Hello, everybody.
How are you
Thank you. Good to see you. Thank you for coming.
Cold out there!
That is cold.
Hello, everybody!
Hello!
Hello. Welcome to The Grand Tour. Happy Christmas.
This week, we are coming -
if you can see through the drizzle dribbling down the windows -
from Scandinavia.
Oh, yeah.
This, of course...
This, of course, is the home of those gloomy dramas
where a weird woman in a jumper solves a murder
by staring at a lake for six hours.
This will probably be the jolliest programme
to come out of this neck of the woods since...
... Four Funerals And A Funeral .
JEREMY: Yeah.
Swedish rom-com that was. Erm...
When Harry Shot Sally .
Oh, a laugh a minute.
The Girl With The Pearl Necklace. No.
-That's another sort of Scandinavian film.
Yeah.
Anyway, specifically,
we are deep inside the Arctic Circle in Finland.
There you go. And Finland, of course...
Finland, of course, is home to every single racing driver currently...
Well, apart from Nico Rosberg, who is Finnish,
but, for some reason, claims he's German.
Why does he do that? I have no idea.
Who else is there, then?
Well, there's Mika Salo,
Mika Häkkinen, Kimi Räikkönen.
Hang on, they're just anagrams of the same name, aren't they?
-Then you've got rallying.
There's Tommi Mäkinen, Timo Mäkinen,
Juha Kankkunen, Ari Vatanen.
More anagrams.
Kinky Wankinen.
Manky Pantiden.
Really?
I'm getting slightly carried away now.
Seriously, I went on Wikipedia last night
to look for famous Finns who aren't racing drivers.
Put up the list I found.
And I noticed something - they're all men.
-All of them.
Are there any famous Finnish women?
Nobody thinks so. They're all...
I know why, OK?
It's because all Finnish women, at the age of 19,
move to England to be au pairs.
I actually had three Finnish au pairs over the years for my children.
-Yeah. It was always funny.
You'd go to Heathrow airport to pick up your new au pair,
and there'd always be a row of 30-something fathers waiting at the gate
for their Scandinavian au pair to come out.
And there was one year I've never forgotten.
This huge moose lumbered out of the door,
and the man next to me looked at his piece of paper and went, "Oh, for God's sake!"
That's not good.
-Shall we get on with the show? -Yes, good idea.
Because tonight in our television programme about cars...
I eat some cheddar.
Richard says he doesn't want any.
I don't want cheese.
And James compares a Ford GT40 to a Ferrari P3.
Avanti!
But first, if you are watching this in America,
you may be amazed to hear
that the Ford Mustang has never been sold, officially, in the UK.
Well, until now, because Ford has now decided
that the latest Mustang will be sold in the UK
with a V8 engine and right-hand drive.
Mm, and this has made our other resident American very happy.
He was so excited, in fact,
that when the first right-hand-drive Mustang
arrived at the docks in the UK,
he was actually there to meet it.
It'll be here any minute.
That is it. Are we ready?
This is the moment. It's touched down!
Go, go, go!
* New World Symphony
Look, it's a bit gloomy, isn't it?
It's not very welcoming. Have you got anything more upbeat?
* When The Saints Go Marching In
Forget it! Forget it! Forget it!
-Forget it.
I'm so excited, my tinkle is fizzing.
Oh, yeah!
* National Anthem of USSR
Oh. Sorry about that.
We really are useless over here.
It's one of the reasons we needed your help in the war.
I decided that, first of all,
I'd show the new Mustang around,
so I headed for London...
which is the capital city.
Ah, now, this is Tower Bridge.
Interesting. It's very, very old.
But it folds completely in half
so that, in the old days, the horses could go through.
Now, that's the Houses of Parliament,
which are a series of houses in which we keep all our idiots.
That clock thing, that's Big Ben.
I know it's not what you call big, but... but we couldn't just call it Ben.
And that is the Cenotaph,
where we remember those who died fighting for us.
Slowing down a bit here.
Show some respect.
No idea what that is. It wasn't here this morning.
A cyclist, you want to be careful of those.
Small but very angry creatures.
That's the army.
They're the ones who shot at your White House.
Sorry about that.
Having seen all of the sights,
we headed out of town
so I could do this.
There it is.
That is the soundtrack that Britain has been missing for 51 years -
real American V8 muscle.
We just don't make cars like this on our side of the pond.
All that lazy-but-determined torque.
Squeeze the throttle in any gear at any speed...
...and there's an inevitability to the way it moves off.
It's like arm wrestling a solar system - you're gonna lose.
It is weird...
driving a Mustang from this side.
It's like suddenly changing your mind
after 50 years of marriage and sleeping on the other side of the bed.
It's also weird driving a car with a big V8,
reversing camera, air-conditioned seats,
rain-sensing wipers that you can buy for £37,000.
That's half of what you'd pay for a BMW M4. Half.
Once we were in the countryside proper,
I continued my sightseeing tour.
Look, I've drawn your badge on a hill.
Jeremy did that one.
Sorry.
Eventually, we arrived at Stonehenge.
That, you'll be amazed to learn,
is an ancient calendar.
Or a clock. Or a church.
My tour of Britain was then interrupted by an unwelcome arrival.
What are you doing here?
Well, I have come to remind you -
cos you've obviously forgotten,
cos you're too giddy -
that we have no need for the Mustang in Britain.
Because if you want to spend,
what, £30,000-£35,000 on a fast Ford,
you'd buy a Focus RS, cos that was designed for here.
No, you'd settle for that in the UK
because you couldn't buy this, but now you can.
That is the point.
Would you wear chaps?
No, because we have trousers.
What about cowboy... Oh, you are. Cowboy boots.
Well, it's appropriate. I'm welcoming...
Listen, I don't want everything from America, I just want the Mustang.
-Stupid. -No, America--
It wasn't designed for here.
-Well, no.
"It's cold out, I'll wear a Stetson."
No! You wear a bobble hat.
That's a bobble hat.
Oh! No, hang on.
-I've just realised.
Erm... I-I don't want to talk to you any more.
Anyway...
Anyway, we shall pick that up later on.
But right now it's time to drop it a cog
and hook a left into Conversation Street.
-Serious. It's serious. -It is serious stuff, this.
Now, look, in Britain we are always being told
that the Scandinavians are brilliant at driving,
and that's because they would be, because they have to deal with all that snow.
Mm, they're brilliant because what they do most of all is crash.
Well, you're absolutely right, as it turns out,
cos I've got some interesting statistics here. Erm...
In Britain, 1.2% of accidents result in fatalities.
Here, I'm afraid, it's 5.1%.
Yeah, and it's not just the Finns, either,
if I may be so bold.
Our Senior International Producer -
that's his job title -
came over to Finland the other day,
rented himself a BMW at the airport -
not a Ford or an Opel, you'll note, a BMW -
and on his way to the location here,
this happened.
RICHARD: He did! He did!
When I say he's our Senior International Producer,
he's now our Junior International Producer.
-Our Junior Local Producer. -Yeah.
Very local. Specifically, the stationery cupboard.
-He can produce that. -That's all he's in charge of.
How did he do that?!
The thing is, what I don't understand is how the Finns manage to go fast enough
to have a crash of any sort at all,
because the speeding fines here are insane.
They're means tested,
which means a guy here recently
was caught doing 49mph through a 30 zone
and he was fined 112,000 euros.
-That's a speeding fine!
Are they really that high in Finland?
A hundred and twelve...
112,000.
-Imagine getting that in the post! -Well, it's interesting.
Actually, there was a Finnish minister recently said
that the government needs those speeding fines
to balance the books, they said.
They actually said, "Speeding is good for the country."
-That is actually what...
JEREMY: Because it is. Every country.
RICHARD: Right. We should adopt that.
-Speeding is good for you. -It's your social duty.
-A bit more conversation for you. -Oh, good!
I think, with the exception of Rolls-Royce,
Volvo now make the best car interiors of anybody.
They do. They're very, very good.
I don't like to, but I agree with you.
because I went in the new S90 the other day, and the interior is superb.
-We've got a picture of it here. -Yes, that one.
JEREMY: They use pale colours.
They've got pale-coloured seats, pale-coloured carpets, pale wood,
and that makes it feel light and airy and spacious.
The only problem is that in one of those
you couldn't enjoy a chocolate Magnum ice cream.
It's all right, I don't eat ice cream.
It's something to do with being straight.
What
Why are you applauding him?
What do you mean?
Are you saying everyone who likes ice...?
Ice cream is a bit, you know....
You're saying all children are homosexual?
-No, but...
There's nothing wrong with it,
but a grown man eating an ice cream, you know, it's a bit...
it's that way rather than that way.
-It is...
Welcome to the inside of Richard Hammond's head.
I'm right. I can't believe you can't see that.
It's easy. It's in front of you.
You could enjoy a 99 in there.
-No...
Ninety-nine. But you couldn't have the chocolate thingy.
-My case rests! -No, the chocolate thing!
-Exactly! -You know what I mean.
No, but if you had that Volvo,
you could have a white magnum...
JEREMY: True. -...or a Milky Bar.
Yeah, but not a Double Decker.
Well, a Flake is worse.
-No, Double Decker's worse.
Double Decker...
Do you all know what I mean by the Double Decker?
It is unique among chocolate confectionery items.
Take a bite as you're driving along,
and a bit about this big, OK,
silently breaks away...
...goes down between your legs
and melts.
So when you get out,
everybody thinks you've had some kind of trouser accident.
This big brown stain right...
-I know what you mean. -It does happen.
A Flake is worse.
No, it just isn't!
A Flake is advertised as "the crumbliest, flakiest chocolate".
-It is worse. -This is a hot topic on Conversation Street.
It is!
I think we should settle it here and now.
I'm going to go into our travelling box.
Our travelling box of chocolate confectionery, and I'm going to...
Let's settle it with a competition, yes?
I'm gonna give you James's Flake
and you the Double Decker.
I'll turn that over, so then you'll see how much spills off as I eat the Flake.
-This is scientific.
Here we go. Oh. Some of it's already crum...
This is cheating, this one.
RICHARD: OK, no, clear away the debris.
JEREMY: No, I need to... Jesus!
-That's part of eating it! -It isn't part of eating it! I haven't even begun.
-But you've got to unwrap it. -Ssh!
Cheat.
* Only the crumbliest *
* Flakiest chocolate *
-Oh, God. * Tastes like choc... *
-Jeremy, you know that advert?
-Girl in...
Girl in the the field of poppies - we're not seeing that right now.
-I am. -I'm not.
Right, ready? Watch this.
RICHARD: He's going in. First bite.
Oh, it's a big fall of chocolate!
JEREMY: Mm. -It's a heavy sprinkling, that.
That is just a light dusting of chocolate.
-A light dusting, yeah, OK. -Right, James May.
Moving over to James May and his Double Decker. This is exciting, isn't it?
-This is a great car programme. -Groundbreaking stuff, yeah.
-Quiet, please. -I can't believe...
-I can't believe this hasn't been done before.
He's going in. He's taking a bite.
His poor old gnash... His teeth!
-Oh!
It's a catastrophic fall! The clear winner...
The Double Decker is worse than the Flake.
There's the Flake. There's the Double Decker.
So, there we are. Using science, we have now established...
...if you've got a Volvo, don't have a Double Decker.
-Ever.
Or an ice cream, because he... Oh, no, forget it.
Let's move a little further along Conversation Street, shall we?
Erm... A few weeks ago, Amazon,
they ran an advert for our show, and we're rather pleased with it.
See, it's got everything in.
-Yeah, the sense of travel. -Logo.
-And there's even the goat. -Yeah, no, that's perfect.
-Everything you need there. -All you need for the advert. It's on the screen.
Yeah. All the essentials are there. Everything you need.
Everything you need to see.
JEREMY: Actually...
All the important stuff.
Hammond, I'm sorry to do this,
but before the show launched, Amazon did another advert, OK,
which somebody sent to me on a tweet, which I screen grabbed,
so the quality's not good, but I have brought it along.
Here it is.
Oh, for God's sake!
I like their marketing department a lot.
I think that's enough Conversation Street,
so let's get back to our film.
Yes. Earlier on, I was in the right-hand-drive Ford Mustang,
showing it the sights around our country.
Unfortunately, he turned up
and tried to argue that the similarly priced Ford Focus was a better bet.
-Yeah, I did do that. -I responded by driving off and refusing to talk to you.
A bit rudely, I thought.
I'm sorry, this is my film, my tour of England,
and I didn't want him spoiling it.
This thing's bloody awesome.
Listen to that bellow.
This thing squats on its haunches.
This is what it's built to do.
Every crackle, pop and bang is just connected to every synapse and sinew in me.
Oh, no.
This is like a first date for me, and on a first date,
you don't want a fat, balding uncle tagging along.
So what I'm gonna do now... is lose him.
It's Hammer Time! Shock and awe!
It's Bond versus Bourne.
He's got five litres. I've only got 2.3.
Is he going twice as fast? No, he is not.
Corner coming up. There's no need to panic any more in a Mustang,
because, for the first time,
the Mustang has independent rear suspension.
Ooh!
The cornering speeds this thing can achieve... beggar belief.
How does it grip that well?!
I'm in a car chase in a Mustang.
I am Steve McQueen.
Try that on.
I've got it in Sport Mode,
which makes the exhaust pop and bang.
Woohoo! Mine!
RICHARD: Oh, my God!
Flat out, yeah.
And it still grips!
What is the point of traction control on this thing?
It's like putting a nymphomania control on a nun.
Oh, God!
Where's he gone?
How did he do that? How did he get away from me
in something from the 18th century?
Especially when I'm driving
what is basically a turbocharged barnacle.
This has the most sophisticated four-wheel-drive system
fitted to any car.
Not even a Nissan GTR could live with this.
The Mustang, well, that's for cruising down
the Pacific Coast Highway, listening to Don Henley.
This is for storming up the Stelvio Pass,
listening to the Clash.
But while it's a grippy, technological masterpiece,
it still has the blue-collar character of its ancestors.
In many ways, this reminds me of the old Escort Cosworth, and that was a great car.
I actually had one in the '90s. I called it Gary.
It started every morning and it always went, "Do you want some?!"
It was just John Terry, really, with windscreen wipers.
RICHARD: Meanwhile, having got rid of the ape,
I was back on my sightseeing tour.
This is our Cheddar Gorge.
Obviously it's not as big as your gorge.
The Grand Canyon is bigger.
Well, it's longer and deeper... and wider.
Mm. But it doesn't have any cheese in it.
Why can't you just leave me alone?
I'm just saying, everything in America comes with cheese,
apart from the Grand Canyon.
Whereas this canyon does come with cheese, and it's delicious.
-Here, have some. -I don't want cheese.
-It's better than Monterey Jack in a tube. -You're ruining this!
No, you are, because you are telling everyone
that the Mustang is better than the Focus.
-Well, it is. -It isn't.
-It is. -No, it isn't.
Look, I'm not saying this is perfect, cos it isn't.
There's a vertical choppiness to the ride, which is annoying.
If you put your phone in the phone holder in front of the gear lever
and then accelerate, it shoots under the seat.
You never see it again.
Petrol tank, way too small.
-And the styling is a bit... yobbish. !
But, Hammond, look at this.
Oh, yeah, you're right.
Half a century of Mustang history, heritage and pride,
but it hasn't got a small plastic strip on the door in case you're a bit clumsy.
No, it's brilliant, that. And... this is faster.
Well, no, it isn't.
-It is. -No, it isn't.
-It is. -It isn't.
RICHARD: At this point, I decided to abandon my tour
and head for the nearest airfield...
...to teach Clarkson a lesson.
Right, I've got 410 horsepower -
that's 100 more than him.
But there's something else on here that's missing on his Focus,
and it's this - "line lock".
So, engage it. Press OK to initialise.
"Initialising. Initialising complete.
Firmly apply and hold brake to engage.
Engaged. Press OK to begin."
What that's doing is locking the front brakes,
so I can warm up my tyres.
Hm. That is an ideal feature for people who wake up in the morning and think,
"Do you know, I've got too much tread on my tyres."
Yeah! I'm doing that automatically!
What a moron.
With my tyres warmed up,
I took my place on the start line.
Right, race mode, launch control,
over-boost facility on the turbocharger,
four-wheel-drive, and a man with lightning reactions at the wheel.
This car is going to boing off the line like a spring lamb.
Launch control, first gear, and we're ready to go.
Oh, he's away first.
The most incredible launch control in the world!
Come on!
Come on, Jeremy. Come on. You're winning.
RICHARD: Oh, reeling him in!
No, no, no! That's simply impossible!
Well, bless him for trying.
Things I don't want to see right now - number one, him.
So er... I won, then.
-Yes, but your car doesn't have a drift button.
-A drift button.
Well, you push it, and then,
when you go round a corner, the car drifts.
-Yeah.
You know, I'd love to see that in action.
-I'd love to see you doing that. -Yes.
-I'll watch. Yeah, show me. -You stay there.
You will not... Even James May could drift this.
-Here we go! -I can't wait to watch.
JEREMY: Check it out, ladies and gentlemen!
Check it out!
I'm drifting.
What do you think of that, Hammond? Look at that!
Hammond?
Hammond!
What? You're not gonna blame me.
-Well, I left you because you were being moronic.
-I wasn't! -You were!
Seriously, who is going to buy
a Ford Focus when, for the same money,
you could have a V8
-No-one.
Nobody would. Mustang's got so much more character.
Hang on. So, you agree with me?
Oh, God, yes! If I had the choice of those two cars,
I'd have the Mustang every day of the week.
So you ruined my day out for no reason at all?
I ruined your day out because it was fun... to ruin your day out.
-Good work. -It was good work. Sorry about that.
But anyway, we must now find out how fast those Fords go round our track,
and that, of course, means handing them over to our other resident American -
a man who thinks that shower gel is basically communist.
It's the American.
JEREMY: There he is, looking bewildered.
And he's away!
It sounds like a bunch of goddamn mice in there.
Why the hell don't they just start with eight cylinders?
Strangest mice I ever heard, as he powers down the Isn't.
That is a good noise.
Arms working the wheel like he's wrestling a drifter,
which, of course, he is.
And already he's at Your Name Here.
Tyres squealing, but it's clinging on well,
and now the climb back onto the Isn't.
It ain't got no room in it.
No place to put your beer.
I think he and I look for slightly different things in a car.
Anyway, now hard on the brakes
as he turns into Old Lady's House.
Yeah, he is dispatching that with no dramas,
and now he can get the hammer down
for the bumpy sprint to Substation.
Looking good.
Four-wheel-drive cars can, of course, understeer,
but... nope, not a whiff of it here.
And Field Of Sheep, tidy through there as well,
and across the line.
Now, I think he might enjoy this one.
And he is wheel-spinning away!
All right! American muscle, baby!
5.0 Mustang - this thing is badass.
It's got a trunk, a place for my golf clubs.
Pack up the old lady, go for the weekend somewhere in this thing,
and you can haul ass while you're goin'.
Something there about an old lady and hauling a bottom.
Anyway, he's on the Isn't,
and he's flying into Your Name Here.
The mighty Mustang has filled the American with vigour,
and he's being surprisingly tidy.
That's what us Americans want, we want to smoke the tyres.
We want this thing to just get shit and get.
Literally no idea what he's on about. It's just a noise.
When this thing stops, man, it stops on a dime.
"It'll stop on a dime and give you nine cents change" is what we say.
You really can't shut him up about this one.
Anyway, he is keeping it neat round Old Lady's House,
and then unleashing that V8 fury
over the rough stuff to Substation.
Hard on the brakes, ready for the 90 left.
Blip it up to Field Of Sheep.
Here we go.
Flurry of exuberance, and across the line.
-There we are.
OK, here's the Lap Board.
Let's have a look, first of all, where the Focus went.
So...
Oh, there it is.
Faster than an ST200 - perhaps not surprising.
Just as well.
Now let's bring up the Mustang.
-Oh!
-That's not embarrassing, is it?
The car that you, me, and the American all prefer
is quite a lot slower than the European Focus.
RICHARD: Yes.
Anyway, listen, let's move on, shall we,
to Celebrity Brain Crash.
Now...
our guest this week isn't just my favourite Formula One driver,
he's also a local boy.
Oh, yeah, this is the chatty man of motorsport,
Mr Effervescent,
ladies and gentlemen, Kimi Räikkönen!
Here he comes.
RICHARD: What are we gonna ask him?
It doesn't matter what you ask him.
It doesn't, because you won't get a coherent answer.
Is he all right?
JEREMY: No, hang on. Whoa!
RICHARD: Oh, no. JEREMY: Not again.
No, he has, I'm afraid, ladies and gentlemen,
literally drunk himself to death.
JEREMY: Damn.
-Does that mean he's not coming on, then?
Well, his liver has failed
and he's now slowly solidifying
in the freezing dusk of an Arctic night, so that's a no.
Yeah, but it doesn't matter.
Well, it does, cos I actually rather liked Kimi.
But I can think of something else we can do to fill the time.
Here's the thing. Er... If you're watching this
on the day the programme is actually released,
it is December 23rd.
There are two days to go until Christmas,
and if you're a man, you won't have done any shopping yet.
-But don't worry, cos we've got your back. -Oh, yeah.
We have trawled the Internet and the shops
to find the best gift ideas.
Yes, and here, in our special Grand Tour Santa Land Grotto.
-Yeah.
Nice view. Nice everything.
Yeah. Er...
We begin with this rather brilliant tray,
which, apparently, is the ideal place to put your laptop or your breakfast.
We have a picture of it in action here.
RICHARD: Hang on a minute! -I see a couple of problems with that.
RICHARD: I can too.
Well, now, the reason I don't play chess any more
is it's just so exhausting to move the pieces around.
-I know what you mean. -Far too heavy, picking the Queen up and moving her.
But it's OK, because Ferrari has answered that problem with this.
-It's a lightweight, carbon-fibre chess set...
...and it's yours for £1,400.
! -£1,400.
And that is the funny thing - you take something ordinary,
write a car name on it, and suddenly it becomes expensive.
This bear, for example. I know about bears.
It's an acrylic fibre,
stuffed with industrial waste.
£2.75.
But, because it's got a Honda T-shirt on, £10.
-£10.
Yes, but it's Honda Bear!
-Or...
I love that! On Christmas morning, Honda Bear!
I love following his adventures!
How about this lovingly crafted
"I love my Hyundai" pillowcase?
What woman is ever going to leap into bed
with a man whose pillows bear that legend?
OK, Hammond, I'll tell you exactly what woman.
The woman who would wear this thong,
which has written lovingly on the front,
the legend Elantra.
Erotic! Erotic!
Can I just say, the perfect Christmas gift for the Hyundai owner is a BMW.
Well, yes, look, we realised that branding stuff,
obviously there's some money in it, so we thought, since we're in Scandinavia,
we would launch our own range of car-branded Christmas jumpers.
JEREMY: Mm-hm. RICHARD: Oh, yeah. Yeah.
-Talk among yourselves, everybody. RICHARD: Hold on a moment.
JEREMY: This is modelling time.
Mine is a simple turtleneck.
Very, very warm, bearing the name of a legend on the front.
I know, it's very special. Very Christmassy, yeah?
-I have gone for a very cuddly...
...and Christmassy cardigan bearing the name,
as you can see, of a car I absolutely adore.
Yeah, and here's the thing, OK.
Mine is a crewneck, actually.
Why is everybody...?
RICHARD: I don't know.
I think...
Is it because they haven't seen us in knitwear before?
Anyway, we've had a go at making some Grand Tour-branded stuff.
-Oh, yeah. -But here's the thing.
We haven't gone for the obvious stuff,
like jumpers and mugs and umbrellas.
We've gone for things that other people haven't thought of.
Things like this -
haemorrhoid cream.
-We all need it. -I don't.
No, I don't, either.
-Well, this is mine.
Bought it for £2.75, but now it's got Grand Tour on it,
we could sell that for £20.
I tell you what really good idea we've had erm...
is condoms, OK, which have been...
well, they've been branded with well-known expressions
and phrases that we often say.
-I'm gonna demonstrate using this-- -Whoa!
You flatter yourself, sir!
-Au contraire. Oh, really?
So we simply roll the condom over the rolling pin.
Here it is. There's the GT logo coming up.
And on the other side, "How hard can it be?"
RICHARD: We're very pleased.
JEREMY: Pretty damn hard, for a man of my age.
We're... We're very pleased with these.
Various of our slogans have been used. I'm going to put mine on this er...
disappointingly small carrot.
Erm... And it bears one of my expressions.
-See, I can't-- -Don't bite it!
Well, I can't open the thing, can I?
No, there's one of those little tear things.
-Hold on, love. I'll be with you in a minute.
-No, it's-- -You're not gonna be here to help me when I'm using it!
-You don't know! -I bloody do!
-I might be. -I'm pretty sure you won't be.
That's quite the wrong thing to... Are you in?
!
-No. -No, I want my glasses back
before you start messing around with sex things.
Oh, right, let me... Oh, dear. It's a bit baggy.
I've actually torn it with my teeth,
which makes the slogan on it quite appropriate, really -
"That's not gone well."
Can I just say, that is by far and away
the least erotic thing I have ever...
Don't tell me that's not an unfamiliar sight.
Oh, have you done one as well?
Of course I have. Very sensibly, I put mine on earlier.
-Whoa!
Branded with the GT logo and my own personal catchphrase,
"I was the first to arrive."
Now, are you bored with having two fully functioning ankles?
Yes? Well, don't worry if you are,
because this Christmas, the market is awash with products
designed specifically to break them.
such as this iBot-9.
I thought that was a vacuum cleaner.
No, it's incredibly heavy
because it's packed full of pain.
Basically, you put these things out on the side, you stand and whizz about.
But within seconds of getting on, you will be falling over and breaking your ankles.
Probably so.
Yes, and on the other hand, there are also these.
These are called the Rocket Skates.
They will cost you just £900,
and they are guaranteed to power you straight to casualty.
RICHARD: Yeah.
-No, they're fine. JAMES: No, they're really not.
-I'll be all right. I could have a go on those.
-You said it.
Seriously. I mean, honestly...
"
See, I knew it would come in handy. I can bludgeon...
-Seriously, I'll have a go. -Off you go, mate.
-Yeah. Can I wear my shoes in them?
RICHARD: Yes, Jeremy, apart from they've got wheels and you're indoors.
-I am not going near them. -Just put my foot in them.
I don't want to!
-I can't see what I'm... -It's degrading and unpleasant.
-Put your great cloven hoof in there.
It fits! You can go to the ball.
-There, you're in.
-Thank you.
You're not gonna do it!
Have you started? -Not yet.
I better face the other way, hadn't I?
RICHARD: Looking good.
These are worth every...
What will they cost, 900 quid?
-Nine hundred quid. -Literally every penny.
Wait, hold it there. Hold it there.
Look out, girls, Mr Darcy's arrived.
RICHARD: Looking good.
RICHARD: Oh, this is brilliant. JAMES: Wow!
I can see why they're called Rocket Skates.
-Come on, man. Oh, God! I'm trying to move!
WOMAN: Lean back! -What do you mean, "Lean back"?
Like that?
Stephen Hawking would make a better job of these
Rocket Skates than you have.
-Right... !
-You've got to get one... RICHARD: Do you remember...
RICHARD: Whoa! It's a disaster!
JEREMY: Shit. Sorry.
Don't worry, Jeremy. I will come and rescue on my...
Bloody hell!
-Oh, my God. It's going mad.
Erm... Right. Right.
-I put my foot on there. -This is a really good ambulance service.
Yeah. Yeah. Don't worry, I'll be there in a minute.
I don't know that this works.
-I've gone again!
Shit! Now I've got cramp!
That was... That was a brilliant idea, but never mind,
because erm... I have a perfect Christmas present here.
You control this with your mobile phone and your face comes on it.
And the brilliant thing about it is that it means
you can have your favourite celebrity round to your house for Christmas lunch.
With that in mind, ladies and gentlemen, would you please welcome into the studio -
he's actually in his office in London, and yet he's also here on top of a stick -
it's Bob Geldof!
JEREMY: We're gonna say hello to Bob.
RICHARD: I can't say hello to Bob! -He's coming, Hammond.
-I just go in circles! -It is!
It's Bob Geldof, everybody!
Hello, Bob. Where have you gone?
Bob! We're over here, Bob!
-Bob! -Bob, we're over here!
-He's there!
Bob Geldof, how are you?
Yes, happy Christmas!
Oh, ! Sorry!
-Are you having a good Christmas, Bob? -Oh, no! Bob's...
Ladies and gentlemen, Bob Geldof is lost!
He's gone in the wrong...
JEREMY: Oh, James May's coming to join in.
JAMES: I'm coming to talk to Bob Geldof.
RICHARD: Whoa! JEREMY: May has kissed Bob Geldof!
-Get out of the way!
-I'm travelling! -No, straight ahead, Bob.
Bob, no. Left-hand down, Bob. No, Bob. Bob, you...
Have I just attacked somebody's knob?
RICHARD: Bob, stop attacking the crowd!
Now where's he going?!
Bob!
JAMES: Right, I'll rescue Bob. Hold on.
Straight ahead, Bob. That's perfect.
-Straight ahead. Straight. A bit of right-hand down.
No, don't drive into it! Stop head-butting the tree!
This is ridiculous!
Where's the reindeers and Santa Claus at?
RICHARD: Oh, no! Hang on a minute!
He's ruined Christmas!
Does he know it's Christmas time at all?
Well, tonight, thank God it's him instead of us
knocking the Christmas tree over.
Absolutely right. He's ruined it!
Anyway, erm...
This year marks the 50th anniversary
of the greatest battle in motorsport history.
The story begins in the 1960s,
when Ford realised that they could sell a lot more cars
if they were a lot more successful on the racetrack.
So they formulated a brilliant plan, but unfortunately...
...it went disastrously wrong, didn't it, Bob?
Ford knew that if you wanted to rule in motorsport,
there was only one race that mattered.
The toughest and most dangerous of them all -
the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
REPORTER: Levegh's Mercedes collides and blows up.
JAMES: The problem was, for all its might,
Ford didn't have a clue how to win at Le Mans.
However, over in Italy, someone did.
In the early 1960s,
Enzo Ferrari's cars ruled sports-car racing,
Le Mans especially.
At the start of the decade,
he had won the famous and gruelling 24-hour race
three times on the trot.
However, the company was in deep financial difficulty,
so when Ford offered to buy the entire business,
Enzo agreed.
At first, all went well.
Enzo Ferrari and the head of Ford, Henry Ford II,
quickly settled on a price of $16 million.
And on May 21st 1963,
Ford executives arrived in Maranello to sign the deal.
Ford turned up with an army of suits.
Enzo Ferrari sat opposite them
with just the local town lawyer.
They read the contract and all seemed well,
but then, suddenly, Ferrari stopped
and he took out his famous fountain pen full of purple ink,
and as you can see from this accurate copy I have here,
he drew a big exclamation mark and he wrote,
"No, that's no good!"
Now, what had angered him? Well, it was this clause here.
You see, Enzo Ferrari wanted to retain control
of the motorsport side of his business,
but this bit effectively handed control to Ford.
There followed a tirade of abuse in Italian,
after which, Enzo said to his lawyer, "Let's go and eat."
Then they got up and they simply walked out on the stunned Ford executives.
That was that.
All of this for nothing.
Back in Detroit, Henry Ford II,
apoplectic with rage,
gathered his lieutenants and issued the order:
"Build me a car that will crush Ferrari at Le Mans."
To beat Ferrari on European soil,
Ford needed European expertise,
so he hired a small British motorsport company
that set up shop here, in this very building,
on an industrial estate in Slough, just outside London.
And the challenges they faced were enormous.
They had to build a car that would race at over 200mph,
which was something that had never been done before,
and it had to be reliable for the 24 hours of the Le Mans race -
a race in which you changed gear 9,000 times
and drove flat out for 3,000 miles.
And, as if that wasn't bad enough, they only had ten months to do it.
Out of that insane timetable emerged this.
The Ford GT.
Thanks to its sleek shape and the body that stood just 40-inches tall,
it promised to cut through the air like a missile.
Add a 4.2L V8,
and the magic target of 200mph seemed in the bag.
The trouble is, a racing car is just a collection of hopes and dreams
until it gets on the track.
And that's something that Ford learned in a very brutal way
when they took the GT40 to test at Le Mans for the first time.
REPORTER: And so to the first Le Mans practice session.
JAMES: On its first outing, the renamed GT40 was fast,
but it was also terrifyingly unstable,
spinning its wheels on the straights.
I'm not talking about when you set off,
I mean it was happening at 170mph!
Now, the problem was either aerodynamics or suspension,
but they never found out,
because, later that day, the car crashed at 160mph.
Well, that was OK. They had a spare one, of course.
The next day, that crashed as well.
Le Mans was just two months away.
Against all odds, Ford got their act together in time for the 1964 race.
REPORTER: The Le Mans 24 Hour Race at last,
and three gleaming Ford GTs are present.
JAMES: But during the race itself,
all the cars broke down or caught fire,
leaving bitter rivals Ferrari
to take another one-two-three victory.
In Detroit, Henry Ford decreed that they would be back next year
to take on Ferrari again.
And to head up the campaign,
he turned to an American motorsport hero.
My name's Carroll Shelby and performance is my business.
Shelby was a former chicken farmer from Texas
who took nitroglycerin pills to keep his heart going.
But he'd also racked up countless victories
as a driver and team owner.
Given the task of turning the GT40 into a winner,
he put his top man on the job.
Coming up is Ken Miles,
one of the best sport-car drivers in America.
Miles was a former Second World War tank commander from Birmingham -
the one in England, not Alabama.
He was renowned for speaking his mind
and developing racing cars.
Miles took the car for a shakedown.
Then he got out and he told Shelby and the Ford executives,
"It's bloody awful!"
Then he got to work,
improving the brakes, the engine,
the aerodynamics, the handling,
and taming the car's terrifying high-speed instability.
However, and even though he and his team took amphetamine
so that they could stay awake all night,
there simply wasn't time to develop the car properly for Le Mans.
The GT40 may have been faster,
but it was still fragile.
At the 1965 race,
six cars started, none finished,
and the Italians humiliated Ford once again.
So, untold millions of dollars had been spent
since the first GT40 emerged from this building here,
and yet not one car had even finished the race.
So Ford now faced a difficult choice -
he could throw in the towel against Ferrari, or he could fight on.
What he actually did was he had some business cards printed,
and he distributed them to his Le Mans team.
And on the cards it said, "You'd better win."
And so, a year later,
the American giant returned to Le Mans
with its hopes resting on this.
OK, viewers,
this is historic-race-car bucket-list moment number two,
because this is an actual GT40
that competed at Le Mans in 1966.
All right, don't go mad, May, it's worth 15-million quid.
Sod it! Let's make some noise!
Oh, yes!
In this new GT40,
Ken Miles had racked up thousands of test hours.
Now the car was no longer horribly unstable,
but would sit rocksteady at 210mph.
And the Brummie tank commander had the backing of Ford's huge R&D department,
who tackled the car's appalling reliability.
The brakes no longer went into thermal shock
at the end of the long straight.
The engine and transmission were run on a computerised test rig
that simulated the whole of the 24-Hour Le Mans race.
Now, that's standard practice in Formula One today,
but in 1966 that was witchcraft.
They weren't mucking about, these blokes.
But neither were the opposition.
Over in Italy, in response to the new threat,
Ferrari produced this.
Called the P3, it looked as sleek as a GT40.
And at just 37.4 inches tall, it was even lower.
Avanti!
Whoo! Holy mother!
I best be a little bit careful on this narrow road.
It's worth £20 million.
Where the GT40 boasted a top speed of over 210mph,
the P3 maxed out at just 190.
But Enzo Ferrari was willing to trade outright speed for gains elsewhere.
The Ferrari was lighter, it was more agile.
Ferrari reckoned he could make up the difference in the bends,
and he wouldn't have to stop so often for fuel.
A David and Goliath battle was looming.
At the 1966 Le Mans race, Ford arrived with an armada -
eight cars, 20 tonnes of spares,
and a squad of world-class drivers,
including Ken Miles himself.
In comparison, Ferrari turned up with just a trio of P3s,
but Enzo had an ace up his sleeve -
the undisputed fastest driver on the planet,
Formula One World Champion John Surtees.
He came to me and said, "John... we've got to beat the Fords. Go out and do it."
I thought there was only one tactic -
to have at least one car be the hare.
I said, "Look, I don't mind being the hare."
"The moment that flag goes down,
we need to be - bang - off,"
tempting the Ford drivers to perhaps overdrive a little bit.
If one could push them hard enough for long enough,
then there is more likelihood, obviously, of being able to break them.
The plan was set.
But, as zero hour approached, everything unravelled.
REPORTER: Shortly before the race, we learned that he wasn't going to drive,
and we asked him about it.
Yes, unfortunately you've heard correct. I won't be driving.
REPORTER: What is the reason?
Well, I suppose it's best summed up at this stage
by saying "political reasons."
JAMES: The problem was that the Ferrari team manager
was playing his own political game.
He had no particular liking for Surtees,
and he nominated another driver
to go out and start the race, to be the hare,
even though Surtees was clearly the fastest man available.
SURTEES: And I just stormed away, drove back, and had it out with the old man.
As the Italian papers put it,
they showed a picture of me walking out the gates and saying,
"The divorce of John Surtees and Enzo."
With Surtees out of the way,
the Fords took the top four slots in qualifying.
And as the clock ticked down, Henry Ford II prepared to drop the flag,
praying that, this time, he would get his revenge.
REPORTER: Live from Le Mans, France, it's the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
At first, the Fords stormed into the lead.
But a few hours in,
it was beginning to look like a depressing repeat of '64 and '65.
As night fell, the Ferraris, using their greater agility
and their greater fuel efficiency,
were leading the race one-two.
Four of the eight GT40s were out of the race altogether.
Worse still, the Ford drivers had strict orders not to go balls-out
for fear of breaking the cars.
But one man wasn't listening to those orders.
Ken Miles put the hammer down,
set blistering lap times, and retook the lead for Ford.
The Ferraris had no response to this crushing pace,
and by morning, they had either broken down or crashed.
That afternoon, Henry Ford watched his cars cruise home
to a spectacular one-two-three finish.
REPORTER: First place for the Ford GT Mk II,
and a first-time win for America at Le Mans.
JAMES: Ford would go on to win their next four Le Mans races.
But the man who had contributed so much to the team
didn't get to see these triumphs.
Ken Miles was killed two months after their first win,
testing the latest GT40.
It's impossible to calculate how much Henry Ford spent
on his three-year campaign to break Ferrari,
but experts reckon that, at the very least,
in today's money, it was £360 million.
Now, that's a big bill for settling a spat with an angry Italian.
But look what we got out of it -
one of the world's greatest cars.
RICHARD: Very good.
That was good. Very good.
-I hate you. -I know.
No, but I really hate you now, cos you've driven a Ford GT40, and I never have.
I mean, next week are you gonna lick Helena Christensen?
-Look...
I'm sure you could drive a GT40 if you really wanted to.
I can't, I'm too tall.
Yeah, you mean fat.
-Tall.
Horizontally tall.
Well, listen, whatever dimension is the problem,
I can't drive one.
And on that terrible disappointment, it is time to end.
Thank you so much for watching. Good night.