Episode 8 Top Gear USA

On Top Gear, the fastest way to Las Vegas...

Have you seen a limo around here waiting for me?

..The ultimately confusing driving machine...

But I still can't figure out what to call it.

..And some Poison on our track.

I got a lot of speed, and no control right now.

Welcome to Top gear.

On this show, no weight will be lost, no wives will be swapped.

But if you enjoy the smell of tyre smoke, this is where you belong.

I'm Adam Ferrara, that's Tanner Foust, and this is Rutledge Wood.

And this, courtesy of the Petersen Automotive Museum, is a Porsche 356.

It's the first production car in the world to carry the Porsche name.

Company founder, Ferdinand Porsche, once said,

"If one does not fail at times, then one has not challenged himself."

And now the company he left behind is challenging itself to come up with a new car.

I went out to see whether or not they were setting themselves up for a fail.

'In two syllables, it defines an entire category.

'Sports car.

'One glance of its coat of arms conjures up superiority, racing pedigree, and a rear engine.

'And their pursuit of automotive advancement gives us a faint glimmer into the future of automobiles.'

The name Porsche's synonymous with sports cars,

and they've had some great ones, like the 911.

They've also had some not so great ones, like the 924.

But their newest model is low, sleek, muscular, and...

DRAMATIC MUSIC

..it's a four-door.

'This is the Porsche Panamera Turbo.

'It'll set you back almost 134 grand,

'and that buys you a staggering top speed of 188 miles per hour.'

'That's not just sports car performance...

'..it's supercar speed.

'But it's a sedan.

CLASSICAL MUSIC

'Looks like the engineers at Porsche have taken up their founder's challenge, and delivered a 911...

'with a front engine... and too many doors.'

And you might be thinking, "That's a big, fat, fail already."

I mean, Porsches should be making sports cars, not sedans.

And they've never made a sedan, which clearly shows(!)

'Just look at this thing.

'The last time you saw something this hunched back, it was hanging off the Cathedral at Notre Dame.

'Pretty it's not.'

'It gets a little better once you get inside,

'but the cockpit's got so many bells and whistles, I need Chewbacca riding shotgun.'

Look at all these buttons.

Earlier, I tried to put on my heated seat, and two missiles came out of the headlights.

This is confusing.

I'm also a little confused by the name, the Panamera.

'Porsche says it's named after the Carrera Panamericana, the Mexican road race in the Fifties.

'But the race only lasted three years after numerous fatalities.'

They do not mention that in the brochure(!)

So it's not pretty, it's got a dumb name, and a dashboard that would baffle even NASA,

but not everything about the Panamera is a fail.

Now, one of the CEOs said he wanted to be able to sit in the back seat in total comfort,

and he's 6ft 3, just like me.

'Porsche put bucket seats in the back that are similar to the front seats of the 911.

'There's plenty of leg room,

'and the synthetic suede headliner has a bubble that gives the back seat an incredible amount of space.'

Having a big back seat is important in any car,

but is it worth the sacrifice when it looks like an eggplant?

But when you drive it...

..it feels amazing.

Driving this thing in sport mode is like holding on to a missile.

I mean, this is a sports car.

So what if it's got two extra doors? When you're looking this way, you won't even notice.

The Panamera Turbo has a massive 4.8 litre twin turbo V8 engine

borrowed from the Cayenne Turbo SUV.

It delivers a whiplash-inducing 500 horsepower.

And weighing over 4,300 pounds,

it needs as much power as it can squeeze out to maintain its sportiness.

This sedan can do zero to 60 in one...

..two...

..3.8 seconds. That's faster than an Aston Martin DBS!

This isn't just quick for a sedan. This is just quick, period.

But even if it accelerates like a Porsche, there's no way it handles like one, right? Wrong!

CAR SKIDDING

The handling on this car completely matches the power.

It is so tight and so precise, yet completely forgiving when you need it.

And with the all-wheel drive, you just point and shoot.

And it goes wherever you want.

Up wings out!

I feel like I'm having an out-of-body driving experience.

I know I'm driving a four-door, but it feels like a sports car.

Much of the body is built from aluminium

to reduce weight and improve fuel economy.

It's nice to see that Porsche's at least striving to go green.

But sometimes you can take things a little too far.

Here's something strange. It's called the start-stop system.

Let's say I'm driving in traffic and come up to a light, so I stop as normal.

But then the car dies.

But that's not a problem.

It's designed to do that to save gas, and it works.

All I have to do, take my foot off the brake,

the car fires back up, take off.

Did I mention it has launch control? Check this out.

Come to a complete stop.

First, put it in Sport.

Then you put it in Sport Plus.

Put your left foot on the brake, bring the rpms up to five grand,

wait till it says "launch control activated" and hold on!

Holy moly! Man, I think the front end left the ground!

100...

..110, 112...

..122...

..130...

..139...

..150...

HE LAUGHS

..158...

..164, 166, 167!

And I'm running out of room.

167 mph in a four-door!

HE LAUGHS

Thank you, Lord.

The Panamera might not conform to what you make expect from a Porsche,

but I don't think old Ferdinand'll be turning in his grave just yet.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

-So, you liked it?

-You know what? It is pretty good.

This is the top-of-the-line turbo model,

which is a little bit pricey at 134 grand,

but you can get a base model Panamera for 74 grand,

which is a pretty good deal,

considering you get a sports car and an everyday grocery-getter.

I still wouldn't buy one.

Are they really claiming that this is a potential track car,

that you can play with like on the weekends?

They think so, it's got launch control and a lap timer -

they are serious about this car.

It's unbelievable, but there's only one way to find out,

and that is at the hands of our silent racing driver.

So, take it away, Stig.

All right, on the line, activating the launch control.

Out of the hole extremely quick for such a heavy car.

0-60 in under four seconds.

Really amazing, as it goes into turn one.

Into the chicane, this is one of the tighter track sections.

Stig just bored inside, really, I think.

AUDIENCE LAUGHTER

Comfortable, upset to drive a big behemoth.

Into the teardrop, tightest section of the track,

when you get 500 hp on this corner it can be difficult to stay tidy.

A little bit of wheelspin on the way out of that one,

but, amazingly, just picks up the speed,

really gets out of its own way.

130 mph on the back straight here.

Now the Stig is starting to get a little bit excited,

goes through the bumpy corners,

the Panamera absorbs it absolutely with no drama.

Into Cameraman's Corner, tyres squealing,

complaining they have to work with 4,300 lbs.

Coming into the Ss, making his way quickly towards the last turn.

A little bit out of shape year, little bit of opposite lock,

fighting his way into the last corner and across the line.

APPLAUSE

Wow.

I have to say, it looked a lot quicker than I thought it was.

Yes, for something that big he was cooking.

Coming out of the corners is where it looks most impressive,

even when it's sliding it picks up speed quickly.

I would call this a GT car,

and to give you an idea of where the GT cars land,

we've got a V12 Vantage with quite a bit of a horsepower advantage at a 1:28.2.

Getting a little bit optimistic, the Mercedes SLS with a 1:27.6.

You think it was quicker than a Mercedes?

-AUDIENCE: No.

-Not a chance, right?

The Panamera did a 1:25.3.

-Woah!

-Wow!

-That's faster than a Lambo!

That's faster than a Balboni.

1:25.3, I am absolutely shocked at that, to be honest with you,

I can hardly believe it.

Wow.

I mean, I know a lot of people would agree that in their mind

a Porsche only has two doors, and I'm one of those people,

but you've got to admit,

that is a fast sports car they've built, and it has four doors.

APPLAUSE

Now it's time to answer a classic question

what is the fastest way to travel across this country?

If you're going coast-to-coast, of course, it's to fly,

but what if your destination is only 500 miles away?

Is it faster to fly, or drive?

It really is a dilemma we've all been faced with at some point.

For example, if you're going from Chicago to Detroit.

Let's say you're in New York, is it faster to fly or drive to DC?

Or if you're in Talladega and you need to get to Bristol.

Or, the classic for us, how many of you have driven from LA to Vegas?

CHEERS AND LIGHT APPLAUSE

And how many of you have flown?

OK, so it really is a question - which is quicker, LA to Vegas, flying or driving?

To find the answer, Tanner and I packed our things and met in Hollywood.

-Mr Rutledge.

-Hey, Tanner.

-How you doing?

-This place is awesome, huh?

-Yeah, it's incredible.

'Grauman's Chinese Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard.

'This would be the starting point of our race.

'The producers had given us two envelopes marked "fly" and "drive".'

I'll drive.

Great, I will fly and whup you.

-When does it say we actually start?

-Uh, it says now.

So I guess...

All right.

Probably should figure out what we're looking for before we get going.

Ferrari key, that's a good sign.

And a parking ticket.

'I had to find my car in the parking garage, hit the freeway,

'drive the 272 miles across the desert to Las Vegas

'and beat Rutledge to the finish line,

'at the Fontana bar in the Bellagio Hotel on the strip.'

Southwest Airlines flight coupon.

'I had to go 12 miles to LAX, fly 231 miles to Las Vegas,

'then go the two-and-a-half miles from the Vegas airport to the strip.'

Hey, man, have you seen a limo around here waiting for me? No limo?

-Hollywood Highland Centre Parking Garage.

-It's right down here.

Taxi! Do they have taxis here? Taxi.

I heard a honk. Nice!

Wow, this is beautiful.

'This is the Ferrari California.

'0-60 in under four seconds and a top speed of 193 mph.

'This grand tourer is the first front engine V8 Ferrari ever.

'It's a car designed for this race.'

Wow, my driver's licence is not going to make it through the next two hours.

'Two turns from the parking garage and I was on the freeway on-ramp.'

Oh, yeah! The shifting is ridiculous.

Finally, there we go.

'After 10 minutes, my cab finally arrived.

'Next stop, LAX, just 12 miles away.'

Oh, my gosh, the transmission on this car...is unbelievable.

It's the dual clutch that actually slips the current gear

and engages the next one before releasing the first clutch.

What it means is instantaneous shifts.

It's awesome.

'20 minutes had gone by and I hit the infamous LA traffic.'

Seems to be a lot of places to buy weed here, a lot of marijuana places.

DRIVER: Oh, yeah.

-California sure is different, isn't it?

-Everything is different.

Man, who would have thought.

I need to go east here.

Uh-oh, this is going the wrong way.

'I was so mesmerised by the smooth shifting I missed my exit.'

This is not a good start right now.

Oh, come on, there is no way she can pull that off, come on.

Those pants.

That's way over. Oh, come on.

Even I wouldn't wear that.

-Hey, Tanner, what's up?

-Rutledge!

So, what kind of car do you have?

Ferrari California.

Isn't that the kind of girly-like Miata one?

No, it is the manly, incredibly masculine, huge,

broad-shouldered, hairy-chested Ferrari.

'The irony of the Ferrari California is that it represents

'everything the company's founder, Enzo Ferrari, hated.

'The only reason he sold sports cars was to fund his racing team.'

Enzo is quoted as being a bit disgusted with his customers that bought the street cars.

He thought they bought them for the prestige of owning a Ferrari,

not for the performance of the race heritage of the car.

'We finally got to the airport.

'We'd gone 12 miles in 45 minutes.

'That's an average speed of 16 mph.

'I'm sure Tanner was making better time.'

We're going to cut this a little close.

'I was somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert

'when I finally lost all traces of civilisation.'

'100 miles behind me was the traffic of LA.

'Ahead, the Mojave beckoned my California into its vastness.'

'The California's shape was created by the legendary design company, Pininfirina.

'But some people, like Rutledge, have complained

'that it's too shapely, too feminine for the famous prancing horse.

'But there's a reason for all those curves.

'Ferrari spent over 1,000 hours in the wind tunnel to make this

'their most aerodynamic car ever.'

And this is probably the perfect desert road trip car.

It's slippery as can be, it just rips through the air.

100 mph is like absolutely nothing.

-Do you have your ID, please?

-Yes, ma'am.

I've got to warn you, it's a pretty good picture, you may want to keep it.

All right, I've got 179 miles to go.

Rutledge is almost certainly on the aeroplane right now.

If there was ever a time in history for divine intervention,

it's right now.

The flight's delayed until 2.55.

-OK, what time does that put me there?

-It gets you there at 4.05.

Wow, OK.

AUTOMATED VOICE: Incoming call.

I guess that means you're not in the air.

Oh, no, we're on the plane, we're just about to take off.

You know, it sounds kind of like you're in the terminal,

not like you're in the aeroplane right now.

Uh, my flight's been delayed by just a couple, two or three minutes.

How long's the delay?

What time do will you get on the plane?

Uh, we're going to leave at 2.55,

so we'll be there at like...

HE MUMBLES

The fact of the matter is, in the US,

domestic air travel is just like hopping on a bus.

They pack you in like cattle, like these guys in here.

That guy's like a modern-day airline pilot right there.

'Even with the delay, I knew that once we took off

'I'd be jetting past Tanner at over 500 mph.

'The Ferrari is quick, but I was about to hit the mother of all fast lanes,

'and Tanner would be doomed.'

How are you? You have a beautiful scarf.

Uh-oh, fuel light is officially on.

Incoming call.

Hello?

Hey, Tanner, how's it going, man?

I don't know if you just heard that beep in the background, but that's my fuel light,

and I've got 32 miles of fuel,

and 36 miles of highway before the next fuel station.

Oh, this is awesome!

That's the best news I've heard all day.

We're actually very close to Death Valley,

where it could be 138 degrees in the shade.

This is not what I had in mind when I picked the Ferrari key out of the envelope.

I've read that if you follow semi trucks, you can add 40% to your mileage.

It's like drafting in NASCAR.

I can feel it pulling me, actually, it's kind of nice.

I don't even need to really accelerate, at all.

We're on the Boeing 737.

This cost 65 million brand-new,

plus we've got a range of 3,500 miles.

The downside of that, it costs almost 15,000 to fill the bad boy up.

Little bit of a trade-off, but we know, 544 mph top speed,

and that's impossible to beat on the ground.

'After 15 miles crawling behind the semi, I'd suddenly hit me -

'I was hyper-miling a friggin' Ferrari.'

'Enzo would haunt me, spit in my face.'

I'd rather walk in the desert

than drive 62 mph in a straight line all day.

'And then I spotted a gas station that wasn't on my GPS.

'Lady luck was back on my side.'

What? No!

Abandoned.

Here you go.

-Oh, boy!

-Mmm, yummy.

-Thank you.

-I'll even open it for you.

Oh, you are the best, Christine, thank you.

Aah.

'I was driving on fumes when I finally crawled into Baker.'

We did it.

We did it. Yes!

'This had to be a high-speed pit stop.

'I knew Rutledge was up there somewhere, filling his greasy beard with pretzel crumbs.'

I wonder if Tanner made it to the gas station.

LAUGHS EVILLY

'I was back on the highway with just 80 miles to go.

'Up above, Rutledge was surely jetting ahead of me.

'It was time to get this California out of California.'

All right, I'm going to call Rutledge.

If it rings, well, I'm screwed. That means he's on the ground.

If it goes to voicemail, he's still in the air and we've got a shot.

PHONE: Hello, thank you for calling Abe Thrillman -

the sausage king of Chicago.

Leave me a message.

I think that answers a lot, actually.

PILOT: Ladies and gentlemen, we have begun our descent into Las Vegas.

Please bring your seat backs and tray tables to their upright and locked position.

we are in the state of Nevada.

And no sign of Rutledge.

Now, this is a real trouble part of the trip.

Right now I've got to wait for everybody to get off,

so for every minute that I stand here,

if you figure Tanner's going 75mph,

then that is...

Let's say Tanner is going 60 mph,

then we know for every minute I stand here he's going one mile.

Come on, bag, come on. Sucker's burning.

Oh, there's my bag.

Incoming call.

-Hello?

-Tanner.

Rutledge, I don't hear any slot machines in the background, where are you?

I am in Vegas, I am holding my bag

and I'm in line for a taxi, my friend, you better step on it.

Can you see the strip?

Yes....

Rutledge was just two-and-a-half miles away from the Bellagio,

and I was still 25 miles away.

Damn it! Pedal to the metal.

-How quick can you get us to the Bellagio?

-About 10 or 12 minutes.

10 or 12 would be great.

There is the airport on the right.

Has anyone seen a little Tom Cruise in a girlie Ferrari?

Plaid shirt?

Real good hygiene?

There's the strip!

No way I am losing this right now.

There's a taxi three cars ahead of me, that could be him.

I've got to catch that taxi.

-Is this a three cylinder?

-I think it's a six.

Oh, a six.

I'm ready to feel that fury of six angry cylinders, I tell you what.

'267 miles down, three to go, straight down the Vegas strip.'

-How far do you think we are from the Belaggio?

-Almost there, third stop light after this.

Come on!

Three stop lights stand between victory and myself.

Oh, man, we are one traffic light away from the Belaggio!

The fountains are waving, they're saying, "You won, get in here!"

Right, there's the Belaggio, we're looking for the north valet.

Man, I hope we won.

Come on!

There we are, the Belaggio, Las Vegas.

Stay to the right, follow the wall on your left

until you get to it on the right.

All right, I think we've lost our way a little bit.

You guys smell that?

Smells like victory.

Over here. No, this way.

I didn't see the Ferrari out front, I think we might have won.

Oh man... Tanner?

Oh, yes!

Oh! Oh!

Oh, that's awful! Oh, you're not serious!

-I got you an Appletini, dude.

-How long have you been here?

-Days.

-No, about four minutes, actually.

-Dammit!

You know, when you fly in the air - delay, 50 minutes is nothing.

How long was your delay?

-50 minutes. Man.

-That's the risk you pay.

-It really is.

-There are some benefits to winning.

-Oh, really? Like what?

-Watch this.

Oh!

HE LAUGHS

How did you do that?

Those hands - magic.

You see, flying is too stressful for me.

Last flight I was on, the flight attendant quit, grabbed a beer and slid down the slide.

I would have beat him if my plane hadn't been delayed.

That's the problem with flying, when's the last time you had somebody say,

"I was late because there was a problem with the landing gear on my car?" Doesn't happen.

-Did you like the Ferrari?

-I did.

At first, I was sceptical, a V8 when you really want a V12,

but the harder you drove it, the more the racing heritage of Ferrari came to the surface.

All that matters is that we learned one thing.

If you want to get to Vegas from LA, take a Ferrari.

Nice real-world advice for everybody here, thank you, Tanner.

APPLAUSE

All right! Now it's time to put a big star in our small car.

Please help me welcome rock legend, TV star, and his new show is called Life As I Know It, Mr Bret Michaels!

Woo! Bam! Boom!

Thank you. Thank you, everybody. How are you doing?

Good to see you.

-Man! I'm fired up right now.

-Good to see you, my friend.

It is good to be alive.

Listen, today, I say this, all the organs are here,

everything's working right now, functioning.

-He made it!

-Thank you.

-APPLAUSE

Thank you very much.

First, let me ask you about your new show, Life As I Know It.

It's a combination of everything that is my life, and shows the balance between the love I have

for my daughters, and my passion for being on the road, trying to make both worlds work.

Being who you are and your past, when you have to be dad to your daughters,

and you go "Don't do that!" and they go, "Dad! You gonna show me one of your old videos?"

Happens all the time.

In our house, we have a go-kart track, I'm teaching them to ride, they got the little ATVs,

They had all their friends over, going way too fast, and I say, "You gotta slow down,"

and I go, "God, I've officially become my father."

You weren't in boxer shorts and black socks?

I was! With the things that hold the black socks up.

"Slow down! You wrecked the Ferrari." "I know what I'm doing!"

LAUGHTER

I do have your car list here, and it is extensive.

-The first one was the Ford Galaxy, you buy that from your father?

-200 bucks.

It was the olive green, with the black vinyl top, it was a ladykiller.

You pulled up in that and you knocked 'em out.

-If you ran 'em over.

-Yes.

-And then Harleys, of course.

-Yeah.

-You were a big bike guy, and when you got a bit of money,

you bought a Porsche.

The first Porsche I got was the 944, not the 924,

and unfortunately, I hate to say this, I didn't have much luck with it.

I bought it used, and it was a disaster for me.

This is no lie, it broke down on me at a gas station in Hollywood,

and I left it there and they collected it for 500.

You know, they come and tow it away for 500 bucks?

Unfortunately for me, that particular Porsche,

I should have investigated a bit more, it wasn't the best running car.

This was what I wanted to ask you, because I remember reading about this,

Poison actually had a NASCAR.

-Right? What year, was it 2000?

-2002.

Derrike Cope was driving it, and I'm a big NASCAR fan,

and we wanted to get him to sponsor a car, it's very expensive, but we love doing it.

We had some good luck, and what was killer,

-the best TV time we got out of it is when it blew the engine.

-Right.

It was on fire, and it looked great.

They just stuck under the hood of the car.

That's the way you go out, burning in flames.

I have to ask you, what did you think of that monster Suzuki SX4 we have for you?

Honestly, I was so pumped up to get out there and drive around that track,

and it really... Actually, it handled great.

-I got in there, I was way too excited, my heart was pounding.

-You had fun?

-I had a blast.

You guys want to see his lap?

CHEERING

Here's the beast. Hey, you launched that, very quick.

Can't they speed this up to make me look fast?

Coming into turn one, and no brakes at all.

BLEEP

Too sharp.

OK, this is the chicane, very tight. You're through there, my friend.

You're coming into the teardrop, the slowest part of the track.

-And I'm proving it, right?

-Yes, you are.

-I thought I was going a lot faster than that.

-That's pretty quick.

BLEEP

BLEEP BLEEP

I missed a gear right there is what happened.

I've got all my excuses lined up!

This is the back stretch, the fastest part of the track.

I got a lot of speed, and no control right now.

-Which could the Suzuki's marketing slogan!

-Exactly!

-That's pretty aggressive, now you're coming up into Cameraman's Curve.

-Yeah, they all step back.

BLEEP me!

-Am I allowed to say that?

-That's perfect, we can get bumper stickers.

Everything the state taught me has gone at this point.

-You're driving like a rock star.

-I'm only half stoned here, that's the problem.

Slap it down into second.

All right, this is the final curve.

Last corner, and you are across the line!

Thank you.

Where do you think you came on this board?

I want to win, so I'm hoping I'm above Tony, but I'm feeling it wasn't my finest,

so I'm going to say just under Tim Allen.

OK, I have your time here,

and you did it in 1...

forty...

..four...

No!

..point...

four.

Oh man, you're kidding me!

APPLAUSE

-Thank you, thank you.

-1:44.4.

You know the beat-down I'm going to take from Kid Rock?

-Thank you for having me.

-You are our final guest, and we usually don't do this,

-but here at Top Gear, we want to give you a special prize.

-I would love that. It's a bowling ball?

No, this is Bret Michaels' Top Gear helmet!

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Dude, that is... Thank you everybody.

CHEERING The trophy!

And now it's time for Tanner to test a strange German mutant.

'In Frankenstein, a tortured scientist brings a spark of life to an odd collection

'of human and animal parts.'

'The result was a larger and more powerful version of a human being.'

'Although, by most accounts, very ugly.'

'Many car companies worked the same way. A chassis here, an engine there.'

'Then they create something bigger and more powerful.'

'But is it better?' This is the BMW X6 M.

'M stands for "motor sport"

'and they're responsible for creating the M3, the M5 and the M6.'

They don't have much imagination when naming cars, but they know how to make them go fast.

'Like Dr Frankenstein, the M-division scientists went into the lab,

'sliced the top off an X5, stirred in a potent twin turbo V8

'and grafted on the swoopy greenhouse from the 5 series GT.'

'Add some angry sparkplugs and you have the X6 M.'

Honestly, driving this car feels like you're driving

a sports car, except you're sitting on the ski rack.

There's just something wrong about being so high in the air

and having so much performance.

The X6 M runs about 90,000.

Which is 22 grand more than the regular X6.

Load up all the options and you can drop 105,000.

This car is deceptively huge on the outside, but, on the inside,

it's tiny.

The X6 is almost an identical layout to the X5, BMW's luxury SUV,

without all that pesky practicality and backseat room.

Now, the dash is shared with the X5, so it's a pretty nice place to be,

but there are quirky bits - for example, the transmission.

The shifter is almost like a PlayStation joystick.

You go down for drive and up for neutral, up again for reverse.

If you want to do manual shift mode, you kick it over to the left and it's reversed.

If you want to go down, you go up, and if you want to go up, you go down.

One interesting thing.

You'd expect a car for 90,000 to have auto setting on the climate control.

This has three - soft, medium and, I couldn't make this up, intensive.

'To shake down a machine like the X6 M, it needed some room to run.'

'So I took it to the track.'

'Miles of open asphalt just begging for rubber.'

Now, the regular X6 was already ridiculously fast.

It surprised us with a twin-turbo V8, making 400 horsepower.

But that didn't stop the M division of BMW saying,

"You know, I bet we can make this weird, little thing faster."

'So they bolted on two dump-truck-size turbos

'and replaced the fuel injectors with fire hoses.'

Mix all that fuel with this dry desert air

and 550 horses lay waiting beneath your right foot.

This will do zero to 60 in under four seconds.

That's faster than a Porsche 911 GT3.

For a car that weighs 2,000lbs more, it almost defies physics.

But the real magic with this machine isn't its straight-line speed,

it's that it handles really, really well.

It can pull more Gs in the skid pad than an M5 or an M6.

It's incredible.

Good things happen when I push this little "M" button, which might as well stand for "magic".

The suspension gets a little stiffer, the steering gets more responsive.

The dynamic stability control lets me slide a little bit more.

It basically lets me live out my destiny as a BMW owner

-and drive like an absolute

-BLEEP.

If you turn off the "M" button,

instantaneously the ride gets a little bit softer.

The steering gets a little squishier.

But why would anybody want to do that, anyway?

'Like the Frankenstein monster, the X6 M is a beast, a more powerful version of its predecessors.'

'But the Frankenstein monster was tortured

because he didn't know who or what he was.'

The X6 M struggles with that same identity crisis.

Is it a crossover? Definitely not.

A crossover was designed to be a lighter, more fuel-efficient version of an SUV.

This thing has the mass of a battleship.

And if you drive it the way it wants to be driven,

it gets about nine miles to the gallon. And that's not a joke.

Is it an SUV?

No. Remember, the "U" is for "utility".

This thing has tiny rear seats, a roof line so low that you have to bend over double just to get in.

It's really not a very useful car.

But is it a sports car?

It sure drives like one,

but sports cars are designed to work in concert with the laws of physics.

The X6 M seems to go fast in spite of them.

It just goes down the road, flipping the bird at the natural world.

I am completely blown away by it,

but I still can't figure out what to call it.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

So you like it, even though you don't know what to call it.

It's just flat-out confusing. What would you call this thing?

-A monster car.

-A monster car.

-SUGGESTIONS INDISTINCT

-All right, all right.

How about fastback utility?

An FU? That's a good idea(!)

-LAUGHTER

-I was thinking a sport utility coupe.

LAUGHTER

-The SUC.

-You want to label this a "suc". Right(?)

OK, how about this? A fastback utility coupe.

All right, it's time to put this machine, whatever it's called, to the test

and put it in the hands of our silent racing driver.

So take it away, Stig.

Off the line, there is no denying

X6 M is an absolute torque monster.

Twin turbos cranking up.

Stig not wasting any time around the first corner into the chicane.

Kind of strangely comfortable. Nobody body roll to speak of,

even with it sitting up so high up off the ground.

Stig not impressed.

As he comes through the Teardrop.

Four-wheel spin as he claws his way out of there.

Huge amount of acceleration on to the straightaway.

It may be big, it may be a little bit ugly,

but it's doing 130mph on our track right now.

-Whoa!

-He is throwing it through the course.

Now he's starting to get excited.

Working the paddles a little bit

as he cranks it out of Cameraman's Corner

and into the Ss, another very challenging part of the track.

Wow. He is pushing it hard. Coming into the last corner.

This could be a respectable time. And across the line he goes.

APPLAUSE

It looked really good, didn't it?

But, earlier, the Stig saw the Ferrari California - the one we raced to Vegas,

that completely smoked you to Vegas. He got hold of the keys and he did a lap on that one.

It turned in a very impressive time.

The Ferrari California, 1:28.5.

Really quite an impressive time, yes. A round of applause for that.

Pretty incredible, but with such a quick board,

it's even at the bottom of the board almost.

The BMW isn't going to be quite that fast,

but ultimately really respectable, with a 1:30.0 from the big beast. Really amazing.

APPLAUSE Pretty good.

Pretty big machine.

For something this tall and heavy, that's an impressive time, even if you don't know what to call it.

It is staggering. You could see how hard he was throwing it. It's impressive.

Because we've got a serious line-up of performance cars.

OK, how about this?

A sport hatchback injected turbo...

-LAUGHTER

-OK. I think that's all we have time

for tonight. Thank you for watching. Goodbye.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd