Top Gear series 28: your full preview

Top Gear TV is back! Last time, they were cooked alive in the Ethiopian desert, inverted in a hearse and electrocuted in the Midlands but, for some reason, Paddy McGuinness, Freddie Flintoff and Chris Harris have agreed to come back for another series of telly at least tangentially connected to automotive journalism.

This time, they’re taking an altogether more sensible approach, as they test budget convertibles with a roadtrip from Bognor to Essex. Oh, and race a McLaren Speedtail against the RAF’s latest fighter jet. And scale Peru’s giant peaks in knackered old American jalopies. And compete in the Baja 1000. And discover if it’s possible to bungee jump a car. (Conclusion: the ‘descent’ part, surprisingly straightforward. The whole ‘stopping the car before it hits the ground below’, that’s the tough bit.)

It kicks off this Sunday, 26 Jan at 8pm on BBC Two. You know what to do.

Photography: Lee Brimble

Be careful what you wish for. When Paddy, Chris and Freddie mentioned they’d like to do the original American roadtrip, they were doubtless picturing a gentle blast down Route 66, taking in a drive-in cinema and a couple of diners, perhaps ending at the Pacific Coast Highway.

If only it was that simple. Because – as the producers delighted in pointing out – the first roads in the Americas were, of course, built by the Incas in the Andes. So our presenters were each ordered instead to buy a classic American roadtrip car for the original American roadtrip, an expedition across the highlands of Peru.

Paddy chose a Pontiac Trans-Am, or at least a car created by someone who might once have seen a Pontiac Trans-Am. Chris bought a Dodge Dart, because someone’s got to. And Freddie went for a VW bus, which no one had the heart to tell him wasn’t really an American roadtrip car in any shape or form.

Cue a car-destroying trip through brutal terrain. But it’s not all bad... at least the lads got to have an ice lolly.

With 616bhp, the M8 is the most powerful BMW ever made. This is a good thing. At over £120,000, it’s also the most expensive M-car yet. This is not such a good thing. For that sort of money, would you really have an M8 over an Audi R8, or a Honda NSX, or a Bentley Continental GT, or an Aston Martin DB11? On the TG track, Paddy McGuinness tackles that definitely-not-rhetorical question.

Buoyed by their unexpected success in Formula Off Road last series (sixth and seventh best in country, though admittedly the country in question was Iceland), Chris and Freddie head to Mexico to compete in the most gruelling off-road race on the planet: the Baja 1000. A 24-hour, 800-mile non-stop charge over brutal desert terrain. An endurance marathon that tests machine and human to destruction. And beyond. Way beyond.

It’s 25 years since Colin McRae became the first British driver to win the WRC. Time, then, for Chris Harris to revisit one of the greatest motorsport seasons ever with a misty-eyed retrospective. And, while he was at it, to borrow McRae’s championship-winning Subaru Impreza 555 for a thrash around the woods. He’s selfless like that.

To celebrate the 100th birthday of the sports car, Paddy, Chris and Fred took a new Porsche 911, Aston V8 Vantage and Ferrari Portofino on a nice gentle roadtrip around Yorkshire. Which, somehow, ended with Fred crashing a weird lie-down bike thing into the end of an airfield.

The Volkswagen ID.R is one of the most unhinged, unlimited racecars ever built. A 670bhp, all-electric, four-wheel-drive one-off, built not to compete in any normal, regular race series, but instead simply to rewrite the record books. An EV that pulls so many g in the corners, it causes drivers to black out. Chris Harris is a man with his own pair of race gloves, and thus was ordered to test the ID.R to its very limits – and, perhaps more pertinently, his own – at the fearsome Portimão circuit. Can Harris handle the Pikes Peak and Goodwood record holder? Will his face ever be the same again?

We’ve done research and discovered the average cost of a summer holiday is £600. Per person. Yes, six hundred smackers to scrunch yourself into an airline seat for three hours before turning yourself an attractive shade of vermillion and enjoying a bout of sunstroke. Surely there’s a better way to spend £600? What about a new-to-you convertible?

To find out, the presenters each bought themselves a very cheap cabrio – Chris a Merc SLK, Paddy a very Nineties Escort, and Fred a monstrosity called the Chrysler LeBaron – and set out on a glamorous journey from Bognor Regis to Essex. During which they were squirted with a ‘low-friction synthetic sweat substitute’, pelted with golf balls and marooned in the sea. Because consumer testing.

Ask yourself this: is there a better way to entertain yourself of a Sunday evening than watching bona fide Top Gear action hero Freddie Flintoff attempting to bungee jump a Rover Metro cabrio off a huge Swiss dam? Obvs, no.

You might ask “Why?” Freddie did, quite a number of times, while suspended 400 feet above an unyielding valley floor. The answer? Not merely a bid to discover if Mr Flintoff has any function remaining in his fear-gland (spoiler alert: definitely a bit), but also Chris’s latest money-saving tip.

See, the new Ariel Atom costs about 40 grand, and accelerates from zero to 60mph in 2.8 seconds. This is a good amount of acceleration for the money. But in freefall, an object – for example, a Rover Metro cabrio-shaped object – will accelerate from zero to 60mph in 2.7 seconds. Atom-grade acceleration for nothing! Provided, that is, you can arrest the progress of said object before it hits the ground.

Get ready for one of the most palm-sweat-inducing bits of telly of the year.

The Land Rover Defender. Say what you like about the looks – and plenty have – there’s no question it’ll be a ridiculously capable off-roader. But, reckons Paddy McGuinness, there’s a problem. Stick a few options on it, and the new Defender is, potentially, a 70 grand car.

That’s a lot of money for something that’s meant to be a rural runabout. So Paddy took it upon himself to create his own capable-yet-luxurious rural 4x4, a machine that’ll get you anywhere, and treat you to a steaming cup of oxtail soup when you get there. Introducing... the Dirty Rascal. A go-anywhere expedition vehicle, blending the no-nonsense practicality of a Bedford Rascal van with the off-road smarts of a Daihatsu FourTrak. And a dash of ‘provincial town day spa’ for good measure. And an on-board hot drinks dispenser. All for seven grand.

After testing the Dirty Rascal against its closest rivals at Millbrook Proving Grounds, Paddy was ordered to bring it to Scotland for a race against Britain’s ultimate off-road machines: the Special Forces.

We’ve been here before... but this time, it’s serious. Enter McLaren’s new hypercar. It’s called the Speedtail, it costs two million quid, will do 250mph and looks like a spaceship.

The fastest British car ever, the Speedtail also has a three-seat layout with central driving position, making it a) the spiritual successor to the incomparable McLaren F1, and b) the perfect car for the driver who enjoys the company of not one, but two ‘special friends’.

In other news, the RAF has a new fighter jet. It’s called the F-35B Lightning II, it costs £100m, will do 1,200mph, can land vertically, and has guns. It is, in short, the sort of machine that only the lightly daft would challenge to a race. So Chris and Paddy grabbed a McLaren Speedtail and headed to RAF Marham to do exactly that.

Time to set that record straight...

Need a little more TG before the series kicks off this Sunday? Head this way for a new trailer...