Top Gear, this one's for you

ANYONE who saw James May violating an airport in an airship probably knows by now it never happened for real.

The latest in a series of Top Gear stunts was outed by the nationals this week as being a complete set up, with everyone at Norwich International completely clued up on why a caravan was drifting over their heads. But did it make it any less of a laugh to watch?

If anything, I think it’s an opportunity for Jezza, Hamster and Captain Slow; why not use the media attention to massage the Top Gear brand a bit more? We’ve already had Top Gear of the Pops and Top Ground Gear Force, plus umpteen books, DVDs and CDs covering their adventures, and I’ve a few more ideas for Auntie’s Great Top Gear Expansion.

Tap Gear could be used to replace the truly dreadful Strictly Come Dancing (surely no one watches that) with sprightly Stigs doing most of the dancing. There’s also scope for Top, Gear, Action, a police car chase show with Jeremy bestowing the benefits of safer driving, before blowing up another caravan. And James May's partnership with wine bore Oz Clarke could easily become Top Beer.

Stig Brother is another great show in the making – I’ll leave you to dream up your own format – but my ultimate favourite would be Have I Got Top Gear For You, a topical quiz where comedians and politicians can crack jokes about all the week’s breaking Top Gear stories.

You’d have to be a complete tool to think Top Gear isn’t at least partly staged, and once you get that and your longing to see a road test of the Renault Scenic out of the way the show’s still a thundering hour of Sunday night telly. I just wish the tabloids would stop ruining it for everyone else.

I’m such a dedicated Top Gearist that I even defended Jeremy Clarkson live on air once, but part of me still yearns for simpler times when balding men called Quentin would make driving a Daewoo through Dewsbury on a damp Thursday seem entertaining.

However I am quite sad, which probably explains it.

Image copyright of the BBC