Top Gear's The Stig Is Finally Unmasked

The Stig's love of Aussie cars
Stephen Ottley
January 21, 2011

He’s driven some of the fastest, most exotic cars in the world as part of his role as The Stig on Top Gear, but Ben Collins has a soft spot for Australian muscle cars.

Having tested a variety of HSV models that were exported to Britain under the Vauxhall brand, Ben Collins admits he has a soft spot for Aussie cars.

"Well the ones I've driven, I've absolutely loved them," he says. "The stunts we did in the live shows we used them a lot."

"One of my favourites is the VXR Monaro Bathurst edition, Commodore you guys call it. That thing, I just love it because you can pull away in third gear and still spin the wheels."

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The Vauxhall VXR8

"I also spent quite a bit of time in the Maloo and loved that ... those big V8s are quite close to my heart."

Collins also enjoyed his time racing a Holden Commodore V8 Supercar in the 2009 Bathurst 1000 and Phillip Island 500.

He has already begun planning another crack at our local racing series.

"I'd love to [do Bathurst again]," he says. "It's a bit of a strange one because I was ruled out of doing the Gold Coast [endurance race last year] because I wasn't an international driver, which I took as a compliment because they must have seen me as a token Australian."

"Maybe we'll try and revisit the rules next year because I'd love to come back and do it."

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Originally Posted by English Noodles

In response to the ruling a BBC spokesperson said: "The BBC brought this action as we believe it is vital to protect the character of the Stig which ultimately belongs to the licence fee payer.

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so that is why they never told me who it was, I never paid my licence fee!!

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Originally Posted by peterpan

he's confident that someone else will don the helmet and racing suit - no matter what colour he is.

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so Jeremy has given the game away already, it must be Lewis

They still charge that license fee?
I ould be pissed at that.
What If I promised only to watch commercial Television?

the latest episode was much better actually, queer boy may has had his hair cut and Jeremy looks like he has had a hair transplant, but he need to get the tobacco stains in his teeth polished

Top Gear: is the new Stig a woman?
Top Gear last night unveiled the latest incarnation of its anonymous driver, The Stig, amid rumours that this time it could be a woman.

Jeremy Clarkson, one of the BBC show's presenters, claimed to have no idea the new Stig was Photo: BBC
By Victoria Ward 1:00PM GMT 24 Jan 2011
The new driver is small and slight, prompting immediate speculation that it could be a female racing expert.
Jeremy Clarkson, one of the BBC show’s presenters, claimed to have no idea who it was, but acknowledged that the driver was of small build.
He said: “People are always asking me who The Stig is and now, for once, I can honestly say, ‘I don’t know’.
“The Stig comes up to my legs and makes Richard Hammond look like a giant. All the good racing drivers these days are very small.”
The mystery of the character’s identity has become such a talking point that Sabine Schmitz’s name has already been mooted as a potential candidate. Top Gear: is the new Stig a woman? - Telegraph

Sabine Schmitz

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Schmitz won in CHC and VLN race events, the VLN endurance racing championship in 1998, and is the first woman to win a major 24h race, the 24 Hours Nürburgring, in 1996 and 1997, all with a BMW M3 entered and co-driven by local veteran Johannes Scheid.

In 2006 Schmitz and Klaus Abbelen drove the #97 Porsche 997 in the Nürburgring VLN endurance racing series, entered by Land Motorsport. They finished a strong third in the 24h 2008, beaten only by the factory-backed Manthey-entered winners of 2007 and 2006.

In December 2004, Schmitz gained recognition in the United Kingdom after appearing in the BBC television show Top Gear with presenter Jeremy Clarkson. On her only attempt, using the same car, she beat his best lap time of 9 minutes 59 seconds in a Jaguar S-Type diesel by 47 seconds (Season 5, Episode 5), having castigated his best lap with the comment "I tell you something, I could do that lap time in a van". When trying to film Schmitz, the team couldn't keep up so they used Jaguar test driver Wolfgang Schubauer to drive the Jaguar S-Type R chase car,[4] which means that much of the lap shown on the episode was not the first lap where she set the 9 min. 12 sec. lap time.

Thus, in her second appearance on Top Gear, she actually drove a Ford Transit Diesel in an attempt to beat Clarkson's time set in the Jaguar S-Type diesel. Her final time with the Transit was 10 minutes and 8 seconds (Season 6, Episode 7). For this final lap the van was stripped and streamlined at the front with gaffer tape (Sabine's belt, hubcaps, spare wheel, toolkit and Richard Hammond were removed) and a Dodge Viper was driven in front to help keep the "air clean" by providing a good slipstream to travel through.

Her first appearance on British television, however, was on the 2002 BBC programme Jeremy Clarkson Meets the Neighbours, where she takes Jeremy around the Nürburgring in the "Ring Taxi".

Her third appearance was at the 2005 Top Gear Awards to collect the award for 'Best German' (Season 7, Episode 6).

In 2007, she appeared in Clarkson's Supercar Showdown DVD where she raced an Audi R8 against The Stig in a Porsche 911 GT3.

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Originally Posted by crippen

All the good racing drivers these days are very small.”

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yep, Lewis Hamilton