestion.

Because congestion is crippling the national economy.

Now that's actually honourable. I agree with that.

- It's very good. - Very honourable, but not

entirely believable, if I might be so bold. I've got the foreword here, by the PM,

okay, he's written a 1-and-a-half page foreword. He mentions congestion,

once, and the economy, once, and safety, once. And then he goes

"environmentally sustainable, realistic environmentally, environmentally,

least-polluting, greener, environment, carbon emissions, climate change,

cleaner and green!" It's all to do with the environment, that's all it is!

Which makes it more interesting to read a recent report by not politicians,

scientists. Not only that, but German and Swiss scientists, and they're the best

kind you can get. And they reckon that global warming might have something to do

with the fact that the Sun is burning more brightly than it has in over 1,000 years.

Now I'm just thinking, turn the Sun up, it could get a bit warmer.

I've noticed, with a cooker, if you turn it up, the room gets hotter flames.

The Sun's quite a lot bigger.

David Bellamy, who is an environmentalist, and a naturalist, has said recently

global warming, the modern nightmare version, is a myth, I'm sure of it, and so

are a growing number of scientists. But politicians and policy-makers are not.

This document, basically, once again attacks the car.

And you just have to ask "why the car?" Why do they keep banging on about it?

And you get a perfect example: Page 36 in here is a good giggle.

- Oh, I can't wait. - What they say in here, is that

the government has told Suffolk County Council that it can't build a ring road

round Sudbury, even though this would divert traffic from the town,

free up traffic jams, save lives, because of the environmental impact.

So it might hurt a butterfly if they build a bypass.

What's even better is if you read on, they tell the Council to find an alternative.

- To a bypass. Why do that? - Through it, round it, or a big flyover.

Maybe you could harness a black hole and end up either in Sudbury, or in space.

You could call it "The Sudbury Warp Gate."

And then you're on the other side.

I tell you what, if you do that, I'll open it for you.

I'll do that.

Won't step through it though, will you? 'Cause you'll end up on the other side

of Sudbury with your scissors and no crowd, and no cheque.

- That is mindblowing. - There's an interesting bit here

under the uh, Urban Coaches, whatever they are, which talks about the

"successful introduction" of a dedicated bus lane on the M4.

We've got footage of this "successful" bus lane, here it is:

Ooh my God, there is one! There's one coming along,

It's okay, there's no-one on it apart from the driver, so there we are.

The silly thing is this document recognises the car is the most comfortable,

most convenient, and fastest way of moving around, okay?

It recognises that throughout. But it keeps coming back to this notion that it wants us

to get on a bicycle, bus, train, horse, or anything other than a car.

- Now, how are they gonna do that? - Put supermarkets further out.

Knock our supermarkets so far out, yes, well that's a good point, but would you

even if it was 2 miles away, would you go on a horse or would you take the car?

- I haven't got a car. - You haven't got a car?

- You are aware this is Top Gear? - What!?

It's kind of a motoring show.

What about you? What would cause you to take a horse rather than a car?

- Money? - Lots of it.

You've hit the nail on the head! Lots of it!

The only way they can make us do it is not by charging just a little bit more,

they're gonna have to charge an absolute fortune! You can smell it coming!

You can smell the size of the bills that are coming through your letterbox.

Go out and take the car, that'll cost 2 - £300 million, or take the horse for free.

And I get subsidised.

- Good what? Good for your thighs? - Oh well, there's some compensation!

That does it all! Don't tell Darling that; He'll put it in the next document.

"You'll all have better thighs if you ride to work!"

- Have you got a horse? Out of interest? - No, they're not horseriders.

She's got a tattoo; She's a lapdancer.

Something I don't understand about this. There's some sort of paradox here,

because they keep saying "we'll charge you for the road tolls, and the money raised

will help improve public transport, yeah?" But if we don't keep driving,

they won't get any money. So you can only have a good bus if we keep driving cars.

- It doesn't make sense. - I'm more worried about schools,

because they say that by 2010 every school must have a travel plan.

- A what? - A travel plan.

Well I never had one! You'd just get there before assembly!

But this is where they really do reveal how clueless somebody must be, somewhere,

because, they get bewildered and say it's congested at certain times to discourage

them from using the road. Why do you think we're on the road at school drop-off time?

- Because that's what it is! - I'm not gonna drop my kids off at 2AM,

"There you go!"

- Saved a couple of quid! - Saved a couple of quid,

- and the Tasmanian Butterfly is now alive! - School time is at school time!

It's just unbelievable. So, there we are. Ooh, and before we move

off it, actually, I'll tell you what, because if we go through it

there's endless references to "future cars" running on pumpkin seeds, all that stuff...

And they've obviously listened to all the carmakers and put it all in the document,

saying things are gonna be fine... Pfft! I'm sorry, it's rubbish!

I mean Ford has seen Darling and told them they're working on this:

That's just a normal Transit van with some "bio-stickers" on the side!

You just know Ford has come out of the meeting, "Right, that's that dealt with...

now, let's get back to getting another 100bhp out of the GT40!"

Essentially, they've gone to the headmaster with their homework.

So VW comes in, goes out, tells Mercedes "Just remember: Bio-fuel, not V12!"

Bio-fuel, not V12!

We've got a picture of Alistair Darling here, here he is look:

Now the thing is...

Thanks for that. To say that the BBC is an impartial organisation...

But the thing is, the motor industry has, without a doubt,

pulled the wool over his eyes, big time.

Actually, if you look closely enough, you can see he's pulling wool over his own eyes.

- Look at that! - With his clip-on eyebrows!

I think that's enough transport policy, don't you? How's some light daredevilry?

This is Bentwaters, a big airfield in Suffolk.

This is Tim, who's a parachutist, and this is Ben, his racing driver mate.

Today, Tim is going to parachute out of a plane and attempt to land in Ben's car

while Ben is driving at 50 miles an hour.

While the Cessna Turbo 206 is being prepared, I'll explain what's going to happen.

Tim will bail out, and he will descend in a series of very elegant spirals,

down to about 700 or 800 feet.

Then, Tim will go into a high-speed swoop, travelling at 70 miles per hour,

and dropping at 160 feet per second.

Timing is crucial, because there will only be a few seconds

for driver and skydiver to meet up.

And there's something else that's been worrying me. Their practise attempts.

Last week, Tim was practising bailing out of the aeroplane and landing

on the runway, and Ben was practising driving along the runway at about

50 miles an hour, but the thing is, they were on completely separate airfields.

Today, Tim is accompanied by aerial cameraman, Andy.

He'll be giving you a skydiver's view of proceedings.

At 4,000 feet, our heroes step out of the Cessna,

and hopefully, into the history books.

To Tim, Ben is just a speck on the ground.

And to Ben, Tim is just a speck in the sky.

Tim hits 800 feet, and begins his high-speed swoop.

Ben starts accelerating hard, he has to match the parachute's speed

at the end of the swoop.

Get back, get back, get back, get back!

Bad luck.

Well, getting much closer than yesterday.

Well, do it again.

Yeah, go, go!

Go, go, go, go, go!

Cheating.

Hey, hey, hey!

So close!

I'll open the boot next time.

No one imagined this would be easy, but we were beginning to wonder

if it was actually possible.

Can you do it?

Of course I can do it. Wouldn't be here if we couldn't do it.

Yeah, good. That's the spirit.

Now, I don't want to make this sound like a Hollywood film script, but it was

the end of the day, the light was fading, the wind was picking up.

We probably had two more chances.

Go, go, go!

Oh, this looks good.

Yes, yes!

Yay!

Well done! That was fantastic!

All right!

Good effort, nice one. Well done, Tim. Well done, mate.

That's a world first!

That was unbelievable! Really!

I'm stunned, now, I've just got to say, well done!

Ladies and gentlemen, Ben and Tim!

The thing is, though, unfortunately,

unfortunately, my guest tonight could probably have done that blindfolded,

and without a parachute.

Because over the years, he's been thrown out of the SAS for misuse of explosives

in a public place, he's walked across the Antarctic, he's walked to the North Pole,

he's run seven marathons in seven days on seven different continents,

and once he went to his garden shed and cut his fingers off.

For fun.

He describes himself as a travel writer. Ladies and gentlemen,

Sir Ranulph Fiennes.

How are you?

Have a seat.

So.

So, lobbed out of the SAS. Perhaps you'd like to tell us what happened?

Well, it's a very long time ago, it was about 1966, and a friend of mine discovered that.

Britain's most beautiful village, Castle Combe, had just been voted as such,

was being desecrated by 20th Century Fox making a film which required building a

20 foot high concrete dam, ruining this lovely village, and my friend decided to bring

this outrage to the general attention by blowing it up.

So I laid all the charges, and it was quite successful.

We got caught. I was the only one who didn't get physically caught, because I'd been doing

another Army course on how to escape from dogs by night.

I was thrown out of the SAS back to my own regiment in Germany.

So, how did you manage to get these explosives out of wherever they're kept

in Hereford?

Oh, I signed for them.

Saying you were going to go blow up Wiltshire?

What you've got to do, is you learn to blow up as much as you can

using as little as possible. And I was pretty good at this, so I had a lot leftover

at the end of every day.

Your, um, your car history has been, shall we say, chequered.

Because I understand you actually lost your first car.

Yes, I had a very good deal in Germany, with the Army, and I got a Peugeot 203,

very smart car,

and we had a party to say goodbye to one of our squadron leaders in Hamburg,

and me and another lowly second lieutenant went up there, had a very good party,

left, and went back into the streets of Hamburg, and couldn't remember the street

in which we'd parked the car. Um, and we never found it.

Never?

- Never found it. - Never found it.

Then there was a minivan, this was when you were running the Army ski team.

Several cars later, there was a minivan in Germany.

Every year we went to ski and we did quite well at the divisional level.

Then the entire division moved 300 miles through Germany to go to the Army level.

And I was overtaking the major generals and everyone else,

'cause the mini was very good on ice, and then I got to this big hairpin bend.

I was alone, but all the regimental skis were in the back of the minivan,

and going around the bend, I saw this big German lorry coming up,

and I knew that centrifugally I would not be able to do anything but go into it.

So, I jumped into the back of the minivan on the skis,

and it went like that and I ended up looking and seeing the steering wheel

was over where I would have been. So I would recommend that rather than seat belts.

If you're in danger, leap in the back.

Exactly.

Now, anyway, after the Army, you embarked on what can only be described as

the most extraordinary series of adventures, possibly ever.

I mean, The Guinness Book Of Recordslist you as the greatest living explorer.

Well, they did do back in '84. I've gone downhill since then.

I hardly think so. First hovercraft descent of the longest river in the world,

first surface journey around the world's polar axis, first human to reach both poles,

first crossing of the Antarctica, and the Arctic Ocean,

furthest north unsupported record,

first unsupported crossing of the Antarctic continent,

longest unsupported polar journey in history,

and the first person...

Well, we'll go on to that later on.

I mean, it's a never-ending stream of strolling around in very, very cold places.

And what I don't think people understand is "unsupported". That's a very critical word.

Isn't it, in these things?

Yeah, that makes all the difference. It's like, sort of, someone said.

Schumacher doing the Formula 1 with no safety belt and no helmet.

And, if something goes wrong, he's in shtook.

But, if it goes all right, then you're all right, and that's the principle on

which you do it.

So, you've tried to go... It's something like 500 yards a day,

is what you will achieve in these unsupported...

Yes. You can only carry so much food, so much calories, so you need to know in advance

how long it's going to take you to do the 500 miles.

So, if it's going to take 500 yards to begin with, because of the big ice

and all the rest of it and the cold,

then you've got to speed up later on.

So mathematically, it's either going to be possible or it's not.

And if anything goes wrong,

or you fall in once, to the sea, or in the south, to a crevasse,

then you won't succeed.

I'm just baffled by this notion. And we're talking temperatures of...

The lowest we ever went to at 6,000 feet above sea level in Antarctica

was a wind chill factor of minus 122 degrees centigrade.

And of course, you have had, on your own, I think in the Arctic, wasn't it?

And not that long ago, you had the moment when your sledge fell into the...

Into an unfrozen piece of Arctic Ocean.

Yes.

And then you got frostbite pulling it out and a doctor said,

"We're going to have to amputate your..."

The doctor said, "You mustn't amputate for five months after the frostbite."

Oh, I see.

To allow the semi-dead stuff which is going to form the new flaps

to resuscitate itself over five months.

But you didn't wait five months, did you?

Well, I didn't wait because for four months of it it was very painful.

'Cause you've got these big red talons sticking out, which are dead.

And if you touch anything,

and it's difficult not to from day to day or when you're sleeping,

it is agonising. So, I thought, "Well, get rid of them."

And I tried with a hacksaw and it didn't do it,

so I got a Black & Decker, and from the village I bought a micro blade,

and I hacked them off just above where the blood and the soreness was.

At home?

In the tool shed, yes. At home.

And the physiotherapist said I'd done a very good job.

But the surgeon, who was Italian, was not happy with it.

He thought you should've perhaps gone to hospital to amputate?

He said it was making his job, doing the final surgery, difficult.

You've had your toes fall off as well, have you not?

I had them, Mike Stroud, who I do these things with, is a doctor,

and he managed to get me to the head of the NHS queue

when we got back, at the Burns Unit,

so I had the stuff taken off the thigh and put on the missing bits of toe.

And it lasted about three years. And then, one day,

I had a very hot bath and the whole toe bit came off.

I forgot... I forgot about it and I left it on the bath.

I went off and, erm...

Anyway, the wife, she was... She got a shock.

'Cause I'm interested, 'cause eventually, of course, this remarkable life you've had,

did...

Well you had a heart attack, let's put it like that,

which was followed by a heart bypass operation and then five weeks later

you started training to run what became seven marathons on seven continents

in seven days, which you did five months afterwards.

- Um, we did. It was four months after the bypass. - Four months.

I couldn't have even done the long-haul flight.

I get up and I'm just so tired I just want to go to bed.

In retrospect, I wouldn't have done it. I would not do it again.

It was Mike Stroud's idea, and it was...

Surely, the doctors must have said,

"Look, it's probably not a good idea to do this."

The Italian surgeon said, "I have done 3,500 other bypasses,"

and he said, "But I can't advise you,

"because none of the 3,500 ever asked if I could do a marathon."

So, he sent me off to a cardiologist,

who was an expert and a bit of a runner,

and he said, "Look, there's nothing competitional about

"doing seven marathons in seven days

"as long as you don't let your heart get above 130 beats a minute.

"If you don't do that, you've got no problem whatsoever."

And so? Did it?

I forgot the machine so I don't really know.

It's just a neverending...

It's hardly surprising when you listen to this

to find that you were considered back in late '60s, early '70s,

for the role of James Bond after Sean Connery.

But they had bad taste, so they chose Roger Moore.

I got into the last six.

You really were...

I actually saw Cubby Broccoli, he had a big cigar,

it was just exactly like it should have been

and he took one look at me and he said, "Your hands are too big

"and you've got a face like a farmer."

He didn't mince his words at all.

Now, it was terribly sad, last year your wife died.

You'd been together since you were...

She was nine, I was 12.

We knew each other for about 48 years.

Do you think that your drive to keep going even now with the marathons and so on

and future exhibitions, expeditions

has anything to do with the fact that you just want to keep yourself busy?

I don't want to think any more.

Don't have time to think, so the more I can do, it's good.

Yeah. Keep busy.

Well, hopefully we can do that today

'cause, of course today is, frankly, your greatest challenge.

Really, uh.

Can you beat Simon Cowell?

I mean, I know you've beaten the elements, you've beaten polar bears

but this is the big one, really, today.

I will go and commit hari-kari if I don't get where I think I am,

which is hopefully above Tara Palmer-Tomkinson!

If I am below her, which I very much fear,

I shall be really disappointed.

Who'd like to see this lap?

I have a sneaking suspicion that

you'd turn to this just so easily. Let's have a look, here we go.

Well, that's quite a smooth start.

And that is the perfect line through the first corner.

I thought you said it shouldn't squeal.

No, it's that it's the perfect line, most people go far too wide through there.

Far too aggressive. What're these horse noises you're making?

And that again is extremely tidy through there.

The Stig presumably teaches you?

Ah, he's brilliant. That Stig is excellent.

Very patient. If you're thick, he doesn't mind.

I don't think he would've thought you were thick!

This is really nice.

Oh, you'll like this corner. This is the fast one, the really, really fast one.

Oh, that's nice. Yeah, that's a good corner.

Presumably, you didn't lift off there?

No.

No, of course not. I believed you wouldn't. Most people do.

Stig had said lifting off can, in fact, slow you down.

Well, it will cause you to spin. How are we going... This is the really...

That's fantastic through there.

Oh, yes, just clipped the edge exactly as you should. And, well...

And, yes, sort of across the line, and on the grass, and there we are!

And

it's a one.

If you can fudge it to put me above Tara, you'll be a friend for life!

There's no fudging necessary. You beat her fair and square, and by a big margin.

Thank the Lord.

You did it in one minute 51 seconds dead. Which is right up there!

- How old are you now? - I'm over 50.

Yeah. Way over. I'm just looking, I'm thinking,

is there anyone older than you, apart from.

Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the Starship Enterprise.

I'm probably older than him. Yeah.

Exactly. Well, I think in that case you are probably

the fastest kind of older person we've had coming around.

I always like to look for some sort of little glimmer there. Which is nice.

Um, and that is the end of that. I'm absolutely stunned, as ever.

Ladies and gentlemen, Ranulph Fiennes.

Ranulph Fiennes, everybody!

Wow! That was... That was amazing!

How do you follow that?

Anyway, earlier on, I drove a collection of simple, soft top, sports cars.

Now, though, we're gonna have a look at some more elaborate cabriolets.

Last time we did this, James and I went to Buttermere, in the Lake District.

Because, supposedly, it's the wettest place in Britain.

This time, though, we went to Scotland.

And we don't mean some pleasant countryside minutes from Edinburgh.

No, this is the Isles of Lewis and Harris.

Right at the tip of the country. Next stop, Iceland.

Up here, the locals think that The Wicker Man is a documentary.

Year on year, the must-have accessory is a big jumper.

And all the telegraph poles are missing.

It's a mystical place, with ruins that are older than Stonehenge.

But none of this is why we're here.

No, we're here because these islands have the lowest number of convertibles per head

in the whole country. They just don't like them.

No, they don't seem to.

No, in fact, there are only 19 on the whole of the Isle of Harris.

So, this year's crop will have to work hard to change things around here.

Maybe the locals can tell us which one's best.

If you want to pick up a woman, this is the car just for you.

If you want speed, and you want road, you buy this Merc

'cause it's wicked.

No, okay, we'll have to do it ourselves.

And we'll start with the new, eagerly awaited mini-cabrio.

This is the Cooper version. It costs £14,600, £2,000 more than the hard top,

and it's truly retro in not having one of those newfangled folding metal roofs.

It's fabric.

But it is quite clever, because you can press a button up here

and simply open the front half, like a big sunroof. A bit like you could

on the Citroen 2CV. Then, if you want the full monty,

you simply stop at the side of the road and down it goes.

And it all ends up piled up on the back like a folded picnic blanket.

Now, a cloth roof ought to make the Mini lighter, but it doesn't,

because they've had to add strengthening beams to keep the car stiff.

And they've added an extra 220 pounds to the weight of the car.

That's like having a fat mate on board all the time.

So it's not quite as frisky as a normal Mini.

I've never been mad about the hard top Mini, it's too nostalgic,

and the interior is too chintzy.

And with no roof, I like it even less.

Now, I'm well aware that

nobody will take a blind bit of notice of what I'm saying.

This car will walk out of the showrooms. But at least Hammond agrees with me.

What gets me is, only sheep can see us, and I'm still embarrassed.

- You're still embarrassed. - Yeah.

As luck would have it, on our Mini journey, we encounter a shepherd.

And his sheep.

I don't want this to be misinterpreted, but these are actually

- quite nice-looking sheep, compared to other sheep. - Yes, they are.

So, would this soft-top hating local be as smitten with the Mini

as James was with his livestock?

Well, actually, no. He complained that there was no room in the boot

for winter rams.

No, it's not a practical kind of machine, but, I mean, I dunno,

you and another shearer, maybe on a nice day, you could drive around in that.

No, thank you. I think it's a ladies' car.

So what about this car, with its folding metal roof?

It's the new Vauxhall Tigra. It comes with a 1.4 or a 1.8 engine,

and it costs from £13,000 to 15,000,

which makes it one of the cheapest small soft tops around.

But, sadly, the interior is based on a Corsa, which is never a good start in life.

Hideous silver-painted plastic everywhere. Crinkly finished and mismatched

from one corner to another. More than anything else, what's annoying me,

and frankly, depressing me right now is that I was so ready to give this car

such a kicking.

And I can't, 'cause I like it.

It's got a better roof than the Mini, it's cheaper than the Mini.

And it looks, somehow, funkier than the Mini.

And there's another thing.

I'm pleased they haven't messed about trying to squeeze an extra two seats in the back

as well, because it's such a waste of time when they do that.

You can't get anybody in them. What's the point? Chuck 'em out,

make it a two-seater.

Now, the Tigra's chassis is based on the current Corsa, which is normally a pretty

desperate old thing. But they've tweaked and fettled it, and you know what?

It's a good thing to drive. It's gripping and driveable, I mean, it feels quite sporty.

In fact, the only disappointment in this car is that pound shop interior.

Which is bad in a car that everyone can see into.

It's a bit like showing your pants, isn't it?

Yeah, it's like that craze, isn't it, at the moment for when girls go 'round

with their pants hanging out over the top of their jeans.

And, when they're doing that, they don't put grey pants on, do they?

No, they wear nice ones.

Yeah, with little flowers 'round the top, or things like that.

And now, the car every footballer's wife's hairdresser's masseuse

has been waiting for, the new Mercedes SLK.

And they're in for a shock, because it's gone butch.

It's got a front end like a McLaren SLR.

It's got a whole new muscular body which, actually, I don't like.

But I do like what they've done with the rest of it.

Now, the old SLK was considered a bit of a damp flannel.

It was very pretty, but it wasn't actually that good to drive.

This one, however, is.

It now comes with a new 3.5-litre V6 and a clever gearbox.

It'll downshift like a racing car.

Give it a bit of a boot, all right, it says, two or three gears down, and we're off!

Yes!

But it's not all sport, sport, sport. You get comfort too.

Here's an interesting touch. If you're driving along on a late summer's evening,

and you find the back of your neck getting a bit chilly in the turbulence,

you simply press this button here, and you turn on the "air scarf".

Air scarf is a little blower in the head rest here, coming out of these three slots,

that directs a stream of hot air at the back of your neck.

Quite a nice idea, I suppose.

Now, all this doesn't come cheap. The SLK 350 is £37,000.

Oh, dear. At that price, it's not likely to up the island's cabriolet count.

And, on the face of it, this one hasn't got much chance either.

The £41,000 Audi S4.

With a titanic 344-horsepower V8.

Now, we've driven the hard top version of this on the programme,

and we loved it.

And taking the roof off only makes it better.

This is now the car for every single occasion. It's a four-seater,

and I do mean a four-seater, it's got a big boot, it's luxurious,

it's discretely styled, and it goes...

It goes. I mean, it really goes.

4.2-litre V8, 0-60 in 5.9 seconds.

Top speed, 155 miles an hour.

And the noise! That's worth having the top down for.

In fact, this just breaks all my rules about convertibles.

I like this plenty.

You used to say, if I remember rightly, Richard Hammond,

that you didn't need a big engine in a cabrio,

because the pleasure was all about having a cabrio, but now you do.

Yup.

It's not just the power, though. Or the noise. Or the speed.

It's a long time since I've been in anything with just so much class.

So, let me just see if I've got that straight.

Um, Audi and Vauxhall you think are good?

- Yep. - Mini you're less happy with.

Don't like that. Hammond doesn't like that.

What about the SLK though?

Now, this is interesting, this is a fantastic drive.

The new engine, brilliant. I'm not keen on the front end.

I have to admit. I think... Well, look at it. It looks like the sort of...

It looks like the fevered imaginings

of a pubescent schoolboy drawn in a maths book.

That is... It's vulgar.

But I like vulgar.

Well, there you go.

I like this car, I have to say, and the one I'd have to swish through

my electric gates with is the 55. They're not putting the super-charged engine in

but the SLK55. Big V8. Brilliant.

I think it'll probably explode in a shower of cogs and springs.

It's funny you should say that, because I drove this one round the track this morning,

bit irresponsible, 'cause the Stig was in the Audi, and I was chasing him,

and I shouldn't have been, three laps and it's expired in a cloud of smoke.

It's funny you should say that, because what I didn't tell you in that report

is that while we were going around on the island, driving very gently,

the gearbox went wrong, got stuck in one mode, and then Hammond tried

to move his seat, he just wanted to go forwards, okay? He pressed the little button.

- He would want to go forwards. - He would, well, obviously, yeah.

As he went forward, seat moved forward, the seat moved back, then the seat moved up,

the roof tried to come up, some lights came on, and, you know...

So let's just say, okay, we agree it's fabulous to drive.

Yes.

We don't agree on the styling.

No.

Uh, and we think it's built like a Mercedes.

Yes.

- Not very well. - It'll break.

Okay, that's that cleared up, now, who'd like to do the cool wall?

Absolutely! Now.

We haven't been here for quite a while, so, first thing,

little bit of housekeeping to be done, okay? And straight away, up here,

the Mini. Now, it's been up there at sub-zero for ages.

To be honest, time and too many estate agents

have kind of eroded the coolness.

And I think it might... It's not even cool any more, it's down here.

There, all agreed. We all agree. The Mini is now uncool. Absolutely.

Absolutely, so, the Mini cabriolet... You see, the thing is,

if you've got a Mini, right now you need to keep a low profile,

you're driving round in dire straits.

This, I'm sorry, is even less cool.

No, you... Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Well, now, that's perfectly correct! I'm...

This is a serious, not seriously cool, but this is a cool car.

You are joking!

The people speak!

The people are speaking, okay.

It's cute, it's quirky, and it's a good girls' car, too.

Thanks a lot, that'll do.

No, listen! You can find anybody else...

We have a new rule on the cool wall.

Yes?

James May, who eats pastry, drinks brown beer, and thinks a curry is exotic,

thinks this is uncool.

He's always wrong on matters of such things, there, it's cool, and that's it,

thank you, and you can boo!

Jeremy Clarkson, that is going to come back and haunt you.

It's a cool car! It's a convertible Mini! You can't get cooler!

You're wrong, people are going to laugh at you for centuries.

Here is the Fiat Barchetta, now, this...

It's gonna fall apart. Every time you drive it, you're gonna be stopping

to get out and pick up bits that have dropped off. But that's why it's cool!

It's got a kind of shabby charm.

Work with me on this. It has. There's a lot of blank looks. It has!

It's a brave choice. It's a cool car.

Who said, "It's still a Fiat"?

What's wrong with a Fiat?

They're not good. They're French!

Where the hell did we get this audience from?

Gardening programme, mate. That's what it is.

Do you know what Fiat stands for? The I in it?

Italia.

Do you know what I'm gonna suggest, we've got a few more to get through here, mate.

I'd keep my mouth shut if I were you. Oh, dear.

Maserati Quattroporte. What do we all think? Let's ask you.

- Uncool. I don't like the front of it. - Uncool. Uncool, you think?

- Definitely cool. - Cool.

- It's a British car! - Cool.

Anyone else got a theory? You got a theory on this?

- Cool. - Cool.

- Cool. - Cool.

- Why did I ask him? - I've no idea!

I've no idea.

You're not a cool man!

You're just, you know... You're worse than me.

It is cool. I mean, basically, the thing is, if you drive a big Merc,

basically, you look like a taxi driver. Yeah?

If you drive a BMW, you look like a drug dealer.

If you drive a Jag, it looks like you might play golf from time to time.

Drive that, freeze nitrogen. That is verging on super cool, that thing.

And I don't even like the look of it,

or the gearbox, or the ride, but there we are.

- Do you want to do the Tour? - Oh, yeah, we gotta do the Tour. Hatchbacks, yeah.

You know, we talked about them the other day.

Now, hatchbacks, if they're small and European,

we kind of quite like them. Can't find any now. A little Fiat, there.

Little French car. Little Renault.

Made in Milan, that one! These, we think, are quite cool.

Ford C-max.

- Over there? - I think it is.

Crikey! Is it that bad?

- I think it's another one. - Toyota Corolla Verso.

- Yes! - That is uncool!

Which brings us on to the Ford GT.

Very nice.

Don't anybody pander to him just 'cause he's getting one!

I'll come over here. What do you think?

Is that the one you've got?

I haven't got it, I'm getting one, yeah. What do you think?

- Cool. - Cool.

It's cool.

- Cool, cool, cool. - In the fridge.

- Uncool? - Uncool, 'cause you've got one.

You're exactly right! That is it!

No car I've got can possibly be cool.

No.

And it's not just me, actually. Ford had a party the other day for

the 28 people who are gonna get one of these. It was like being at the.

Dennis Waterman appreciation society.

Martin Brundle's getting one! Have you seen his trousers?

Yeah.

So, I'm afraid it's right down, almost verging on...

It's there.

It's a shame, but it's true. That is true.

It's true.

I want it to arrive and start ruining your life soon.

Now, we gotta talk about the British.

Over the years, we've taken on the Germans twice and beaten them.

We've beaten the Spanish, the French, the Zulus,

I mean, pretty well everyone. We are unstoppable.

Unless we encounter a bit of snow. Then we're stumped.

In the olden days, we used to have proper winters.

Even tall people were buried, and whole towns disappeared.

But we battled the elements

with our black-and-white lorries and our steely resolve.

Now, though, we're told to stay at home every time the wind gets a bit brisk.

Good evening, and welcome to North West Tonight.

Winter hit the region with a vengeance today, some people seem

to be panicking a bit.

There are reports of shoppers clearing shelves of flasks, duvets and gloves.

British Gas is warning there could be thousands of emergency calls

in the coming days.

Honestly, the way they were going on back in January,

you would have thought it was time to build an ark.

Batten down the hatches, and wrap up warm, because Arctic weather's on the way.

If doing it is not necessary, then people shouldn't travel.

Make sure you've got some warm clothes with you.

And what did we get after all their warnings?

This. Not exactly Alaska, is it?

Still, it provided us with an ideal opportunity

to test a new estate version of Jaguar's X-type.

So, why is an estate car so important in the snow?

Well, in the olden days, they used to let you go out there

with nothing more than a jumper and a shovel.

But these days, the health and safety people say you need rather more than that

if you're gonna deal with these treacherous conditions.

They say that you should take a tow rope, obviously,

a rag to tie to your aerial, in case you get covered by a drift,

a torch, some warm clothing, carpet to put under the tyres if you get stuck,

mobile phone charger, first aid kit, obviously, plenty of water.

Good, um. That's what they say. But I think you can

probably go further without being stupid.

Andy McNab, for instance, he'd be a good idea.

Doesn't have to be Andy McNab himself, anyone

from the SAS will do,

anyone with a knowledge of how to build a rudimentary shelter.

And drink their own wee.

Ray Mears, he'd do. Thermos. Stove for cooking. Some kindling.

Food. I've got a lot. Soup, curry, chocolate.

I think some skis would be a good plan.

Spare fuel. Sorry, mate. Put a shovel on you.

And the hip flask.

So, with a pile that size,

it's a good job that the X-type estate has a bigger boot

than the BMW 3 series estate, the Audi A4 estate, and the Mercedes C class estate.

Underneath, the X-type is actually a Ford Mondeo.

But don't let that put you off.

Genetically, you are 98% identical to a halibut.

But it's the 2% that makes the difference.

And it's the same story in here. You've got all this wood and leather and equipment.

It feels very Jaguarish.

Prices start at a very un-Jaguarish £21,000.

But for that, you'd get a small engine

or a diesel, and front-wheel drive.

This version, however, costs £26,000, and that's 'cause it has a 2.5L V6

and, more importantly, four-wheel drive.

Now, we know that when the weather's like this, four-wheel drive works well

on big off-roaders with their chunky tyres.

And we know that ordinary cars don't work at all.

So, where does the Jag fit in?

The thing is, this is an ordinary car, with ordinary road tyres.

It just happens to have four-wheel drive.

So, how does this one cope?

Well, the simple answer is "very well".

It didn't get stuck once. All day.

It laughed in the face of the weatherman,

and the police, and the AA with their advice to stay at home.

And I'm not surprised by this.

Once, many, many, many years ago,

I actually drove an X-type saloon down a ski slope.

And coming up now is some footage of it.

The Jag may have a very rudimentary four-wheel drive system.

There are no torque-sensing diffs and no active yaw control.

It doesn't even have particularly high ground clearance. It's just a car.

But even so, I made it down the mountain.

We know it works on snow and ice, but better still, it keeps on working

on roads like this, roads that have been gritted.

If I were to drive down here in a BMW 3 series estate with rear-wheel drive,

I'd need a nappy. But in this, I feel relaxed.

There are none of those heart-stopping moments where the wheels hit the slush.

You know, when it all suddenly goes twitchy. It doesn't. Just tracks straight and true.

Honestly, I could be driving along this road at nearly 60 miles an hour,

doing a little light embroidery to pass the time.

In the advertisements for this car, Jaguar suggests it would be an ideal tool

for your family skiing holiday.

But if you have one of these, you don't need to go to the Alps.

Eat your heart out, Val d'Isere, and welcome to Val de Chipping Norton.

This is the best ski-lift I've ever been on.

Morning! You well?

You well? I'm having a good day.

And this is the great thing, you see, is I can adjust the speed of my lift by

shouting at the driver.

Faster!

Yes. Oh, yes.

Oh yes!

Okay, that'll do, thank you. Nice speed.

Okay, and stop.

arriveat the top.

Now. Ski back down again.

No poles, but hey!

I need a bit more gravity.

Very topical, Jeremy, snow in summer. Thanks for that, yeah.

But what's the car like when it's not a winter wonderland?

Uh, it's very good, actually. I mean, you can have that 2.5 litre V6 with four-wheel drive

for 'round about £23,000. And I think that kind of makes it the best car in the class.

It's good value.

And are we gonna thump it round the track now?

No, we're not, because the other week, we had the Mercedes CL65 here,

the world's most powerful production car,

and we have had literally some emails from viewers saying,

"You never gave it to the Stig! We never saw how fast it would go around the track!"

So this being the new, fresh, shiny, caring, sharing BBC, we got it back,

and we're gonna find out.

Okay, 738 ft-lbs of torque, will it make the world move backwards?

No, it's managed to move forwards and the world's okay.

That's marvellous. Now, of course, he's got all the power in the world

but how is it gonna be in the corners where it's just a Mercedes.

The Stig's really having to fight that one.

Here he goes into Chicago, lot of understeer on the way in,

and I bet he has some, yes, there it is, there's the oversteer on the way out.

Is he still there?

Here he goes, it explodes, it's just an atomic power station going down

into the Hammerhead.

Once again, it becomes a Mercedes, a big, soft, squidgy executive car.

He's really wrestling it there!

This is where it's really gonna pick up speed, though. Through the follow-through.

It's flat out all the way down,

now we know that in a straight line,

this is much quicker than the Bentley Continental,

much quicker than the Aston Martin DB9, so he's got all the power in the world

there, he's hard on the brakes in that...

That's a beautiful piece of car control from the Stig.

Round the last corner, just about holding it together.

And across the line!

Well, what do you reckon?

Uh, no idea. It looked pretty quick.

It should be quick.

It should be quick. The Stig said he was stunned at how fast it was.

He was also stunned at how bad it was through the corners.

- Really? - He really did not like this thing in the corners.

Well, come on, then!

He did it in one minute, 29 seconds!

It's right down there.

That's almost exactly average.

It is.

Yeah. Mind you, we should explain, if Alistair Darling is watching,

it was running on free range petrol.

If he's not, it was run on normal super unleaded.

Ah, next week, we're very eco-friendly.

Yep, six litre Corvette for me.

Absolutely, that'll be terrific. And so we'll see you then. Thank you very much.

- Good night! - Good night.

Subtitles modified from MTOD transcript Ripped by GLUE of QxR Edited/corrected for TGCC v2 by AlexGRFan97