MOTOR-BLOG from Coventry

Yep we was there, if you’ll excuse the poor english. The Auto Italia Magazine Italian car shows are always a great affair, but this one really was tops. Why? Well because unlike last time, we actually went in an Italian car. I say we, I mean myself and Jim, our Italian car corespondent.

The show is also good as it is at Stanford Hall - a great venue, and not far from the greatest city in all of Britain. Well Coventry, but you get the idea. So with this show on the doorstep, Jim fired up the Monte and piloted it to his first show in his dream car. I followed on in his everyday car, an Alfa GT JTD. Yes it may be modern, but I actually like it a lot, it’s very stylish and it’s true what they say - driving an Alfa really is a special experience.

The attendence was cracking too - perhaps because the public were show starved last year with all the poor weather we had? Perhaps. I’m sure it had nothing to do with the fact that Top Gear were doing one of their adventure pieces and driving three Alfas to enter in the concours. Shock horror - some broke down and they kept bashing into each other…

I’m sure when they edit it all together it’ll be very amusing, but it did make kind of a mockery of the concours - and people were quite disrespectful to the ‘proper’ cars entered - some of them sitting on very rare top condition motors to watch the filming. Were these people really car fans? I suspect not - a real petrol head wouldn’t sit on and risk damaging a car at a show. No, a lot of these people were celebrity chasers…      

Still, it brought the punters in, and the car selection were great. The many Ferrari’s in attendence left me cold (as they always do) and why do the owners all insist on wearing red Ferrari branded T Shirts to match their cars? I’ll keep my opinions to myself on THAT one I can tell you, but an ISO Griffo? Yes please. Maserati Khamsin? Yup, I’ll have one. Alfa Romeo Montreal? Well, if you insist…

Also present was the Lea Francis club with a fine display of fine Coventry built cars to round the day off. Oh, and Jim was interviewed by Jeremy Clarkson and James May about his Lancia Monte Carlo, so a good day was had by all, and Clarkson was quite nice about Jims car, so that won’t make it into the show then…

Well it’s come around quickly again - another new series of Fifth gear. That’s two series on from the Tim Lovejoy stint at the helm, which was OK I guess, but not great. A lot of people I know (and from what I hear at work) haven’t got a lot of time for this programme, but I think that Fifth Gear are getting the mix about right.

Now that the ‘New style’ Top Gear is not as fresh as it once was (which it isn’t) and old Jezza Clarkson’s totally predictable ’stick with the same old bullshit’ is back with a vengence i.e. - old cars are crap, BL cars are rubbish, anything under 200bhp is worthless, old cars are owned by blokes with beards drinking real ale, etc. etc, etc ad nauseum, the old style magazine car review programme has actually become attractive again.

For a start, reviewing cars that people may want to buy is a good thing. The first programme in the series pitched the new Citroen 4×4 against an old 2cv bought for £800. The 4×4 won of course, but would have shed well over £800 in depreciation as soon as it had the first name on the log book. Well you do the maths, the 2cv wins in my book and will be worth more than that 4×4 thing in eight years time. While we’re on the subject - thank goodness for Jonny Smith.

At last a bloke who loves old cars and doesn’t look like Chris Goffey (bless you Chris) and here’s the thing, Jonny Smith comes into our office from time to time and he is a genuine bona fide car enthusiast plus a nice bloke to boot. Anyone who is spending large amounts of time (and no doubt money) building himself a V6 powered Allegro can’t be bad in my book.

Making fun of older cars and people who own them is simply lazy, lazy journalism (says the motoring journalist who has only been doing it for a few months i.e. me, so don’t take my word for it - nevertheless it is lazy…fact) so when a programme like Fifth Gear bucks this trend it buys itself some credibility. Lets face it, Top Gear is a very successful entertainment programme that just happens to have the odd car or two in it. Top Gear is now more about the presenters than the cars.

The formula goes like this: Make fun of James ‘Captain Slow’ May’s sense of direction/hair/clothes then make fun of Richard ‘the hampster’ Hammond’s teeth/height/daytime TV presenting. Then have Jeremy Clarkson driving really badly in a car that no-one could afford - driving said car on the track using no more skill than turn in, boot the throttle to spin the car. Then film the car going backwards out of control whilst still in a forward gear to a cacophany of tyre squeal and smoke. Then cut and edit later to make it look as if Clarkson is doing a great powerslide. Simple.

Throw in a smattering of phrases to describe the supercars featured - ‘epic’ is a popular one which seems to be used in every episode. Then buy something old, trot out a load of outdated, wholly inaccurate and mostly false twoddle, plus undo some bolts and loosen some handbrake cables so that the cars fall apart/don’t stop/breakdown for good measure. Drive to Slough, and then smash them up (preferably into a caravan or two) whilst awarding yourself points for doing so. No matter what the outcome, Clarkson MUST win. Finally, end the programme by uttering the line ‘..and on that bombshell…’ and there you go - the Top Gear formula for world domination. 

Don’t get me wrong, I love watching Top Gear - for a start it’s a car related programme that my girlfriend and I can sit down and watch together, which makes a nice change, and the experience that the presenters have in motoring journalism is in no doubt. I like Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond, they are a good team and the show is really put together well - it’s just that it’s getting a bit up it’s own arse for my liking, and becoming predictable. In fact the only thing that really surprised me was the treatment of the Peel P50 - quite refreshing that was, so perhaps there’s hope yet.

 If only Fifth Gear would stop trying to compete with it and doing it’s own half arsed stunts (with obviously very little budget) I’d be happy. Fifth Gear should forge it’s own path instead, becoming the very best and informative motoring magazine programme on the TV. There is room for both Top and Fifth Gear(s) to flourish , and in this time of everythings the fault of cars and we’re all gonna die because of them absolute bullshit which we are enduring at the moment, we might well be in for a TV car programme renaissance.

I for one hope so.