For four days, encompassing eight live arena shows and a motoring festival, Sydney was thrust into the spectacular that is Top Gear Live. Hosted by Jeremy Clarkson, James May and V8 Supercar driver Greg Murphy people came from all over Australia to get a piece of the action.

Before entering Acer Arena for the live show we were able to pass the time at the Top Gear Live Festival. With activities ranging from an Xbox challenge against other punters, the Anglo Motorsport Pit Stop Challenge, exotic and historic racing car legend displays, somewhere to freshen up your hair and make up to a Harley Davison race simulator there was something for everyone.

A couple of highlights of the Festival for me were being able to see motorcycle stunt legend Matt Mingay and precision stunt drivers, the Toyota Hilux Heroes, in action.

Matt, whose career highlights include two world records and being a stunt double for Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible, drew the crowds and wowed them with his display. Sitting on his Harley Davidson handlebars while travelling on one wheel and doing his own commentary was nothing short of incredible. After his performance he was more than willing to sign autographs for his many young - and not so young - fans.

After Matt, it was the Toyota Hilux Heroes turn to thrill the crowd.  You were able to win a chance to experience what they do first hand and the next thing I know I have a helmet on and was sitting in a Toyota Yaris, jumping over a 3m gap and spinning around on wet pavement. Thinking that was a lot of fun, I was then harnessed into the passenger seat of a Toyota Hilux. Seconds later we are up on our side, on two wheels. Lawrence, the driver, talked the entire time he was manoeuvring and balancing the Hilux. Who says guys can't multi task?

 If all of that wasn't enough, it was soon time to go inside, take our seats and strap ourselves in for the live arena show. After a couple of compulsory sponsor adverts, it all started with a bang, lots of smoke and fire. You could be forgiven for thinking you were at a rock concert, but with cars, and not your ordinary, every day cars.

There were a team of Ford Focus RS covered in a special paint that changed colour after going through a heat tunnel in between all the precision driving moves, Subaru Imprezas literally set on fire and a Suzuki Swift with a Mitsubishi Evo IX engine doing doughnuts on an elevated platform no bigger than its turning circle.

 In addition to all of this Clarkson, May and Murphy interacted with the crowd and brought the Top Gear flavour to the show. First up was a race with vehicles they had made out of appliances from garden sheds, such as a whipper snipper “Harley”, a six “chainsaw” speed car and a leaf blower hovercraft. 

Next it was time for the cool wall before the audience were split in two and competed against each other in a race around the Top Gear track. It was a computerised race where the amount of audience noise controlled the speed but a race none the less.

In lieu of the extraordinarily popular car soccer this year was a six lap race of Reliant Robins. The three wheeled vehicles were made famous in the Top Gear television show as the car May and co host Richard Hammond had attempted to launch into space.

Competing in the race were the three hosts, joined by local Today show host Karl Stefanovic and former Australian cricket legend Michael Slater. Everyone spent almost as much time on their side as they did on all three wheels much to the crowd’s amusement. I don't think Formula One will be stealing any ideas from them any time soon but it looked like a whole lot of fun regardless.

 A parade that included an Aston Martin, Audi R8, Ferrari California and a Pagani Zonda had the crowd (including me) wishing that lottery win would come sooner rather than later before The Stig came out to play “Carmageddon”. A gladiatorial type battle that had him pitted against four other drivers ended with The Stig completing the worlds only inside loop to loop.

If he entered the loop too fast in his Honda Firebird powered Rage buggy he could hit 6 g's and burst blood vessels in his eyes, too slow and he could drop off the top of the loop. Luckily, neither of these happened and it was the perfect end to the a show that had everything: laughs, crashes, exotic supercars, stunts and the witty banter that everyone loves about the Top Gear television show, just, live. by jacki Warnock http://www.girlracer.co.uk

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Comments (1)

• |2010-02-24 05:04:59 Lachlan  - Worst live show ever
  Wow, I'm surprised that Clarkson would put his name to such tripe!
  
  Blog post explains it all:
  ****trackshun.tk
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