The Man in the White Suit

by Ben Collins

  The supercharged Range Rover was the ultimate tracking weapon. It provided a moving platform for the camera crews to film whatever the presenters got up to in their cars. It was big, ridiculously fast and had a tailgate, allowing a cameraman to shoot from the back without falling out.

  At six the following morning, the crew were busy rigging at the start line in Palma, surrounded by palm trees swaying in the morning breeze under a clear blue sky. Complementing the Titanic yachts in the harbour were numerous Porsches and muscle cars, any of which boasted more power in their headlights than the bhp of our three entries put together.

  I was charged with filming James May with Barbie doll Madison Welch aboard their 1970 Citroën Ami 8. It would take more than clever tracking to make that little biscuit tin look dynamic. James played on his Captain Slow character and hammed up his eccentric, mad professor image, but his real personality was never far from the act.

  Before the cameras started rolling, he was trying to look in every direction other than the bulging Page 3 breasts bobbing next to him. When Madison asked for some help to tighten the shoulder harnesses that clicked into her waist belts, the set came to a standstill. Our sound operator was first to drop his bacon roll and dive in through the passenger window to assist her. Whilst he craned his head around in our direction to have his picture taken, James shifted uncomfortably in his seat and snuck a sideways peep at what he dubbed ‘the work of the divine potter’.

  Having secured Madison’s breasts, it was time to start the rally. Everyone climbed aboard, with Casper filming from the boot, his assistant and the sound recordist in the back seat, and Phil, the young up-and-coming director, alongside me.

  We rolled out of Palma in convoy, with the other Rangies leading Jeremy in his little Austin Healey Sprite and Hammond in the lumbering Lanchester. Casper, Ben and Iain blazed away with their cameras, cleaning up Grand Vistas of the glistening beach, the rugged yellow stone mountains and close-ups of the star cars, with Phil monitoring the dialogue via the soundman.

  ‘Fast Porsche coming through on your right, Casper,’ I shouted.

  ‘Thanks, Buddy. Casper hoovered a shot of James being zapped.

  ‘EYES, RRRIGHT …’ An anonymous voice over the crew channel. The spotting game was off to an early start, with a hot blonde in heels and a snug bikini strolling the ocean drive.

  ‘What’s he saying in there?’ Phil asked.

  ‘He’s asking her to calculate speed and distance formulas, and she’s telling him to shut up and drive faster,’ replied the soundman.

  ‘Beard …’ the radio crackled as we passed a pedestrian in a trench coat with a set of outrageously bushy mutton chops.

  ‘Bearded woman with DOG,’ Iain called.

  That spot was declared a winner.

  ‘Jeremy’s making a phone call to James,’ the soundman reported.

  I turned to Phil. ‘I’m indicating right but James isn’t.’

  James was prattling away whilst Madison gazed out of her window. Neither seemed too concerned about the direction they were travelling. All they really needed to do was follow the Rangie. I slowed in front of him and pointed to the slip road. James flew straight past and missed the junction, blinded by the headlights in his passenger seat.

  I put the supercharger to work and caught him up again.

  ‘We’re going the wrong way,’ James squeaked. ‘We should have turned off the motorway by now.’

  ‘Er, we know. Just follow the tracking vehicle from now on, Jimbo. We have to make a U-turn.’

  The rally course followed the coast for a while before peeling up into the tree-lined mountain roads. ‘Rally’ exaggerated our mission. The aim was simply to mark the most precise time and speed over a set distance, although that rule didn’t apply to anything with a Porsche badge. Those guys were taking huge risks on the closed mountain passes and waiting at the end of the stage to set the correct average.

  James and Madison were the picture of a dysfunctional couple. With the corners tightening into hairpin bends, James put in some spirited helmsmanship, rolling the car into its suspension so much that the wing mirrors scraped the tarmac. Maddie fiddled with her lipstick and looked singularly uninterested. We stopped at a checkpoint and I asked what she thought of James’s driving.

  ‘’E’s awful. I thought I was gonna be sick. In them corners I looked out the window and all I could see was road.’

  ‘You should be fine. Just keep your arms inside the car if it really leans over.’

  ‘No shit, Sherlock.’

  God knows what a young girl like Maddie made of a clique of eccentric blokes filming cars, but her previous experience certainly came in handy. Phil fidgeted and gnawed his nails as he summoned up the courage to explain a delightfully gratuitous shot of her working her magic with some soap and water.

  ‘Basically, you’ll be leaning over the car in a tight, er, white T-shirt. And as you’re wiping the car, you know, um, well, some of the water will, er, you know, get on your shirt …’

  ‘Oh, wet T-shirt,’ Maddie chirped. ‘Yeah, I done that one. No problem.’

  We bolted a small camera to the front of the Rangie, so I could chase the farting French supermini through the corners and get some forward tracking shots. Casper had been glued to his viewfinder monocle for nearly three hours, which was murder for motion sickness and would bubble chunks in the hardiest of men.

  I had to match James’s speed precisely to keep the nose of the Rangie a few feet from the Citroën as we belted through some dense woodland.

  With James leading the way, we inevitably got lost in the town centre and arrived too late to enter some of the stages. The rally rounded off with a few circuits. I joined Grant, who was busy tanning his biceps, to watch the presenters pound around in a chase scene from an Inspector Clouseau movie. Clarkson’s helmet poked out of his convertible like a cartoon character as he was harassed by a Ford Mustang.

  James finished off his day with Madison over a delectable picnic of strawberries, foie gras and chilled Chardonnay. Madison swooned in the love scene; after five takes the sun and the plonk had taken their toll.

  Brian the dwarf announced that he was unusually accomplished at handling liquor for a man of his stature, but was very concerned for Madison’s wellbeing. We helped her trot indoors to drink some water in the shade. I was looking forward to dinner.

  The patron of the rustic hacienda reserved a special table for the twenty-five film crew and guests in the far corner of his restaurant. Brian tucked straight into the vino rosso and Madison did her best to focus on her soup. On the arrival of the second dish, Brian appeared excessively disgruntled by the temperature of his spaghetti. When he rejected it a third time and his noggin started circumnavigating the rafters, I suspected that his gazpacho was due a second coming.

  I hustled Brian into the fresh air with Grant, and we propped him up against the garden table. We really needed to get him back to the hotel, but not before a final showdown of man pride.

  I had already laid waste the crew champ in an arm-wrestling match: now it was Grant’s turn to feel the burn. As we clapped our paws together and took the strain, I began to regret my recent enthusiasm for the wine and garlic mussels.

  Iain helpfully chanted in my ear, ‘Go on, Grant, have ’iiim …’

  Russell, the cockney soundman, offered me some cool instruction. ‘All you gotta do, Ben, is go over the top. Seen it a million times; it’s all in the wrist.’

  Grant stayed as firm as the pillars of Zeus. It was a dead heat.

  ‘Well,’ Russell said, ‘seems the only way to settle this one, fellas, is a good old-fashioned fistfight. Chop chop.’

  We completed the night in a taxi with a paralytic dwarf, a broken stiletto and a sore arm instead.

  Chapter 21

  If It’s Got Wheels

  The crew were as adaptable as they were wicked. By land, sea and air, from the polar icecaps to exploding volcanoes in Iceland, they conquered the sights and sounds of th
e world for the purpose of light entertainment on a Sunday night.

  My favourite method of filming was by helicopter; it offered so much perspective at speed and could follow the action almost wherever it led.

  I flew out to Valencia to film Sauber’s new Formula 1 car. Felipe Massa was driving and it was the first time I’d caught up with him since Formula 3. He was still down to earth and smiling at a world of opportunity that was opening up for him.

  I was driving a BMW that had been hurriedly modified with a ton of scaffolding to act as a tracking vehicle. The camera was rigged too close to the exhaust, which blew condensation over the camera lens. Also Iain’s camera operating console was malfunctioning, so we kept getting fixed shots of either sky or tarmac.

  By the time an F1 engine was switched on it cost the team around £50,000, so every lap counted. I had to drive the BMW flat out just to prevent Massa’s engine overheating. And the track was damp.

  Iain rode in the back cursing the equipment, and I had Phil directing from the passenger seat. It was his first time on track with me. To communicate with Massa he had to relay everything via the team, so they could pass it on through Massa’s earpieces. Phil was having a shocker getting his shots and our allotted laps were counting down.

  ‘Can you get alongside the F1 coming out of this next corner?’

  ‘Yep, but he’s not making it easy,’ I replied. ‘He keeps pulling up on the way out …’

  The BMW sank low on its wheel arches as it struggled through the turns under the burden of the metal cage and camera. It was an embarrassing contrast with the thoroughbred F1 bird trundling alongside on idle.

  Determined to drive out of the corner ahead of Massa, I had the traction control off and squeezed hard on the gas. The tyres spun and I ended up sideways on the slippery painted exit kerbs, just as he popped up alongside for a close-up. The rear snapped back into line and the Sauber promptly romped away.

  ‘Phil, this camera is shit,’ Iain chimed, oblivious to everything else. Phil turned slowly towards me as I chased after Massa and said, ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Yeah, no problem.’

  ‘You sure? Do you need to pull over for a minute? Because from where I’m sitting, we nearly just hit a Formula 1 car.’ The colour had drained from his face.

  ‘No, we’re fine, I had options.’ I fought to keep a straight face. ‘Phil, this camera’s shit. I can’t pan or focus; all I’m getting is sky,’ Iain said.

  We took a five-minute break which turned into two hours of watching the local technicians try in vain to resolve the camera system. I explained to Massa the track positioning we were trying to achieve, and we managed another sketchy run with more footage of sky, tarmac and glimpses of Sauber.

  Phil hopped into a helicopter to shoot from the air. As it crabbed sideways down the pit straight, all eyes were on the Formula 1 car as it exited the last corner and sped into view.

  Phil sensed something was wrong, glanced up from his viewer and felt the air sucked out of his lungs by what he saw.

  ‘BRIIIIIIIIDGE …’

  The pilot swivelled his head to the right and clocked the walkway over the middle of the pit straight, now metres away from the airframe and only feet below the spinning blades. His wrist snapped at the cyclic stick and he cranked the collective to gain altitude, hopping the bridge just in time.

  ‘Thank you, Señor.’

  Most helicopter shots were achieved using a stabilised head operated by an onboard specialist or by a guy hanging his ass out of the door with the recorder on his shoulder. It required a combination of skill and balls to sit in the fresh air with both hands on the camera, with a false view of the horizon, and still manage to keep the target in focus.

  Iain May lived for these occasions. He was da man when it came to reading oncoming traffic so that I could overtake with impunity and scythe through the countryside.

  One of the finest scenic drives in the world was the Flüelapass from Davos to Susch in Switzerland, a 17-mile stretch of stunning alpine road. Wave upon wave of heavenly corners punctuated long straights and a scattering of cambered hairpins. The medley of juicy bends flowed through a seam of green and snow-capped peaks, so high that if you were about to meet your maker it was only a short trip.

  I was driving a 200mph Mercedes CLK63 Black automatic, one of the most nimble weapons in the AMG armoury. It was jacked with brute power, boasted a telepathic feel through the tyre to the road, and flew through the mountains like a Messerschmitt. Its carbon-fibre cockpit contained a moulded racing seat that fused you to the ride. The tight suspension and direct brakes made it ideal for arriving late into the turns, pointing in and blasting off on to the next straight. The massive torque of the Affalterbach motor was over-zealous for its tyres; you hung on with both hands.

  Iain took to the skies with a two-way radio that he kept live so he could operate the camera joystick and talk me through the traffic without moving his hands. With my eye in the sky, blind corners were no more and I kept a constant picture of the terrain.

  Zip, zip, zip to a thundering rpm in fifth gear, running parallel to the rail tracks approaching a bundle of traffic, into a wooded hill with no line of sight.

  ‘All clear, clear ahead, splash ’em.’

  No need to brake, straight past the lot and down the hill.

  ‘90 left coming up, then two cars, don’t pass.’

  Braked down to third, slightly threw the steering, big powerslide, straightened and held behind the two cars. I could see the parallel road coming out the other side of the next hairpin was clear, booted it past the obstruction and entered the corner.

  ‘Nice one, Ben. All clear.’

  I caught a group of bikers strewn along the road like a Hell’s Angels chapter of the pinstriped variety. Some rode in pairs, side by side; the rest were linear and offered little room to overtake. I eased past them one at a time to ensure none of the organ donors fell off their mounts, then caught the two leaders. Alerted to the presence of an infiltrator, they sped up, beards and ponytails whipping in the airstream.

  The road rejoined the railway for a straight run and the Merc splashed past with ease. This riled Ponytail, who wound back the throttle on his Milwaukee vibrator and tagged along. It was CHiPS, Swiss cheese style, versus me in a 460 horsepower race-tuned Merc with a helicopter in my pocket …

  Iain updated me on a section where the road curled left downhill and crossed the train tracks. The f lat level cutting through the road would act like a jump, the sharp drop that followed like a landing ramp.

  As I arrived at the tracks I braked, dropped two cogs to third, released the pins and took off. All four rubbers left the deck on a slight angle across their axis, with some lift on the front left owing to the diagonal cut of the tarmac.

  My head kissed the sunroof as I vaulted out of the seat and banged back into the deck, no dramas. And Ponytail …?

  I looked up to the head mirror at the wall of tarmac, pine trees and sky behind. It really was a big drop. Suddenly the fat hog flew into view about two metres off the ground. Ponytail was clinging on for dear life. His saddle bags extended from their side mounts like wings, the left one reaching up over the back of his seat. The dynamic effect of his weight over the handlebars kept the nose pointing earthwards, the saddlebags tilted his rear wheel high and to the side, so that I could the spokes spinning.

  Ponytail landed his machine with bags and moustache in some disarray. He popped the white flag and cautiously applied the brakes, no doubt scanning for a lay-by in which to hose off the river of gravy running down the inside of his leathers.

  At lunch on top of a mountain the following day the boot was on the other foot. Clarkson had been driving the Merc and had somehow annoyed a cyclist on the way up. Jeremy arrived at the top considerably faster than the cyclist, parked up and slurped back another espresso from Heidi’s tavern. Meanwhile the cyclist pumped his pedals for another fifteen minutes and visualised ways of murdering the Mercedes driver.

  I w
as chatting with the crew in the lay-by at the top of the hill when I clocked a goliath of a man stepping off his racing bike on the other side of the road. He looked pissed and he was scowling in our direction.

  He was at least six five and 220 pounds, and he was solid. Once the traffic cleared he strode purposefully across the road. He wore a mankini, like Borat’s, only his was high-vis yellow over black leggings. He was a terrifying sight. Jeremy copped it first.

  ‘Who is driving the fucking Mercedes?’

  This was the first occasion I’d seen Jeremy lost for words. And as he turned to face him, he appeared to have shrunk at least six inches.

  ‘Is it you, huh? You’re driving this car like a fucking idiot?’

  ‘No, it’s not me. I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  It was a good opener, but Mankini wasn’t to be put off that easily.

  ‘This car is going up and down like stupid. Who is the driver?’

  ‘I don’t know, but I think he went that way …’ Jezza pointed randomly back down the mountain. Good work, mate; just don’t start pointing in my direction.

  Mankini was livid at being denied a righteous kill. He lectured us on the sanctity of two-wheeled travel, yelled, ‘Fuck all of you,’ and loped back to his nut-hugging Lycra buddies.

  Our visit to Switzerland was not entirely unwelcome. Brian Klein, TG’s studio director, was helming Clarkson’s DVD and led our convoy of supercars to another location at the base of the mountain. As Brian climbed out of the Aston Martin DBS, the female proprietor of a local restaurant came running out and refused to let go of his arm.

  Brian was wearing an urban cowboy ensemble, with pointy boots, bleached jeans and a stripy top over his well matured physique. After we ordered some food and the rest of the proprietor’s family had been assembled, the cause of the commotion became clear.