Top 10 Top Gear Moments

Car reviews are Top Gear’s bread and butter. From reasonably priced motors, to supercars, and one-off machines, including this, the Ariel Atom, which is designed so that the chassis is essentially its exoskeleton. It can do 0-60 in 2.9 seconds, but the car isn’t what makes this moment so memorable. In fact, it’s hard to even think about the car when you’re watching Clarkson’s face melt away through sheer speed and the lack of a windscreen. We’re sure he’s enjoying it, but it’s difficult to tell.

Creating an amphibious car was a crazy challenge, even by Top Gear’s standards. The team had precious little success with the endeavour in series eight. So, two seasons later they tackled the task again, with almost identical cars except some slight changes. A true test of how much they’d learned from their first try. It soon became clear, they hadn’t learned anything. This time they were bound across the channel to France. Clarkson proved the best of a bad bunch, but not before a few disasters and a couple of restarts.

Top Gear is no stranger to controversy. The final episode with Clarkson, May and Hammond was full to bursting with it. But it’s the US Special which earns a place on our list. Challenged to paint offensive slogans on each other’s cars, the trio had to drive their freshly decorated rides across Alabama. Unsurprisingly, the locals weren’t happy, and it all went wrong at a petrol station. One incensed owner and a pickup truck full of angry folk, and the boys soon fled for the border.

Clarkson doesn’t do simple challenges. So, when he was tasked with redesigning the interior of an old Mercedes S Class, he was in his element. Refusing everything a qualified designer suggests and demanding what is essentially a cottage in a car, he has the team fill the floor with concrete before installing wooden boards, a stove, a novelty gear stick and a tiny arm chair, to turn his dream into reality. Which left time for just one more thing: a road test done by Hammond and May.

With £3,000 to spend, Clarkson, Hammond and May are sent to auction to buy a classic car. Hammond was surprisingly laid back, bidding on and buying the first car that came out. Clarkson was incredibly excited and quickly parted with his cash. But, in true Captain Slow style, May deliberated for too long and wound up with the last car of the day, which he didn’t like or want. Still, at least a trip to sunny Majorca should see them right… Or not.

After receiving a viewer complaint that Top Gear doesn’t do serious car reviews anymore, Clarkson took matters into his own hands to test a Ford Fiesta. With simple questions, simple answers and clear demonstrations of what the car could do, it was a very concise feature. He showed us that the Ford could evade bad guys in a shopping centre and even assist the Royal Marines for a beach assault. Emerging from both ‘everyday’ scenarios unscathed, who can argue with the final verdict?

When the hosts modify cars, it rarely ends well. As their best-laid plans prove impossible to execute. Here, they had to turn a standard motor into a stretch limo, then put it to the test by driving VIPs to the Brit Awards. Clarkson made the longest limo possible and ended the day with only half of it. Hammond created a convertible and actually made it to the show in one piece. And May, who made a two-sided limo, didn’t make it to the BRITs at all, taking an unplanned detour instead.

An instantly recognisable car, when Clarkson tried to embrace the Reliant Robin he wound up rolling it on every turn. But it’s Hammond and May who take third-place today, trying to turn the three-wheeler into a bonafide space shuttle. Given that their thinking was based entirely on the car’s pointiness, there were big question marks over how well they’d do. However, to everyone’s surprise, the shuttle had a strong take off, but a disastrous landing. Better luck next time, guys.

When Top Gear was given the chance to test drive the world’s smallest car – the Peel P50 – it seemed only right that 6 ft 5 Clarkson be the one to do it. Hilarious as this moment was, it’s Clarkson’s own attempt at creating the world’s smallest car that makes our list. True, he looked like a sporty Dalek, but Clarkson tested it everywhere; outdoors, indoors, on the motorway. There are seemingly no limits to this ludicrous little runaround, provided you have a mechanic on call.


Before we unveil our top pick, here are a few honorable mentions.

Polar Special

Hammerhead Eagle i-Thrust

The Old People’s Car

Top Gear is world famous for it’s OTT approach. And when Toyota claimed that their Hilux pickup trucks were virtually indestructible, the team sniffed a challenge. But, after some careless driving, drowning it in the sea, dropping a caravan on it, hitting it with a wrecking ball, setting it on fire and parking it on top of a building that was being demolished, the hilux still worked. Apparently, it really can’t be broken. So, it was immortalised in the Top Gear studio from that point forward. Well played that car.