The season premiere of Top Gear has come and gone. Airing earlier this month on BBC Two and last night on BBC America, the series opened its 21st season with Lord Grantham himself, Hugh Bonneville, as the shows Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car.
 

For those few that have not seen and/or heard of the series for the past twenty years, the ‘Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car’ segment of Top Gear, has presenter Jeremy Clarkson interviewing a celebrity and then showing a clip of their attempt to drive round the Top Gear track, which was filmed earlier. They are then put on the leader board either to their delight or humiliation. Over the years, there have been four ‘reasonably-priced-cars’ – a Suzuki Liana, Chevrolet Lacetti, Kia Cee’d, and the newest member of the team, the Vauxhall Astra.

Seated in his Vauxhall Astra, which was introduced as the newest reasonably priced car in 2013, Bonneville didn’t show much confidence at the possibility of besting the top time of 1:45:1 by Brian Johnson, lead singer of AC/DC”, saying: “I’m fairly cautious, I’m not very adventurous and I’m rubbish at parking. Luckily, there isn’t a parking segment to this program.”

Bonneville finished with a time of 1:50:1 for his best lap time. In Lord Grantham’s defense, the track was incredibly wet and when you think about it, if you watch Downton Abbey, he has a driver so it’s pretty impossible to think he could have topped the board given his time behind the wheel is minimal. The current leader board for the Vauxhall Astra looks like this…

1. 1:45.1 – Brian Johnson
2. 1:45.6 – Jimmy Carr
3. 1:46.1 – Hugh Jackman
4. 1:46.7 – David Haye
5. 1:46.8 – Warwick Davis
6. 1.47.8 – Benedict Cumberbatch
7. 1:48.5 – Rachel Riley
8. 1:48.8 – Charles Dance
9. 1:48.9 – Joss Stone
10. 1:49.9 – Tom Hiddleston (very wet)
11. 1:49.9 – Ron Howard
12. 1:50.1 – Hugh Bonneville (wet)
13. 1:51.0 – Steven Tyler
14. 1:51.5 – Mike Rutherford