Episode 7 Top Gear: Extra Gear

Hi, I'm George Lewis, and welcome to Extra Gear.

It's the final show in the series, and it's a good one.

We get nautical and go behind the scenes

as Matt and Rory launch the SsangYacht in Monaco.

It looked a lot calmer from the dock, didn't it?

Chris gets his hands on the new Audi TT RS and finds out whether Porsche

has anything to worry about.

Well, they say these things are hairdressers' cars,

but this one's got 400 horsepower!

Extra Gear does some important consumer testing in a Golf R.

Don't try this at home unless you've got some budget hockey equipment on.

OK?

Oh, yeah. This is Extra Gear.

APPLAUSE

Over the course of the series, our intrepid Top Gear team has

tackled all of the automotive challenges we

threw at them. 200mph top speeds, drifting through holes in walls,

and life-size arcade games.

In the final Behind The Scenes of the series,

they faced a new challenge...

out at sea.

The day had finally arrived,

it was time for the SsangYacht to take its maiden voyage.

Morning, how are you?

-Morning.

-And as an excited cast and crew prepared

for life on the ocean waves,

Harris was being his usual cheery self in the car park.

I'm now sitting in a van, facing away from the sea,

which feels really odd, because when you're by the sea,

you normally look out to sea. But I'm not allowed to see the boat.

I've no idea what it looks like or what they've done.

As you can tell, the suspense is killing me,

I'm so desperate to see the van.

Stand by.

And...action.

Look at that.

Come on. Feast your eyes.

Ahoy!

THEY LAUGH

Rear Admiral Reid at your service.

-Nice!

-Oh, he's going to hit that now.

Whoa!

It's got some juice.

It's just a crash waiting to happen, isn't it?

-He's got it...

-It's all under control.

-He's got it under control, for sure.

-Your windscreen's cracked, Rory.

And things were only going to get harder out on the open sea.

There do seem to be some substantial swells out here.

It looked a lot calmer from the dock, didn't it?

It's a little bit choppy, I'm not going to lie.

THEY LAUGH

-Whoo!

-Yeah!

So, Extra Gear, let me just sum up the situation.

We're in a minivan,

in the sea, and everything appears to be going quite well.

This boat is a spectacular triumph of design.

Chris Harris is currently at the controls.

He's never, ever driven a boat before.

And this thing's quite top heavy,

so it has a tendency to roll over if you do things wrong.

Getting me to test this boat is like

taking a child off the street and asking them to

test the new Bugatti Chiron.

I am so underqualified, so I'm just going to say, "Stuff it,

-"give it some tap."

-And you'll fit right in.

-Nail it!

-Yeah, baby! Yeah!

-Whoo!

That's nice! I've got my head out the window, like a dog!

I will begrudgingly concede that it's not utter crap.

-Yeah!

-Come on!

-See, it's a winner!

With Chris's ringing endorsement in the bag,

it was time to film with Eddie, ship to ship.

Ahoy! Afternoon, boys!

Eddie!

Are you reviewing our boat?

Boat International correspondent at your service!

But the hardest challenge of the day was going to be shooting the

drag race.

OK, here we go. And three, two, one...

-Action.

-Go!

-Stand on it!

Hold on!

That thing's quick but we're quicker!

Yeah, baby! See you later!

Whoa! I don't want to die!

OK, let's make a turn.

You've got the camera boat on your left.

I see him, I see him, I see him...

OK, a little more.

Go, go, go, go, go, go, go...

Go! OK, he's coming up on the left.

-Whoa, Rory!

-We're all right, we're all right, we're all right...

-We're going to win!

-Whoo!

Thrilled as we were at the result,

we soon realised the boot had slammed shut during the race,

trapping us inside the SsangYacht.

-Where are you going?

-I'm going to fix the hatch.

Matt sprang into action, preventing our impending burial at sea.

OK, open it. There we go.

Get that hinge on on that side.

-I think that's up.

-Whoa, whoa, whoa...

Dude!

With the SsangYacht's emergency exit no longer sealed,

it was time to get back to the luxury challenge at hand.

Despite Chris's lack of nautical experience,

he jumped at the chance to show us what he could do on the water.

-All right, engine's off. In you go.

-It looks quite cold in there.

Get in there.

-Get in.

-Argh! Blimey, that's deep.

-How's that feel?

-BLEEP

-cold.

-Ready?

-He doesn't look happy.

-Shut up.

-OK?

OK! Nail it!

Whoo!

Yeah!

Nice work, Harris.

Do you know, I think this guy is a master of all forms of transport.

He's great!

-OK, wave coming up.

-Wave coming up!

Come on in, Chris.

Whoo! We have just proved, you can

ski behind a Korean MPV outside Monaco.

Mate!

THEY LAUGH

Once all the excitement had died down,

we realised we were missing something.

I don't know where the other ski is.

-Down there, I'd imagine.

-Down there somewhere.

So in the finest naval tradition, we set sail to find it.

Where did he drop the ski? I don't see it.

Stop, stop, stop, Matt!

Turnaround! Found it.

-Hang a left, hang a left.

-I don't see it.

Where is it? Oh, there it is. I see it. Is that it?

-That's a stick.

-Oh!

-Cut it, cut it, Matt. Cut it.

-See it?

-Keep going,

-keep going...

-Can you see it?

-Can you see it?

Oh, no. It's seaweed.

-It's that same

-BLEEP

-stick.

-It's the same piece of wood.

LAUGHTER

So now they're back on dry land, let's bring on Chris and Rory.

So, the SsangYong Rodius.

-Yes.

-First of all, Rory, what was it like to drive on the road?

Well, what a lot of people don't know about the Rodius

is that it's a driver's MPV.

-OK? It's actually rear-wheel drive. It's not a four by four.

-Yeah.

So the rear wheels can spin up, it's got a manual six-speed gearbox.

Or five-speed, I can't remember. But basically, it handles quite well.

And it's actually quite a decent car to drive.

There's not a lot of feedback in the steering,

it's not very responsive or agile, and it is kind of slow,

-0-60 in 15 seconds.

-About 15 seconds, yeah.

But you can light the rear wheels up and have a good time.

You can doughnut in a Rodius.

-So you like it?

-No. Not really. It is hideous.

-That is the problem with it.

-Chris,

I can tell that maybe you don't agree with this.

I've never sat in a conversation where someone opened with, "So,

SsangYong Rodius..." It's

never happened before. And I hope it never happens again.

But they designed something that

looks terrible, doesn't drive very well,

regardless of what Rory says.

-It's all right.

-So it's a total disaster.

And the amazing thing is that

however bad you think it is on paper,

when you see it in the flesh, it's even worse, isn't it?

It's kind of got a hint of BMW X6 about it, actually.

Apart from the bit on the edge.

Right, you can do this on your own, you two.

Come here, come here. You don't like the X6 either.

-Clearly.

-No, I don't. Look, it's a remarkable thing, isn't it?

Yeah, it was designed by Ken Greenley, as I said,

who is this super-hot design guy.

And he wanted it to be nautical.

And I think they executed that really well.

And that is what brought me to the Rodius and inspired our creation.

It was designed to capture the elegance of a luxury yacht.

And you and Matt took that, and you ran with it, didn't you?

-Oh, yeah. We ran...and we sailed.

-Yes!

-It was a hell of a thing.

We spent, what, three months building this thing behind you.

You say "we".

Me, Matt and a couple of professionals.

Tell us about the features in the car.

So, you had the TV-on-a-rope.

That was impressive. The foot spa.

-Yep.

-One thing we didn't see was the hot tub.

Ooh! The hot tub!

We've got a clip of that as well, actually.

-Here we go.

-Deleted scene.

-You want to see this.

Cannonball!

That's warm!

So warm! Whoo!

Ah, that is lovely.

So warm. So warm.

-Come on in.

-No, thanks.

Is that a wrap?

Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen!

Thank you!

We shot that in December.

And even though it is in Monaco, the water is freezing.

And then you get this thin film of diesel.

-Yeah!

-And then the torpoodo, so it wasn't a very pleasant environment.

But you were kind of impressed with the boat, weren't you, Chris.

And am I right to think that you

didn't see the boat until that moment

that it pulled up in front of you, right?

I hadn't.

And it was a shocking moment.

-Yeah.

-It was a shocking moment,

because I didn't quite know what I was looking at.

And it was horrendous.

And now, of course, I think it's completely magnificent,

because of the fun we've had in it.

But it was amazing, because it was so convincing.

As it rolled towards me, I thought, "Well, it's just a boat."

And then you see the windscreen.

And then you see the C-pillar.

And then you can't un-see it.

You were the man chosen to test-drive this on the water,

so that must have been quite different to your usual test.

Yeah, well, I'm uniquely qualified to do that, because I know nothing

about boats, and I can't really drive a boat.

And I'll let you into a secret,

the SsangYacht isn't that stable.

And it's got quite a bit of grunt as well.

-Yeah.

-And what I do know about boats is that

if you don't get them up on a plane,

they basically plough through the water, and they're very unpleasant.

This thing took a while to get it up on the plane,

and then it would sort of pitch around a bit.

And so the whole thing felt...

It felt like a dynamic situation

that could either end in triumph or death.

Did you feel reassured having Captain Rory in there?

Admiral. Admiral.

Admiral Rory in there?

Yeah, the Admiral was slightly worrying.

You did look a bit like a North African dictator,

and you had awarded yourself a massive amount of medals.

Rory, we have got to talk about the outfit.

Yeah, I insisted.

I wasn't coming in anything other than my sailor whites.

We've actually got a scene that was deemed too sexy for the main film.

-Yeah?

-We'll show it to you now.

-I mean...

-Come on!

That's pretty top shelf!

All it needs now is a box of Kleenex.

I have to say, that race, the race between us and the big boat...

-Yeah?

-..he gave it the absolute potatoes,

and a bit of a swell had built up.

And I mean, we were not supposed to see the props in the film.

You can see the thing out of the water.

-We caught air.

-Proper air. I couldn't stand up.

I went over twice.

Then the boot lid came down, and we felt we couldn't get out.

-Yeah!

-You could see how much fun we were having.

-It looked a laugh.

-It was brilliant fun.

So, I mean, final word on this one, SsangYong or SsangYacht?

SsangYacht.

SsangYacht every day of the week.

Look at it, it's a design icon now.

Yeah, it's beautiful.

Now we've cleared that one up, Chris,

why don't you tell us what you've got lined up for your final lap of

-the series?

-OK, George.

I may not be completely besotted with the new Cayman S,

but it's still probably the best sports car you can buy for around

£50,000.

The Audi TT RS comes a very close second, though.

So I thought it best to take this opportunity to have a closer look.

Launch control.

That means 0-60 in 3.7 seconds.

And this one will do 174mph.

Yeah, the TT RS,

well, they say these things are hairdressers' cars,

but this one's got 400 horsepower.

And sort of still understeers.

That was a bit more neutral, but the dreaded H word is

still here, Haldex. You know what Haldex is, don't you?

It's the four-wheel drive system they use in the Golf.

So, at best, it's 50-50 torque split front to rear.

You can just feel, as I accelerate there,

it just wants to push. At the moment that you want the rear axle just to

swing round, it pushes. That's why, ultimately,

even though this thing is massively impressive and hugely fast,

I still don't think of it as a genuine driver's car.

I think it's a really fast, very competent, quite stylish coupe.

How was that in terms of sub genre of sub genres?

But that engine, you could buy this car for the engine alone.

It really is that good.

It's just musical, it has great throttle response,

even though it's turbocharged.

And it's one of the best production car engines I've driven in a long,

long time. I think it's such a great surprise,

it almost makes the entire car.

That's the only way to make it oversteer, bung it on the way in.

So yeah, it's a hairdresser's car, but just one with a massive...

dick.

So, you liked that, didn't you?

It's a really interesting thing because, for me,

it sort of resurrects that

philosophy that Enzo Ferrari had in the '70s,

which was, "You give me a load of money and I'll give you an engine,

"and I'll throw the rest in for free."

You pay for the engine, the car comes for free.

Sadly, the rest of the TT doesn't match up to the engine.

You guys probably know, and everyone knows that Volkswagen owns Audi and

Porsche.

You'd expect, given the name that

Porsche has, and the image it carries,

it would have the best engine.

But the irony is that the engine

that the Cayman S needs is stuck in that car, in my opinion.

I don't know what you think. But I just think it's the wrong engine in

-the Cayman.

-OK, let's address the looks first of all.

The TT is an iconic design,

but when you try and take it that step further and make it even more

hard-core than the standard car,

you start adding these extra bits and pieces,

like that spoiler on the back.

You start getting that silver stuff on the diffuser...

Whoa, whoa, whoa... So you, Rory Reid,

are not happy that someone has added stuff to a car?

In this particular instance, yeah.

-That's very interesting.

-This is over the top for you?

The problem is, you can't do anything with it.

The Audi TT is stuck in this bubble.

You can't add anything to it to make it look good.

Dynamically, we both agree the looks are questionable.

What's it like to drive? Forget the engine for a second, dynamically?

It's a Golf, isn't it? You can't hide the fact that it's a Golf.

You know, dress you up in an

admiral's outfit, you're still Rory Reid.

And I think that's the same problem here.

You know, ultimately, it's a case of subterfuge.

And to be a geek about it, you'll all know this,

that the four-wheel-drive system in this car is a Haldex system.

That means that fundamentally it's a front-wheel-drive car that can throw

a bit of torque to the back when you need it too.

So in normal driving conditions,

80% of the torque is going to the front axle on that car,

which ultimately means boredom.

That has had a visit from the fun police, and they've gone, "No!"

But it does sound mega.

I was standing by the track when you were doing your laps,

-and it is insane.

-The launch control...

HE IMITATES ENGINE

It sounds like Walter Roehrl in a Quattro S1.

Yeah. Would you buy one?

Oh, God, no. Absolutely not.

So you'd always choose the Cayman over the TT?

I think I'd have a last of the last generation Cayman GTS

with the six-cylinder engine over both of them, really.

I think they both slightly missed the mark.

Now, Chris, there was something that you wanted to address before the end

of the series, a bit of a consumer test, isn't it?

OK, so electronic handbrakes.

How many people here have got a car with an electronic handbrake?

Who has been driving on the

motorway, doing 75mph, pottering along, and thought,

"What would happen if I pulled the electronic handbrake on"?

You must've thought that.

Yeah, you've thought that! Man with beard,

-he say yes.

-Man with beard.

-OK, so anyhow, well,

we went and did it for you because we're a consumer show.

So this is the new, updated Golf R.

Very exciting. 310 horsepower now.

But it also has an electronic handbrake,

which means I can conduct a scientific experiment.

-Mate, what am I doing here?

-You're ballast.

-Ballast?

-Yeah.

-Well, why haven't I got any of this protective stuff?

Because you're bigger than me, and you'd upset the weight balance,

side to side, of the car. This is science, Rory.

-Come on, get with it.

-Well, why don't you get Matt as ballast?

Matt involves lots of paperwork, sadly.

-What, and I don't involve paperwork?

-No, you don't. Right, here we go.

Consumer information for you, you're driving along at motorway speed.

That's 120mph.

German motorway speed.

Don't try this at home unless you've got some budget hockey equipment on,

OK?

Here we go. Let's pull the lever.

BEEPING

Warning, parking brake active.

And we're stopping really, really quite gently, aren't we?

Clutch down.

Well, that was, as science goes, quite useful.

Who would have thought that the brake stopped the car?

The Germans have thought of everything, haven't they?

They've literally dialled the fun out of the hot hatch.

So, what we've got there is just a flap that if you want to pull,

as a passenger, you could pull,

and it would be no problem coming to a halt.

You'd bang your head on the steering wheel, yeah.

It's a good job you wore that helmet.

That's quite impressive, though, the way they've made that work.

But it does mean the death of one thing...

Yeah, handbrake turn.

I'm going to try one now.

Oh, Rory, this is a very, very sad day.

-Computer says no.

-Computer says no.

-I'm not having that!

-Hang on, hang on, hang on.

I dress like a what?

What's your story for looking like a total bellend in that video?

Total bellend. Good phrase.

The producers told me to do it.

Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I'm not clapping that, that's a sad day.

Where's the fun bar? You need the fun bar.

So that's it, the death of the handbrake turn.

I just can't see the point in them. They are utterly useless.

The fact that you don't know what's on or off in half of them.

The number of times I think it's off, and I drive away.

And I love the way it gives you that one yard of freedom.

So you drive one yard, then it stops you.

And you just go...bang,

and everyone thinks you're a complete knob in the

-Porsche 911 that you've borrowed.

-Yeah.

-I mean,

they free up a bit of space for an extra cup-holder,

but the death of the handbrake

is the death of the handbrake turn. And that is... That's tragic.

So you agree?

Rory Reid, we agree.

Well, what a lovely way for us to end the series.

Thank you all so much for joining us for Extra Gear.

And we'll see you very soon. Good night.