The BBC’s Top Gear ‘terrible trio’ of Clarkson, Hammond and May never ceases to surprise, and yesterday’s (March 11) episode of the popular TV programme featured them trying their hand at rallycross for the first time – the results of which were surprisingly impressive!
The aim was to prove that motor racing can be achieved on a modest budget and the starting point was our heroes’ purchase of three modestly-priced second-hand cars – a BMW 328 for Clarkson, a Citroen Saxo for Hammond and a Toyota MR2 for ‘Captain Slow’. Kumho’s role was to supply the tyres – the company’s proven C03 tarmac rally tyres for Clarkson and May and a set of the much vaunted V70A road legal competition tyres for Hammond, who was competing in a different class.
The venue was Lydden Hill, Kent and the meeting was a proper rallycross event run to BTRDA (British Trial Drivers’ Association) regulations, so the boys inevitably met some experienced opposition; considering which Hammond and Clarkson did well to feature in the B final. What about May we hear you say? Ah well…….
Kumho products are no stranger to Top Gear and in recent times featured in the team’s infamous shoot-out with Germany aboard Kumho-shod Bowler Nemesises. They were also very prominent when the futuristic Mazda Furai appeared in the Top Gear studio.
Kumho has played a major part in the European rallycross scene for some time now, sponsoring and supplying the control tyres for the British championship for many years and still fulfilling that role for the French one. The road-going V70A tyre used by Richard Hammond is the same as Kumho Motorsport supplies to BAC for its innovative single-seater Mono – a car that featured strongly on Jeremy Clarkson’s 2011 Christmas DVD.
Commenting on this recent Top Gear adventure, Kumho’s European Motorsport Manager Steve Thompson said: “We enjoyed being involved with the feature and were quite impressed with the way the guys got on, as rallycross is not an easy discipline to learn. It was good to see this popular branch of the sport getting some mainstream TV exposure too, something it deserves but very rarely receives these days.”
