Top Gear: Season 1, Episode 8 - ProjectFreeTV

1 - 8: Gambon Corner Gets Its Name

On an action-packed Top Gear, a Knight took to our reasonably priced car, Maserati's coupe tried out our track, white van men battled for supremacy, and we turned a Lada into a Lotus. As the programme was all about performance, we started to wonder - can any car be a driver's car? Is it something a car is born with, or can it be bolted on? To find out we 'borrowed' an ageing Lada and gave it to Lotus, whch spent 1,000 hours tweaking it in an attempt to turn it into a decent track car. Did we manage it? Of course we did, although the car did still look like a Lada, which ruined the effect slightly. We also tried to find the fastest white van man. We had over 1,500 applications and picked five to race around our track in a tuned Transit. Predictably, one got lost and two crashed. The winner was a chap called dave, who drives a van for NTL. Richard lined up five superminis to test as an antidote to all this power: the Ford Fiesta, Citroen C3, Honda Jazz, Nissan Micra and MG ZR. His verdict? If you want practicality, it's got to be the Jazz. But if it's fun you're after, choose the MG. Sir Michael Gambon, one of Britain's finest actors, was determined to set a fast lap in our reasonably priced car. He managed 1.55, which isn't a bad time. Although it was worrying that he nearly killed both the Liana and himself in the process.