The Stig

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The Stig

The Stig (Series 3 onwards)
Born:	Unknown
Occupation:	Test driver / trainer

The Stig is a racing driver on the revised format of the BBC motoring show Top Gear. He is cast as a mysterious "tame racing driver" whose identity is unknown, and who never speaks on camera. Nonetheless he is fully credited as a presenter alongside Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May.

His primary function on the show is to post unbiased lap times on the Power Lap board, and to help the week's Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car around the test track. In addition the Stig carries out other driving duties on the show when the need arises. The Stig has also appeared on some of Jeremy Clarkson's motoring specials, such as Heaven and Hell and The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, as well as on BBC's Whizz Whizz Bang Bang.

Contents 1 Duties 2 Origins 2.1 Black Stig 2.2 White Stig 2.3 Big Stig 3 Identity 4 Introductions 5 References

[edit] Duties

The Stig's primary function is to drive various cars during segments of the programme, most often around the Top Gear test circuit, setting unbiased times which are then recorded on the Power Lap board. His second duty is to train the show's weekly Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car.

[edit] Origins

The Stig's name derives from presenter Jeremy Clarkson's days at Repton School.^[1] According to Clarkson, new students were always called "Stig." A proposed name for the Stig was originally "The Gimp" until protests from Perry McCarthy nixed the idea.^[2] Officially there have been two Stigs on the show, while an American "cousin" of the Stig also made a cameo appearance in one episode filmed in the US.

[edit] Black Stig

The first Stig wore black overalls and helmet. He was introduced in the first episode by Jeremy Clarkson as a substitute, as they could not get a professional racing driver to set consistent, fast times. Clarkson noted that "we don't know its name, we really don't know its name, nobody knows its name, and we don't wanna know, cause it's a racing driver." Clarkson then described The Stig as having a very small brain, who had worthless opinions, and suffered from "Mansell Syndrome". Its job description was to just go out there and drive fast.

Black Stig posted a lap time of 1:46 for the Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car segment. This Stig was used for the first two series of the show. He was then "killed off" at the start of the third series when he was shown driving a modified Jaguar XJ-S over the edge of HMS Invincible during a stunt and landing in the sea.^[3]

[edit] White Stig

The current Stig wears white overalls and helmet. He was introduced in the second episode of the third Series as a replacement for the Black Stig.^[4]

The White Stig is more involved in the series than the Black Stig. Some of his work beyond the Power Laps and Star in a Reasonably Priced Car segments has included driving other cars in various segments, including finding a winner between the Aston Martin V8 Vantage, BMW M6 and Porsche 911 Carrera S on the Isle of Man,^[5] determining a winner in a dispute between an Austin-Healey Sprite and a modified Peugeot 306,^[6] acting as a police constable in a Vauxhall Astra police car against the hosts in a white van man challenge,^[7] and racing against the hosts in a bid to see who would cross the starting line at a race track; White Stig driving a Caterham Seven kit car from Caterham, Surrey to the racetrack in Scotland against the hosts in assembling an identical car from the ground up.^[8]. The Stig was arrested for speeding during the challenge and did not make it to the start line.

White Stig has also appeared outside Top Gear in some of Clarkson's motoring specials, such as The Good, The Bad, The Ugly where Clarkson reviewed and compared American and non-American cars, and Heaven and Hell, where the Stig was used to compare the track times of the Chevrolet Corvette C6 and the TVR Sagaris, and raced Clarkson, in a BMW M5, with a Ferrari F430.

[edit] Big Stig

A third Stig of sorts was introduced in episode 3 of Series 9, set in the southern United States, with the presenters given the challenge of trying to buy (and subsequently sell) a car for $1000 US (less than the price of renting one during their two week holiday).

One of the challenges given to the presenters was to have the cars set a lap time around a racetrack, for which "the Stig's American cousin" was introduced. Also wearing white overalls, he was dubbed "Big Stig" (though Hammond refers to him as "Fat Stig" later on) due to his larger girth. Clarkson commented that Big Stig's "more relaxed" driving style worked well for an ultra-soft Cadillac.

[edit] Identity

The Stig's true identity is never revealed on the show, and in order to maintain the secrecy, all shots show him wearing full racing overalls and matching helmet. All that can be seen from the gap between his helmet and jumpsuit is that he is a white male with dark hair. It is also known that he wears size 10 racing boots as discovered by the Sunday Times when the Driving section wrote an article about the show.^[9] During an interview The Stig spoke to a Dutch reporter on camera.^[10]

Another source of entertainment for the presenters is the music the Stig chooses to listen to while doing Power Laps around the Top Gear track. Often a specific genre will be chosen for one or more series. These have included one-hit wonders, easy listening, prog rock, baroque, advertising jingles, foreign language tapes, and romantic novels. Clarkson claimed in the show's first episode that music keeps the Stig calm during test laps.

The identity of the first Stig was revealed to be Perry McCarthy when his book Flat Out, Flat Broke was published in 2003. McCarthy is a former Formula 1 driver and test driver for the Benetton, Arrows and Williams teams, and also tested for BMW F1.

The identity of the new Stig has not been officially revealed. In a Winter Olympics special episode of Top Gear, the Stig was shown doing a ski jump using a snowmobile. According to the Swedish tabloid newspaper Aftonbladet, the driver performing the ski jump stunt was Dan Lang, a Swedish snowmobile cross driver.^[11] In January 2006, a Daily Express article reported that Julian Bailey is secretly the Stig.

Several Formula 1 drivers have appeared on the show over the years, and in their interviews the show has hinted that any of them may be the Stig, without ever revealing his true identity. The Top Gear website also lists the Stig under the "F1 drivers" section of the Power Lap board.

In the episode of June 26, 2005, Damon Hill appeared as the "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car". When asked directly by Clarkson if he was the Stig, Hill evaded the question and did not provide an outright denial or confirmation.^[12] Mark Webber was interviewed on July 31, 2005 and at the conclusion of his lap Clarkson presented him with an "I AM THE STIG" T-shirt. Webber was then warned not to wear it around the F1 paddock, as "Michael doesn't always wear red".^[13]

When former F1 driver Nigel Mansell appeared on the show, Jeremy Clarkson noted that the Stig theorised that the Suzuki Liana (the show's "reasonably priced car" at the time) could achieve a 1:44 time on the track.^[14] Mansell proved the Stig's theory by lapping in a time of 1:44.6. Clarkson also noted that Mansell's racing line through the first corner was the same as the one taken by the Stig.

During the review of Jenson Button's lap, Clarkson commented that he, as did most of the other F1 drivers, took very different lines than the Stig. Button commented that "...obviously, the Stig isn't a Formula One Driver then".^[15]

[edit] Introductions

The presenters of Top Gear regularly introduce the Stig with a few jocular, spurious rumours before each appearance. In earlier episodes, the Stig was introduced with various ad-libbed lines from the presenters, such as "Please welcome, his Holiness, the Stig!" Later episodes standardised the introduction, usually leading in with some outlandish claim (e.g., "Some say the outline of his left nipple is exactly the same shape as the Nürburgring"^[16]) and concluding with "All we know is, he's called the Stig." The general suggestion created by these introductions is that the Stig is not a human being. In the first episode of the show the Stig was consistently referred to as "it".

[edit] References

edit Top Gear
Top Gear (1977 to 2001) - Top Gear (2002 to present)
Original format presenters
Jason Barlow - Steve Berry - Julia Bradbury - Jeremy Clarkson - Vicki Butler-Henderson - Brendan Coogan - Noel Edmonds - Chris Goffey - Kate Humble Tony Mason - James May - Tiff Needell - Michele Newman - Angela Rippon - Quentin Willson - William Woollard
Current format presenters
Jeremy Clarkson - Jason Dawe - Richard Hammond - James May
Also starring
The Stig - Top Gear Dog
Current format episodes and broadcasters
Top Gear Episode List - Top Gear Broadcasters and Video Releases
Current format featured segments
Power Laps - Races - Star in a Reasonably-Priced Car - The Cool Wall - Caravan destruction - Cheap Car Challenges
Spin-offs
Rally Report - Top Gear Motorsport - Stars in Fast Cars - Top Gear of the Pops
Related articles
Top Gear Magazine - Fifth Gear