AMG is Mercedes-Benz’s performance brand. When people say “AMG,” they mean the faster, sport-tuned versions of Mercedes cars and their special engineering.
This is a way of talking about AMG before and after Mercedes took over. The host is implying the cars felt different once the company was fully integrated.
This is talking about a business deal where Mercedes-Benz and Chrysler were connected under the same corporate umbrella. The host is using it to explain why AMG’s cars seemed to change over time.
This is a Mercedes-Benz CLK model that was tuned for more power and performance. The host is saying his CLK 55 looked and sounded good, but it didn’t end up being a great car for him.
The C43 is a Mercedes C-Class that’s been tuned by AMG for stronger performance. In the conversation, it’s presented as a step up from earlier AMG models.
The SLS is an AMG supercar from Mercedes-Benz, and it’s known for its V8 sound and the iconic gullwing doors. The host is saying it’s the best AMG era/car they’ve experienced and that it’s great to drive.
Gullwing doors are doors that open upward, like a bird’s wings, instead of swinging out normally. The host is using them to describe why the SLS looks so dramatic.
The BMW 6 Series is a bigger, more comfortable BMW than the smaller 3 Series. Depending on the year, it can come as a coupe, convertible, or wagon. The podcast is referencing a specific wagon version and saying it was enjoyable to own.
Car
SL63 2010
The SL63 is a high-performance Mercedes-Benz SL roadster made by AMG. The host is talking about his 2010 car, including the mileage and price, and he’s especially impressed with the engine.
The BMW 3 Series is a popular BMW model that’s meant to be comfortable for daily driving but still fun to drive. People talk about it a lot because some versions are very sporty and have become famous. The podcast is bringing up a specific 3 Series generation and its M3 variant.
The BMW M Coupe (E36) is a sporty BMW with a two-door design. It’s based on an older 3 Series generation, but it’s made as a special performance version. The podcast is mentioning it because it’s not as commonly seen as other BMW M models.
A launch color is the special paint color a car is introduced with. People remember it because it’s tied to the car’s first release and can be a recognizable detail.
This is a BMW M3 from the E46 generation. It’s famous for being fun to drive—good steering and handling. The hosts are comparing it to how AMG cars later became the “nice to drive” choice.
This is an AMG version of the Mercedes E-Class wagon. The point is that it can be driven like a normal family car, but still has serious performance. They’re using it to show AMG became “nice to live with,” not just a track toy.
A V8 is an engine with eight cylinders arranged in a V shape. The hosts are using it as a symbol for the traditional AMG character—if AMG stops making V8s, they feel the brand’s identity changes.
The SLS is a famous AMG supercar from Mercedes-AMG. The host brings it up to talk about when AMG’s “first” products happened and how the brand’s lineup evolved.
Traction is tire grip. If traction is good, the car can accelerate without the wheels spinning.
Concept
four-door electric coupe
A “four-door electric coupe” is an electric car that looks sporty like a coupe, but it has four doors for easier access. The speaker is using it as an example of a questionable design direction.
“Group think” means people in a group start agreeing with each other too easily. Instead of challenging ideas, they go along with the majority.
Term
technobor
It sounds like a made-up word the reviewer used to say the car is so tech-heavy that it changes how you experience everything about it. The idea is that the car’s “personality” is mostly controlled by software, not by classic engine sound and feel.
In this context, “programmed” refers to how an electric AMG’s driving feel (response, throttle mapping, stability behavior, and even sound/feedback) is controlled by software calibration. That means the sensation isn’t coming from a naturally aspirated engine’s inherent character, but from what the engineers choose to simulate and deliver.
Naturally aspirated means the engine pulls air in on its own, without a turbo or supercharger pushing extra air. The speaker is contrasting that with a car where the feel is mostly created by software.
E63 is an AMG-tuned Mercedes E-Class with a powerful V8. In this conversation, they’re talking about the older AMG formula—big engine feel—before newer electric/tech-heavy approaches.
Mercedes is a car brand. Here, the hosts are talking about how Mercedes performance cars did in comparison tests and why they might not be winning those tests.
A locking differential is a part that helps both wheels on an axle work together instead of letting one wheel spin faster than the other. It’s often used to improve grip when traction is limited.
This is a Mercedes C-Class C 63, a performance version of the C-Class. The hosts say it was a big improvement for Mercedes’ reputation because it came with a strong naturally aspirated V8.
The M 156 is the name Mercedes gave to a specific V8 engine used in its performance cars. The hosts are saying this engine’s output is what made the car feel like a real improvement.
Normally aspirated means the engine doesn’t use a turbo or supercharger. It makes power by breathing air in naturally, and the hosts are pointing out that this Mercedes V8 was in that category.
MCT is a type of automatic gearbox that uses multiple clutches to shift quickly. Paddle shifters let you tell the car when to change gears using buttons on the steering wheel.
Concept
dovetail in this perfect piece of energy
He’s describing how the car’s power delivery feels smooth and coordinated. Instead of jerky transitions, everything seems to work together at the same time.
Formula One is the highest level of racing in the world. The discussion here is about how racing success can influence what car brands sell to customers.
The G-Class is a luxury SUV with a very recognizable boxy shape. It’s built to handle rough roads and off-road conditions, but still focuses on comfort. The podcast is talking about how it became more popular over time.
“Higher margin” means the car makes more profit for the company per vehicle. So even if two models sell, the one with higher margin can be the bigger win financially.
Ola Kalenius is a top executive at Mercedes. The host is saying he used to be involved with an AMG-related leadership role elsewhere, and they hoped he’d help AMG stay on track.
It’s a car that uses a small engine (four cylinders) plus an electric motor. The electric part can help the engine and sometimes move the car on its own, depending on how you drive.
The Mercedes-Benz E-Class is a luxury car that’s built to be comfortable and easy to live with. Some versions are much more powerful, and people often talk about which engine it has. The podcast is specifically referring to the high-performance E-Class variant.
The G 63 AMG is a Mercedes-AMG version of the G-Class—an ultra-recognizable, rugged-looking SUV. The speaker likes it for its bold presence and the way it sounds/looks, including the exhaust placement.
BMW’s “M” cars are the high-performance versions of BMW models. They’re saying BMW is still making those performance cars, while Mercedes has changed its lineup.
The AMG GT is a Mercedes performance sports car. It’s a two-door car that AMG made to compete with other famous sports cars, especially the Porsche 911.
The Porsche 911 is a famous sports car that a lot of other fast cars are compared against. When people say someone was trying to “beat the 911,” they mean they wanted to be faster and more impressive on track. It’s basically the yardstick for this kind of performance.
Lap time is how long it takes to drive around a race track one time. Faster lap times usually mean the car is better at accelerating, braking, and turning. That’s why racing and track testing use lap times to compare cars.
Mercedes-AMG is Mercedes-Benz’s performance brand—think faster engines and sportier versions of their cars. In this part of the episode, the speaker is saying AMG hasn’t been as noticeable or dominant lately. They’re comparing AMG’s recent impact to Audi’s.
The Audi RS6 is a very fast version of Audi’s big wagon/estate. The speaker is saying it’s stayed popular and relevant while other performance brands haven’t. They even describe it as the kind of car many people end up owning in London.
Brand equity is how much extra “goodwill” and reputation a brand has. If a brand has strong brand equity, people are more likely to want its cars and believe they’re worth it.
Car
AMG GT
The AMG GT is a sports car from Mercedes-AMG. It’s one of their main “serious performance” models, and the host is saying they recently refreshed or launched a new one.
The Nissan GT-R is a fast sports car made for performance. It’s known for quick acceleration and strong driving ability. The podcast is mentioning it because of its big-engine performance.
The BMW M5 is a fast BMW sedan made for performance. It’s designed to be powerful enough for spirited driving while still being a real daily car. In the podcast, it’s mentioned because it uses a large V8 engine in the generation they’re talking about.
Hybridising means combining a regular engine with an electric motor. The goal is usually to use less fuel and meet emissions rules while still keeping performance.
A hybrid is a car that uses two power sources—an engine and an electric motor. The host is saying some automakers push hybrids mainly to meet emissions rules.
Concept
zero emissions of vehicle mandates
“Zero emissions” mandates are rules from governments that pressure carmakers to sell cars that don’t emit exhaust fumes. The host is saying this policy pressure drives the strategy more than what buyers want.
Brand
M
BMW M is BMW’s performance line—cars tuned to be quicker and more driver-focused than regular models. The discussion is about how these performance brands used to dominate in straight-line speed.
RS is Audi’s performance badge. It usually means the car is the high-power, sportier version of an Audi model, and the hosts are comparing that reputation to what’s happening with electric cars.
The “straight line argument” is basically the claim that a performance car’s main bragging right is how fast it is from a standstill. The host is saying electric cars made that kind of advantage harder to keep.
The Tesla Model 3 is an electric car. Because it’s electric, it can accelerate very quickly, and the host is saying that this changed the “who’s fastest in a straight line” game.
The Tesla Model Y is an all-electric SUV, meaning it runs on electricity instead of gasoline. It’s designed to be practical for everyday driving. The podcast brings it up as part of how electric cars became a big deal.
They’re talking about everyday driving moments—like when you’re stopped at red lights and then accelerate briefly. The point is that the fun of a car isn’t only about top speed.
EV just means an electric car. It’s being mentioned because EVs can be quick off the line, but the hosts are talking about why some people still prefer a traditional performance car’s driving feel.
The Jaguar X350 is a Jaguar XJ-era car (a big luxury sedan), and the host is talking about the version with a V8 and a longer wheelbase. He’s basically saying it’s a special, desirable Jaguar.
“MOT in a box” means the seller has the paperwork that says the car passed its inspection, but it doesn’t necessarily mean the car is in good shape. It’s a warning not to trust the paperwork alone.
Service history is the record of scheduled maintenance and repairs a car has had over its life. Enthusiasts use it to judge whether a car was cared for consistently, because gaps or vague entries can be a red flag even if the car looks good.
A heated seat is a seat with built-in warming. If the passenger side doesn’t work, it’s often a problem with that side’s switch, wiring, or heating pad.
The Peugeot 106 XSI is a small sporty Peugeot from the 1990s. The host is saying he bought one used and later realized something was wrong with the car and the seller wasn’t being honest.
The anti-roll bar helps keep the car from leaning too much when you turn. If you hear a clunk over bumps, it can mean the parts that hold the bar in place are worn or broken.
A drop link is a small connector that ties the anti-roll bar to the suspension. If it breaks or wears out, the bar can move too freely and make knocking/clunking sounds.
The Ferrari 275 GTB is an older Ferrari sports car that’s considered very special. It has a V12 engine, which is part of why it’s so famous. The podcast is talking about it as a potentially interesting buy and highlighting its story.
The Ferrari 456 M GT is a Ferrari designed for comfortable fast driving over longer trips. It’s a specific model from Ferrari’s lineup, not the most basic or common one. The podcast is talking about how many people agree it’s a good buy.
The Ferrari 456 is an older Ferrari with a big V12 engine and a focus on cruising in comfort. People sometimes consider it because it can cost less than newer Ferraris, but keeping one running can still be pricey.
The Ferrari 599 is an older Ferrari with a V12 engine built for fast, comfortable driving. The idea here is that it may cost more at the start, but it can end up being the better deal overall.
The Porsche Boxster is a Porsche roadster with the engine placed behind you for better balance. Here, the host is basically saying that if you’re buying one, you should talk to people who really know Porsches and Boxsters.
An auction can be risky because you might not be able to check the car thoroughly beforehand. The host is saying you’re often committing without fully knowing what you’re getting.
“Buying it blind” means you’re buying without really knowing the full truth about the car. You might not discover problems until after you’ve already bought it.
The Audi S3 is a more powerful version of a smaller Audi model. It’s meant to feel sporty and quick, but still work as a normal everyday car. The podcast is talking about how people often compare it to another similar performance option.
The Focus RS is a high-performance version of the Ford Focus. “Gen 1” means the first version of that model, and it’s famous for being quick and grippy, not just fast in a straight line.
The NSX Gen 2 is the second version of Honda’s NSX supercar. It’s a mid-engine car, and people often talk about it as something you can modify—like lowering it for a different stance.
“Evo” is a car magazine that reviews cars and gives them star ratings. When someone says “five stars in Evo,” they mean the magazine really liked that car based on its tests.
Nigel Mansel is a famous Formula 1 driver. The speaker is saying he won the World Championship in 1992, and that he still managed to get onto the podium in Hungary even though he had trouble during the race.
Hungary is the country where the key 1992 race happened. In Formula 1, that means the Hungarian Grand Prix—an event that can strongly affect the championship standings.
Car
Williams FW14B
This is a Formula 1 race car from the early 1990s made by Williams. It’s the kind of car a top driver would use to fight for championships, and it was raced in the same period as Nigel Mansell’s big success.
Silverstone is a major Formula 1 race track in the UK. People use it as a reference point because small changes in the car or driving can show up clearly in lap times.
A double apex is when a driver turns into a corner, then turns in again to hit a second “closest point” to the inside. It’s a more complex way to take the corner than one single turn-in.
Term
1.8 seconds faster
“1.8 seconds faster” means one driver was noticeably quicker than another over a lap. In racing, even small time gaps can be huge because the track is made of many fast sections.
In F1, tires don’t last forever—they get worse as you drive. “Tire deck” is a way of talking about how long the tires stay fast before they start slowing the car down.
A “three-stop strategy” means the race car pits three times to change tires. Whether that’s good depends on how quickly the tires wear out and how well the team times the stops.
A virtual safety car is when the race is slowed down by rules, but there isn’t a real safety car driving around. It affects pit timing and can help some drivers more than others.
A stint is just the time you drive on one set of tires before you pit again. Doing the stints “spot on” means you’re using the tires at the right pace for the whole race.
Grip is how well the tires can hold the road. “Right to the edge of the grip” means the driver is pushing hard, close to the point where the car would start to slide.
Lando Norris is a Formula 1 driver. He’s commenting that the Ferrari was extremely hard to beat in fast corners, meaning it cornered very strongly at higher speeds.
Ferrari is a famous racing team that builds and races Formula 1 cars. Here they’re being talked about as a team that could get a big advantage if they improve their engine.
LIVE
Hello, and welcome to the Card Podcast with Chris Harris and his friends. This is episode
number 92. If you're a batsman, you'll be getting very nervous and looking at the
scoreboard regularly because we are right into the 90s. I'm not going to tell you any
factoid about 92 because actually it makes up one of our points on the agenda this week
because it's that important. So I'm going to leave it alone until we reach that point
in the podcast proceeding. Now, this point I'm about to raise at the beginning here.
Could I point to Chuck in a little factoid about 1992. Of course you can. I became a
doctor that year. Did you? And in those days you started your house jobs. Everybody started
them on August the 1st and it was a Saturday. And I remember thinking, you know, some poor
git gets a short straw, gets a weekend and it was me. But it was actually, it was literally
looking back on it one of the best years of my life that first year. Suddenly the long
white coat actually doing it rather than reading about it. And you never went to bed
thinking, oh, do I do a worthwhile thing? Went to bed every night. Mostly actually when
I could go to bed because there were two nights out of three where I couldn't one night out
of three then that I couldn't. But went to bed thinking, yeah, this is pretty worthwhile
stuff.
Where were you? Where was this doctoring starting?
The first hospital I was at, unfortunately they demolished the hospital but it was the
Middlesex Hospital which was on Burners Street just behind Oxford Street.
Oh nice, yeah.
So that's where I started my house jobs in 1992.
On Bond Street Ward, which was an orthopedic ward. And it was, it was amazing.
I was on Burners Street in 1992.
Doing what?
I was head of merchandising for champion sport above the head office on, yeah, the Burton
group.
We probably walked past each other.
I did. Yes, I did. I do remember you actually.
Okay, this is the first point on the, yes, congratulations, I mean, if you want to go through it, I can
tell you that in 1992 I passed my driving test, which I think is probably the most transformative
thing that's ever happened to me. Anyhow, let's, let's move on to this came up during
our live podcast at Bruxton, just to let anyone, one of the few people who messaged
us on me about these live podcasts was saying, where's the recording?
Why have you not put it up?
We've decided that we're not a brilliant live act when it comes to recording.
We very much like entertaining people, but what happens, what tends to happen is that
when we review the results, it's like sort of four chimps screaming into a microphone
and we don't film it very well, and it costs lots of money to do it.
So we've decided that's nothing to do with the reason we decided not to broadcast them.
We've tried not to broadcast them to keep them special and private for those that attended
the events live.
And that's what we decided.
And they, yes, and they gave us some beer tokens as well.
So those live events will never, ever surface.
And what's said within them will die with the air that day.
And talking, talking of live events.
Our next one.
Oh, what a leg.
Our next one is when this goes out four weeks today, Friday the 17th of July.
Is it the Clapham Grand?
Go to the website.
Tickets are extremely well priced because it's kind of our third thing this year so far.
And you've been very supportive.
So, yeah, it is live and unrecorded because otherwise we get sued.
There is that bit as well.
But there was one point on that live podcast that I thought we should throw into the open
forum of the natural recording environment and that is this.
What the fuck happened to AMG?
I just, I'd sit there at night.
I feel like one of those great characters in literature that's pondering my inner self,
gazing into my navel, thinking the existential thought that is AMG used to be great and
I don't get it anymore.
So, Chris Cooper, what happened to AMG?
I think it's a great question because they went through an absolutely classic curve,
didn't they?
Some of us remember very, very early AMGs.
So, when was the first AMG being, late 90s, early 2000s?
Late 90s?
Well, pre-AMG, pre-Mercedes, maybe.
Well, they're called pre-merger and post-merger is the environment they talk about.
They bought them in the mid to the 90s.
Yeah.
There are AMGs that exist well before that, some of the great ones, the Hammers.
And the red pig goes on into the 70s.
I suppose I'm thinking about the post-merger.
So, post the extraordinarily successful haha merger with Chrysler.
Some of the early ones weren't great.
I had a CLK in 1999, CLK 55.
It just didn't work really.
It looked nice, made a nice noise, but it wasn't really very good.
But then they just started getting better and better.
And that, I mean, the C43 was a 98 car.
That wasn't bad.
The V8 one.
That was quite good.
But by mid, I mean, for me, the peak is the SLS, which was, we can do anything.
Not only we can do anything, we will do anything.
And that car, that shape, the madness of the gullwing doors, the shape,
that everything about it was just ever so very perfect.
And to drive it was lovely.
Chris, you had one that blew over the tobacco in turn.
It was just wonderful.
And then, and I had a E63 wagon 2011.
That was brilliant.
My SL63 2010 car, 49,000 miles on it now, bought it for 20 something K under 25 K.
It's mega, the engine, it's just wonderful.
Now, I honestly couldn't tell you really what the product is, where you'd buy it.
You go onto the website and it's just bewildering.
You can't, what you better do is go onto the website and do the specking of it.
And I can't find it now.
It is and that it's happened by stealth.
It feels like it's happened by stealth.
And Chris, I know you want to talk about this, which is the new,
which is kind of what you thought about it in front of the audience.
The Thruxton was that new thing, which the Luce sort of.
It's sort of like grant that famous quote from the line of duty TV series.
It's like Grand Mars Nightgown.
The Luce covered everything that AMG was doing wrong.
I think it is.
We'll talk about when you talk about Alpina, because Chris, you raised that this week.
We need to come back and talk about that.
But for AMG, I don't know because it can't just be hybrid and electric stuff and blah,
because BMW is knocking out the park.
Where is AMG?
That's the benchmark.
And for a long time, we felt like AMG were just pulling away and pulling away
all the products are great.
The 6.2 C63, even the 5.5 and the 4.0 V8 C63, they were all great.
You'd have all of them.
You'd even have a C63 cab.
I would, because I love cabs.
Now, no, what's happened?
No, it's gone.
I agree with you.
Neil, you never struck me as a massive AMG fan, Neil.
Is that a fair to say?
I've had an SLS, which, you know, we all regret selling those now.
Yeah.
I didn't really.
I was always a bit more BMW.
I didn't really have the 60.
I know I've had a 63 thing, SL.
I didn't really get on with that.
No, it wasn't.
It was a 55, which I think is a bit shitter.
That is a bit shitter.
Yeah, it's on the shitter scale.
It's up.
Yeah.
I look, I don't even.
Does it exist anymore?
More AMG?
I mean, the big question is, does what's happened to Mercedes?
Yeah.
Fuck, that's even bigger a question.
But they they used to be literally couldn't tell you if it exists anymore.
That BMW M thing is interesting because if you think about E46 M3
in that, was it Bahama gold?
What was that goldy color, the goldy yellowy color, the launch color?
Of what?
The E46 M3 BMW.
That 2002.
Was that Phoenix?
Whatever, that one.
Yeah, and you would phone every BMW dealer.
No, sorry, sold out, mate.
Yeah, can't get one.
No, everybody wants one, particularly with the slightly smaller wheels,
which even then we thought was slightly cooler.
Get Mercedes and we knew, if we're honest, the M cars, E46, E92, probably.
E40, certainly it just was nice to drive.
Nice to drive, steering worked, suspension worked.
AMG is nice engine.
But then it came a point where late 2000s, 2010 round there,
bit after that, suddenly the AMG product was the one that was nice to drive.
It stopped, it steered, it's comfortable, it did everything.
The breadth of the product went like that.
You could drive to Germany in an E63 wagon with five people and.
They used to do all the tests, didn't it?
The E63 wagon, particularly when it had that, what was it?
The 507 or the S, there was an extra little one that everyone used to rave about.
I worked in Switzerland for a couple of years, actually.
That's where I'm just reflecting on where I discovered AMG.
And in Switzerland, no one had BMW.
It was all about the AMG.
You know, literally everyone in the office said that.
I don't know whether the C43 really is an AMG.
I suppose it is, isn't it?
But to me, AMG is V8.
So if V8 doesn't exist, AMG is gone, in a way.
They're sort of totally connected to me, even back to that, you know,
that the very first one, which is the red pig or pink pig or whatever.
The red pig.
The 306.3, because that was AMG, wasn't it?
Basically.
That was, to me, V8 equals AMG.
Now, maybe a V8 is coming back because there's, you know, the wind is changing.
Maybe AMG can have a new strategy.
Maybe we can even help them with that strategy.
Do you think that if they did that, people start might start sending into the internet
pictures of their cats that look like some other historical despotic figure?
Maybe. What does AMG stand for?
Alfred Melsbach, Horsensbach.
Yeah, there you go.
They're the three founders.
No, the two founders and where it was founded.
Oh, sorry. Sorry.
I've been there a couple of times.
SLS would be my favourite, I suppose, because that wasn't the first AMG product, really, as a model.
Spoke.
I think that was quite...
What's your thoughts?
Because obviously you've probably not driven many of them.
No, all you do, I have driven an SLS and I've driven it on a racetrack.
So that was...
Who did that happen?
A Brock road.
Some friends in Abu Dhabi, they closed off the track.
We didn't get the long track.
Yeah, it was very nice.
It was just me, a British superstar and the person who organised it, three of us on the track.
But that SLS, I mean, it was just an extraordinary, first of all, just an extraordinary looking car.
The Goldwing doors, how you had to get in, it was so quick.
They copied the British writer, really.
Yes, probably.
I was just thinking about what you were saying about that little gap between BMW and Mercedes.
So it brings me back to why AMG Mercedes hired Lewis Hamilton.
I always felt that that was in 2013 and maybe they didn't have the same traction.
BMW was always the driver's car and in the end, a Mercedes was always sort of a doctor or a taxi driver.
Had that kind of slightly boxy reputation and it does coincide with when these cars were really good.
Lewis was there, he was always in some PR campaign for an AMG.
I mean, always there and it does feel, I mean, we're electrifying.
It is going to happen and it feels like this four-door electric coupe is kind of the last misfire of a large organisation.
I think, you know, suddenly that kind of group think, but we've got to make these, we've got to make these.
We've got to show that we can make these and they're powerful.
I read a top-gear review on this new electric AMG and there's a great word they used.
It was technobor, something that eats technology.
And they said, it's very difficult to know how to feel about a car when the sound of the car, the look of the car,
the driving characteristics of the car are basically programmed rather than exist in some naturally aspirated world.
And that just brings you back kind of to what Neil was saying, which is, you know, maybe you're right, Neil,
this is all about what you can do with the V8, how well you can package that V8,
how light or beautiful you can make the body around that.
And there was a peak to this and it probably was a decade ago.
You're absolutely right, Chris.
And there were just, there were lots of good cars and I said, but SLS, I'll never forget driving that as long as I live.
It was the most extraordinary, exciting thing to do.
And I was glad I wasn't on the street doing it.
So I guess I'm with you.
It's it's slipped, hasn't it?
But maybe it will come back.
Chris, when was the last AMG you had?
Was it an E63, four-litre twin-by-tower?
My last one I had was a long time ago now.
It was an E63 S on an 18 plate.
That's the last AMG I owned.
I think this is the reason why I've raised it partly, I think it's pertinent to this podcast and its audience,
but also because I feel old, because I've now seen a cycle of something in my industry.
So when I started doing this, AMG was the source of afterthought to the group test.
You'd be told by your editor, book these in.
There's a new M car.
So you you find out the Mercedes press office a bit like booking a lamb to the slaughter, really.
You're booking a car you knew was going to get absolutely annihilated in a group test.
So the point where I think to myself sometimes, why do Mercedes now even bother turning up to these tests?
Because all they do is get absolutely hammered.
The Audi, we say, understeers and the Merc, we say, is too expensive and isn't fast enough.
And why can't they put a differential to it?
Sorry, locking differential.
And this went on for ages.
And then suddenly things turned and became significantly better.
The turning point was that C class in about 06, 07 C 63.
I haven't got my W or C numbers.
So I'm not I can't remember.
And my telephone is what I'm using.
Normally, I'd be Googling frantically now to tell you what the the code was.
But it was a normally aspirated M 156 engine UK's got a couple of them.
So it's the M 156 engine, normally aspirated car with about, I think,
starting with 440, 450 horsepower.
212. No, it's the one before that.
Yeah. Sorry. 212 is a C class.
It's a E class.
I want the C class.
Yeah. So.
And I it was quite amazing because I think once your muscle memory is so
conditioned to something being better than the rest, when a car comes along,
that alters that hierarchy, you're a bit taken aback.
I remember being in Germany for the launch of the E 92 M 3.
I think it was.
And we borrowed one of these C classes or might be the other way around.
Maybe it was the murders being launched.
And I remember thinking on balance.
I think I'd probably prefer this on the road.
It's lovely.
Automatic gearbox works.
It had the MCT paddle shift, which works pretty well.
So the whole thing worked.
And what happened then was everything seems to just dovetail in this perfect
piece of energy from, say, these bands.
You could tell someone or some people up high had said,
we're going to go to Formula One and we're going to make sure that not only do we
win in Formula One, but we're going to there's going to be a range of cars
that are offered to people that come on that journey with us.
So we're just going to we're going to swamp the space.
Yeah.
And that happens infrequently in motorsport.
In fact, it's never happened as comprehensively as that in my working life.
Normally, you'd have an example like a Peugeot or a Citroen, a Citroen.
When it won eight or nine on the bounce with Sebastian Loeb,
didn't offer one car that fed that sort of sporting marketing message.
You could maybe get a red one with white wheels, but not one vehicle.
AMG and Mercedes offered dozens of vehicles that were some of which
were uneconomical to make, but they did it for shits and giggles
because they just got drunk on the whole thing.
I loved it.
And so I won't go through the roll call of what they produced, but it was amazing.
And I think for a while, they did swamp BMW.
They did make cars that had BMW going, what's going on here?
Because they had an R class AMG.
They had and of course, then they had the SL 55, which yes,
was a bit rough to start with, but it was the F one pace car.
Yeah. And then the G wagon took over.
The G wagon became better selling car than the SL,
which took them by surprise. It was a higher margin cast.
They made even more money and it was just endless, endless good news.
And it continued and then out of nowhere.
It stopped.
Now, I find it interesting because if you study these car companies,
the boss of Mercedes now is called Ola Kalenius.
When I first started reporting on those things, Ola Kalenius was the boss of Volvo AMG.
Oh, we'll see.
And I always thought that when people graduated to authority points
in car companies, this was kept a soft spot for where they come from.
I'd always had this.
I'd harbored this thought that Ola Kalenius would sort of nurture AMG
and never anything happened to it.
And then it all went wrong with this four cylinder hybrid C class they made,
which I've still never driven.
I've never been offered the drive on by Mercedes Benz UK.
I've seen one on the road in four or five years.
It's been out and I'm not convinced it's still for sale in the UK
or they're even making the car.
A lot of people gave this thing a really hard time.
I have to say at the moment it was developed, a four cylinder hybrid
with 700 or 600 horsepower wasn't such a stupid idea, actually, at the time
because it felt like boundaries had been broken down.
But as Neil said, maybe even more than Ferrari,
I think everyone associated AMG with V8.
Yeah. And the moment it wasn't a V8, they just switched off.
Yeah. I thought that was the E-class.
63 AMG, I forgot about that.
It's a I mean, A, it must generate so much of their American profits
because it's more than any car, whether you're in New York, L.A.,
San Francisco, Dallas, Texas, whatever, Houston.
It's a magnificent thing, G63 AMG.
I know you can you can argue it's, you know, four by four and it's a brick
and it's blah, blah, blah. It's built like nothing else.
That car. And I love the side exhaust.
How ballsy is that? It's fantastic.
You know, I agree.
And I just so.
So the AMG arrived, it conquered, and then it just
latterly disappeared.
There is no they've got a top end sports car
whose name changes most weeks.
I couldn't even tell you what the top end one's called now.
No, I don't know what it is.
Very fast.
The road still weighs over two tonnes with the hybrid.
I know that.
And there is there's no C class offering.
The E is a is a 53
So what's strange is that it just exploded.
AMG's model range exploded all the time.
BMW's Carolyn doing the same thing.
And now Mercedes has done this down.
And the BMW still makes its line of M cars.
Do you think just listening to you talking there
is kind of prompted a thought I've often had.
When AMG, when Mercedes launched the AMG GT,
the two door sports car and cabrio thing.
And they were comparing it.
It's the first time they sort of directly
in the magazines directly compared it with the 911.
Sort of hadn't really happened before.
Yeah. And it really suffered.
Yeah, it really suffered because it wasn't really that good.
And I couldn't fit in one.
It just felt ridiculous that, you know,
car that size in the modern era didn't really fit.
Somebody, you know, is not grotesquely distended.
He's not in the main length of the body.
It's an astute point.
They became obsessed with beating the 911.
And the reason they were GTR versions
that went along to try and beat lap times
that battle still goes on, actually.
Yeah. So maybe they got a bit distracted
and they tried to fight on too many fronts.
But for a while, they were in the supremacy.
And Audi was always just in the wake of these two.
But even Audi's had a better run of it
because all the time that Mercedes AMG has been
almost invisible, the RS6 has plodded along.
The RS6 is a bit like Audi's M3, isn't it?
It's for those that want that type of car.
It is the most popular one, whatever we say about it.
The default, if you live in London,
and you make a lot of money and you like going to Verbier,
that's the car that everyone owns, one of them.
And probably I'd rather have an RS6
than an AM than a Mercedes estate now,
because I really, really don't like the dashboard
and all the buttons and all that.
I think there's it's not very good.
Some sort of big nuclear submarine control panel.
It's sticking outside when it's inside.
But if we step outside of it
and I ask some of you people who are cleverer than me,
from a brand perspective, you've created in a short time
incredible brand equity in AMG.
You've got a Formula One team
who is associated with Lewis Hamilton.
You've got all these cars that are beating BMW at their own game.
You know, that should be the work of two decades,
not in, you know, 56 years as it happened.
But where are they now?
And how do you reboot it?
Because I had a message about a year ago saying,
AMG is back, we're going to launch something.
You've got to come along, it's starting again.
I'm not, I'm not really seeing it.
They launched this a new AMG GT
and they've got a fourth, four door one.
And then whatever a month ago,
undercover of Ferrari Lucegate,
they revealed what looked like a car that was designed by me
and Manish after several bottles of Rose.
With some fucking wine gum stuck on the front and back as lights.
It's one of the worst looking cars I've seen in 25 years.
And I say this is someone who loves AMG,
has got t-shirts, has just bought another one, an old one.
And I, I suppose I feel
a bit bereft, actually, I feel a bit desolate about the whole thing.
I love AMG, but it's nowhere now, it's just nowhere.
I think as engines have had to get smaller, so as AMG got weaker,
I think it's like, who's the bloke with the hair with his power?
And it's about capacity to me.
V12, V8, big engines, seven litre.
But they, but to be fair, Neil, this the four litre
AMG engine that was the staple at the end, I forget the M number.
That is a proper mill, that is.
Yeah, I like that GTR thing.
So that four litres was big enough.
An M5 still got a four litre V8 in it.
I think, you know, BMW have proved that you can hybridise things and make it work.
I don't know, maybe that maybe AMG is sitting back going,
you know what, it's too expensive, we can't do this.
We've got too many other problems in the world, but it's such a shame.
I do sense there's a shift and I, you know, I'm nerdy like this.
And I've, you know, part of our diseases,
you're lost after the things you can't afford.
And you get, for me, that's going on to a configurator,
because you can sort of like dream, say, this is the one I'd have.
So can't afford it.
I can afford it even less than the one I did last week.
And you used to do it at the Mercedes.
Now it doesn't feel like you can do that on the website.
And I think the lack of that has.
Made it's made it more impenetrable.
Think when you go to the website, it says, do you want to browse the stock?
No, I don't want to browse the stock.
I want to choose what I want, not what you've got.
And I just wonder whether that mentality of we've got to sell hybrids.
There's zero emissions of vehicle mandates in the UK and the EU.
It's just a numbers game and it's a hybrid and it's emissions game, blah, blah, blah.
That's our world now.
And whether they've been slow in spotting what others are spotted or thinking about where it's going.
But that, but you think, hang on, you're the one with the Formula One team.
That's that's the bit I find strange.
And I know that there is definitely a straight line argument, the AMG and the M and the RS,
even though there was a post factor and a lot of kudos attached to them,
there was a performance argument.
You know, you buy these cars and they'd be incredibly fast in a straight line.
But the obviously with the advent of the electric car, the Tesla Model 3 rather exploded them.
Because suddenly you had something that looked like a mini cab that could smoke them all in a straight line.
But I think BMW answered that very succinctly with the current M3.
It's not as quick as some EVs in a straight line,
but the way it looks, handles, makes you feel,
is enough for people to go, I don't care, actually, if I'm at the traffic lights
and I'm going to be a little bit cautious if I have an EV roll up next to me,
you still own an M3 built by BMW.
In fact, that should be one of the most reassuring things we ever say on this podcast.
That's it. And it's sort of, we've touched on this,
and Neil, you made the point about what's happened to Mercedes, period.
The SL was always a car going back to the 60s, and looking back to the 60s even now,
it manages not quite ever non-ending quest to find an SL.
I found one for him.
We've all found one for him. Have you actually found one for him?
Yes, I read me. It's just come through on a message. Let me just read it out.
This is no bullshit, by the way.
Hi, Neil. I've got an Amthrocyte late model 107 SL500 with red leather and air conditioning,
and I just wondered if you are Manish's advisor, and he is actually serious about buying one of
these cars or just wasting people's time. I've added that bit, by the way.
I did meet him and you in Bristol at the Luca screening, and we chatted briefly.
Let me know if he would find this of interest.
I have no idea, but yours will be too expensive.
I won't mention the dealer, but you know who you are.
What's the year?
He doesn't bloody mention that, or the mileage.
Too late. It'll be 88, won't it? Something like that.
A late model 107.
In 91, if it's late, probably.
By the way, this is an opening partnership goes. This is a world record.
We're 28 minutes in and we've not strayed.
We haven't actually finished either yet.
We're going to come back to this before we lose half our audience.
AMG is a subject close to our hearts, and this comes from a point of love and wanting it to
succeed, but right now, no. Now, the next one, this came up, and it's been on the agenda several
times and I've nipped it off. You've been too busy, and Neil Clifford got very eggy.
We're actually going to bypass it again and move on.
Here we go. This is a weird one.
That sense of relief when, for whatever reason, you ended up not buying a car, that you insisted
you should buy a car, that maybe you had built yourself up all week to buy a car, and you thought,
I can't wait to buy it. For whatever reason, the gods decided that you weren't going to buy it,
and very soon after that, you could look in the mirror and go, what on earth was I thinking?
Neil Clifford, if you've not got five of these, you're a liar.
Well, I've got an exact story of this. We were giggling to ourselves about it, weren't we?
And this all stems from the Great British Jaguar Day, and Chris banging on about his
bloody X350, V8 Super Duper, long wheelbase, blah, blah, blah, all aluminium, it's fucking mint,
and I'm like, oh, really? Well, so you get this uncontrollable addiction of,
shit, I've just got to get one of the Koopers driving the Queens one,
suddenly it's the prettiest car, it's the best car in the world in your head, you've got to get one.
So you're on car and classics, and you're like, right, I'm going to have a look,
and there's three or four of them on there, and you really want a green one,
but that's from Japan, and you know, you're going to turn up and the service history is basically
an MOT in a box, and you're not going to know, and it's got the Jaguar thing on the front,
and it shouldn't have that because some bloke in Japan stuck it on, and it's got a big thing on
the dashboard for the camera, so you're like, I'm going to have to avoid that, but it's 10995,
so it could be the one, and then there's the black one, I don't really like black cars,
so that's already a compromise for me, I'm like, black, I'm not sure about black,
and it's got like a light tan, really it's cream, but you persuade yourself it's tan,
that's another subject, when you say it's tan and it's not really.
Don't you just hate that, that's up there with, it's a manual, and you see the picture and it's not.
Yeah, because everyone says tan now, because they think they get more money for cars,
oh for cars I haven't got tan, it's plain, it's a fucking cream.
Manual tan, and it's neither, is the biggest ick, I've just done.
I bring a lovely man up, and he's in Fulham, this super lovely, beautiful man,
and a lovely house, and you're like, oh this is going to be good, and we speak on the phone,
and it's full service history, and I wanted a perfect one.
You know that story, I looked for three years for this car, until I found the one,
and you're like, oh this is it, and then you go along, and there's traffic, and you don't really
check all the buttons, because of course, that's all you have to do is check the buttons,
you don't obviously have to check anything else.
My V12 fault story will come out at another date, maybe a live podcast where we'll talk about the
buttons, and how you need to look a little bit deeper than the buttons working.
So then you're like, okay, you're in the car, and it is mint.
You know you look in the back, oh those seats have never been sat in in the back,
the paint's immaculate, he's done four grand's worth of invoices to make it perfect,
you check the air conditioning, it's all nice and icy cold, the heated seats work,
you're like, this is it, okay. So 13, it's advertised for $13,500.
Yes, I'm really, I'm going to stick out for that, I think this is the best car,
I really think I'm going to get that, and you're like, well,
shit, how am I going to deal with this now, because you've got a win, you can't pay, even
though if it was on for $14,995, you probably would have paid $13, you know, it's a head
fuck, isn't it this thing, you've got a win, and look, I'm not going to mess around,
I'll give you 12, and he's like, no, we're near, no, we're near 12, we're driving around,
we're in traffic, I'm late for another bloody meeting, I've tried to fit this in in my day,
it's all gone wrong anyway, you're in a panic, he's like, look, 13, 13 is the best I can do.
And he said it's worth $14,500.
Yeah, exactly, if he were to put it up for $15, I would have probably stupidly paid $13,500,
so then I'm like, look, I'm just going to leave it there for you, I'm not in a hurry,
you do all that, I'm really in a hurry, but I'm not in a hurry, 12,250, I'll send you the money
tonight, and I'll pick it up next week, and he's like, no, can't agree that, so then you do the
false, well that's it, so you get out the car, and I'm like, sorry, lovely to meet you, it's a
fantastic car, to be honest, you do that false thing, I'm sure you'll get 13 for it, but if you
don't, give me a ring, so you sort of leave him hanging, but he was smarter than me, he's like,
no problem, take care, lovely to meet you, and then he messages, you're like, I've got him,
he sends me a little message, and he says, okay, 12,750, and it's yours, and I'm like,
there's one more move here, there's one more move, okay, I think I went up 100 quid,
and he's like, nah, and I'm like, okay, no problem, and then you go, oh, I didn't even want a black
one anyway, thank God, I didn't buy that, and that feeling of relief, because it's about the chase,
isn't it, it's about the chase, you've found the car, I'm thinking, as soon as you buy often,
I know it's ridiculous, as soon as you get the bloody thing, the enjoyment goes down,
yeah, because then you've got to insure it, you've got to MOT it, you've got to put it somewhere,
you've got to bloody, oh, then something's going to go wrong within a day, isn't it,
oh, the wife gets it, but you know why heated seat doesn't work on the passenger side,
he's like, oh, for fuck's sake, I think it's the, that feeling of relief afterwards is often
as nice a feeling, if not better, than actually winning.
I don't think you're wrong, Manish, you've bought two cars in your life,
it's unlikely that you have a story along these lines, so by all means talk about
F1 in the 70s if you need to, or surprise us with a story.
Whatever, a slightly lateral story, and it's, did you watch Dallas when you were a kid?
Of course I did, of course.
Okay, so my favorite character in Dallas was the Bobby Ewing character, I mean, everybody
actually probably really liked JR, because Larry asked him-
Maybe I thought you were going to say somebody else then.
No, no, I was going to get to, you know, that's like, yes, no, I think Victoria had principles,
there's no doubt about it, and-
Kleenex Palmer, she was down in my house.
Oh, my days, yes, Victoria.
So the boy, Bobby Ewing was the Kleenecart one, wasn't he?
He was the one who was always utterly screwed by JR in some way, shape, or form.
We all got to really like him, and apparently when they used to film that,
they were a real family, they really enjoyed it.
They even started sharing the directing, just to, you know, just to have stuff to do.
And he decided at some point, his career was going nowhere,
he'd sort of had enough of playing Bobby Ewing, and, you know, I think he'd only played Aquaman
before that.
He's a man from Atlantis, sorry, the man from Atlantis, so-
With that swimming action that when you tried it in the pool, it never worked.
I don't know, it really never worked.
Never worked.
It never worked.
The skin between his fingers.
There it was, isn't it?
So if you remember, he really famously quit Dallas in a way that meant that they could never
bring him back, and he has this horrific car accident.
I remember, I mean, the car thing sort of hit him and reversed over him,
they went back over him, they went back, and like, he was on Wogan a short while later,
and he was sort of saying, you know, well, I really enjoyed myself doing that show.
It was great, you know, they're all like family to me, but I kind of felt I needed to move on.
And Wogan was like, well, you know, do you think you'll ever go back?
And he's like, no, no, no, the way they killed me, the way they killed me,
there is no way that I can go back.
Anyways, there was a year of Dallas without him, and apparently they were all pretty unhappy on set.
The chemistry was gone, the storylines were really tough, and there is something about,
there is something about chemistry, perhaps the four of us, you know.
Let me get to this, all right, let me get to this.
So the point is this, he decides to come back, he decides to come back.
And they've got the best writers in Hollywood, and they just can't figure out how to do it.
You know, do they kind of exhume him, do the best plastic surgeons alive, do whatever?
And if you remember, the way they did it was Victoria Principles asleep.
And she wakes up one morning, has a good stretch.
She goes into the shower, it's all really, really steamy.
And suddenly, you know, the shower spray falls onto the plastic screen.
And then there is Bobby Ewing.
You need to put your dirty little minds away too.
There's Bobby Ewing there, and it was all a dream, wasn't it?
It was all a dream, that whole series of dreams.
So my answer to this question is, I've just had another bunch of interesting faults on Lola.
I mean, I could list them, but I'm not going to, okay?
And I've had it for two years.
And perhaps there will be a morning I just wake up and go, I never bought her.
It was all a dream, and do my Bobby Ewing in the morning.
Because I have to say, hopefully she's getting incrementally better,
but it just feels like at times, it's that thing.
It's just those coloured ribbons coming out of the magician's sleeve.
And they're always different colours, but they will have a dollar sign on them,
or a pound sign on them.
And there are more and more and more.
If ever I feel qualified to say this, because it's the one thing in life,
I feel no one should ever say to anyone, friend or foe.
But in this instance, I'll say it, we told you, we warned you.
Yes, yeah.
We couldn't have been clearer, and therefore the journey is positive,
because you knew you had been sat down by us a lot and told,
this is easily the trickiest car ever made.
And you went and buy one regardless.
And we all went, that's the way to buy one.
So you're on the journey, Manish, whatever.
And it doesn't matter if you wake up with Victoria,
holding the shower head in all sorts of different ways,
you're still stuck with Lola.
Now, I'll call her Lucy, man.
The poisoned wall.
Where are you? Charlene Tilton.
That was her name.
Lucy Ewing, wasn't it? Lucy Ewing.
Do you see Lucy Ewing? She was gorgeous.
In fact, her opening scene was in a ring stack, wasn't it?
With Ray. Ray Craig.
How do you know this? How do you know this?
Oh, God.
We watched it.
I'm not addicted to that show, I must admit.
Lots of reasons for it.
For the third time, Chris Cooper.
This is about addiction, isn't it?
This is a manifestation of our addiction.
That you sort of, you're addicted to the idea of it
and the purchase.
And then you know that's what it is,
because then when you don't, which in my case is in 99% of the time,
because I can't afford it,
the sense of relief is, what was I thinking of?
Why did I need one of those?
And now it's here and I bought it.
And oh, my God, that's a disaster.
Whereas the moment up to that, and you know,
if you're bidding online somewhere or going to a dealer
and having the conversation that Neil's had.
So the excitement of that and the sense of validation,
that this is absolutely right.
It's the right car.
I really wanted a four door saloon.
I didn't really want a two door mid-engine V8 coupe.
No, no, I was looking for one of those,
but actually what I really want is this.
Because it's an Alpina B5 VAS or whatever it is.
And I know I'll never use it and it's quite expensive.
And actually really is a space for it.
No, and all you can think about for that day is that car.
Yeah.
All you can think about.
And then you have the email conversation
or the online portal conversation about,
well, what's the service history?
And you know, and actually who was the last owner?
And where is it exactly this car?
Because the photographs don't look like work your addresses
and you're all that sort of like,
and you think, I'm going to solve though.
It's so I'm satisfied.
Well, it's a bit Quincy.
You go into a bit of an investigation.
You do.
You do.
And you have those numbers, some of these websites.
So these car, not car and classic, obviously there,
but other portals, which I occasionally have to look at and dismiss.
They'll have a telephone number.
It's not a telephone number.
And you think, well, where is this person?
And you get one of those apps from the internet,
which will you show me a picture and say,
Oh, that's an Albuquerque.
Well, I thought it was Liverpool.
Anyway, you do all that stuff.
And then you get to the point and think,
Oh, God, and you're racked with that.
Got a lot of money.
And then you leave it.
And what I've learned now, my coping mechanism is
you put it in the folder, drafts or whatever it is on your email
or whatever you put it there.
I think I've done, I've left it there.
I've done nothing to it.
I've changed nothing.
I'm going to come back tomorrow.
And you think, Oh, God, what was that about?
No way.
It's part of our, I'm sure clinically,
it is a prima facie example of addictive behavior.
And for us, this is how it manifests itself.
I'm trying to think, have I, I have bought something
that I almost instant, I won't say what it is,
because it's actually quite a nice car.
And people evolve quite nice.
Oh, I don't know.
The key to this is, is something you didn't buy.
Yeah.
Did you, did you get, or, in fact,
I know for a fact, for a conversation we had in the last week,
this nearly happened to you in the last week.
It did.
Well, and that's the example I'm thinking of here.
I was describing here the two, which was,
and the relief of when I realized,
when I looked at the following day,
and that feeling in your tummy, that tingly scent had gone.
And the relief that that feeling had gone,
and therefore you avoided the mishap of however good the car was,
and however, you know, actually it's black,
and actually really is black.
What could you do with him?
What, what, why is it that if you make a banana smaller,
they become really funny?
That's a ridiculous banana.
Good, and a couple of little friends there,
what can you do with those?
Yeah.
Can you see what it is yet?
That doesn't look small to me.
It's actually got quite a realistic droop to it,
as well, look at that.
That reminds me of boarding school.
Boarding school, you wouldn't have been able to see it.
So here we go.
I think you've answered, you've all answered this truthfully.
A bit of this is about age for me,
and there's a shameful admission here.
Maybe this is genuine therapy.
I think when you're fully mature and confident,
as confident as you'll ever be in this weird world,
you can walk away from any deal at any time.
But when you're younger and you're in the current,
you can't, and the number of times when I was younger,
I probably ended up trying to buy stuff,
and I knew, somebody saw my head said,
don't buy this, this is the wrong person,
the wrong car at the wrong time for the wrong money.
But I still bought it, because I didn't want to look like
I couldn't afford it, and didn't want to look like
I was scared of the person.
Some of the tat I bought, when literally,
there might have been a sign on the bonnet saying,
don't buy this kite, utter shit.
And I did, and I knew about cars.
I knew how to spot a good or a bad car,
but I was bad at the human contract.
I couldn't, I was scared, and I'd get things wrong.
I remember buying a Peugeot 106XSI back in the day,
and it's a bit of a pain to get down there,
and it was quite a new, it was the newest car I'd ever
thought about buying.
And the person played me like an absolute fiddle.
They were a bit late, I turned that bit stressed,
and I drove it, and as I drove it,
I remember going over a bump, and it was a massive clunk
from an anti-roll bar.
Clearly, a drop link had failed, or the roll bar was bent,
or it had a crash.
So the car was, the car was actually shouting at me,
orally, don't buy me.
Yeah, I've done that.
And I bought it, because I just thought,
well, I can't back out now.
Does that phrase, I can't back out now?
So in fairness, that's a long, long time ago.
But latterly, I've definitely been in, I've been a,
I've been the, I think actually the beneficiary of this,
this is a good thing.
When you, when you, when you don't buy something,
and you can just think afterwards, first of all,
that silliness still lurks within that childish,
that boyish thing of getting carried away,
of being, as they say in the trade, unsupervised, you know?
When you're, when you're basically, when,
when you're better half is, is not quite looking,
or you're dealing with sums of money that don't fall
above the waterline of, of, of revelation,
you can still get yourself in a pickle.
And I've had a couple recently, I've learned,
sometimes it's best to just go quiet.
You know, you just, sometimes you can't, you can't,
if you stay in contact, there's a strong chance
you're going to buy this bud.
So you can't, you can't.
That's the best way to get the truth
about the lowest price of going quiet.
Yeah, yeah.
Let them keep bidding against themselves.
Yeah.
And I, for ages, I used to, because I, I do have a,
my big problem is I buy, I buy cheap shit,
and I buy cheap shit because it assages my guilt
about expensive cars, and regardless of where I am
in my economic calamity, I, I can buy cheap shit.
But if you buy cheap shit in quantities I used to,
it's the same as buying expensive shit.
So I'd just buy lots of cheap shit.
It's ridiculous.
It's, it, it's somebody's worst because they've got a tax,
somebody's got to look after them.
But what I would do is I'd do that thing where if I'd
traveled, I think in my head, if I'd gone more than
two hours, I was buying it, whatever,
because I had to get home somehow.
So I was always.
Yeah, you go down to that bloke near Winchester
sells the old Mercedes, bless him.
Oh, what was, what was his name?
What was his name?
Oh, well, his name was Charles Ironside.
That's right.
Oh, him.
Yeah.
And he was not his cars.
Is it, I, he's not with us anymore, isn't he?
No, he's with us, but he's not, he's not selling cars.
And he was lovely and honest, and it was all my fault.
But you go down there and he had, you know,
he had equivalent cars that were five grand less
than all the other ones.
And there was a reason, because they weren't as good.
Yeah.
Well, I tell you, the W124 I bought off him in 2006,
I still have.
That's 20 years ago, and it is the worst car I've ever bought.
It was, it I've replaced everything on it.
I still laugh with, I've got a little spreadsheet buried away.
I, I like to have got it on a computer,
but of course the computer I was using 20 years ago,
I don't use anymore.
So, but I think we are, I think I'm 45,000 pounds into owning it.
Oh my God.
And I think it's probably worth 10.
It probably is.
Everything that could go wrong.
It had water in it.
I mean, why would, but I remember looking at it in his,
he was sort of near Alton.
Yeah, that's right.
And I remember looking at the car, I'd come back from Goodwood.
Yeah.
I got a taxi from Goodwood, so I was 60 pounds in.
And I thought, I've got to go home in this.
I've got to go home in something.
So I'm buying something from this bloke.
And I bought the worst, it was a terrible car.
And I've still got it.
It lives in the back of my unit,
and I've done 3,000 miles in it in 20 years.
Well, those are shit when they're good.
But it sits there as a reminder of the folly of life.
Yeah.
But I do, I do think there are several times.
I can remember, and this is with respect to Lola,
I remember going to look at a 456 many years ago.
And I looked at this 456 and something in my head just said,
you can't do this.
This is just on every level.
You know, the dashboard's bubbling up.
I think in those days, they were about 25 grand.
I think it's 25 grand.
I think it's V12 Ferrari, 25 grand.
What a story we could do so much with this.
And I ummed an ard, and that night I phoned the bloke back.
I probably had a bit of Dutch courage,
phoned the bloke back to say, I'll have it.
And he went, I'm sorry to say to you,
the bloke that came to look at it after he's bought it.
And I was absolutely livid.
I was like gutted.
But I slept on it and woke up the next morning and thought,
that probably saved me.
Well, Manage can tell me what it saved me.
80 grand.
And counting.
So, um, but there's been, there's been so many other,
but the initial point I make is that maturity thing.
I think you get bound in a process when you're younger
and you buy shit for all the wrong reasons.
Now, where are we?
I haven't grown up.
51.
Okay.
When friends ask for car advice,
now,
I don't even know where to begin with this one.
So I'm going to move on to Manage
because this could be highly amusing.
You're on mute, Manage.
So many people were asked by me,
should I buy a Ferrari 456?
And never have I seen such unanimity.
Okay.
In a crowd.
Listen, how can you, should you,
should you morally speaking,
should you ask people for advice about cars?
And I think the answer is,
if you've truly not made up your mind, I think it's fair.
I think if you're genuinely asking, you know,
oh, shall I get this?
Shall I not get this?
I think it's a good question.
I think if you've kind of made up your mind
and you actually, you're not really asking for advice,
what you're asking for is someone to support your decision.
I think that's when it becomes kind of morally dubious.
So I think that, you know, I didn't really ask anyone,
should I buy a 456?
I entertained that question.
But actually, I think I was a bit naughty.
I made up my mind I was going to buy it.
And, you know, a couple of people very strongly advise me not to,
for lots and lots of reasons, but I was steered towards,
I was told, save a bit more money and buy a 599.
You'll be much happier.
You know, you'll spend probably double on that 599.
Maybe you've a little bit more,
but you'll find that in the long run,
that's less than you'll spend on whatever.
And I think if somebody, recently we were asked,
I was asked for advice about a Boxster.
And I tried to steer this person towards a different.
I believe you are a Boxters?
No, but that's why I steered him towards a different group.
A group of people who do understand Porsches,
who are Boxster owners.
But in the end, if you're going to buy a car like that in an auction,
you know, to some extent, you're buying it blind, aren't you?
And so you go around advising someone to buy this or not.
You're encouraging them to have some kind of a moment
while they're on honeymoon with this Porsche.
It didn't happen.
But what am I trying to say?
I'm trying to say, I certainly don't have any.
I don't have anywhere near the experience, the Hutzpah,
the wherewithal to give anyone advice about buying a car.
I just, you know, not my, not my guy.
If you want to hit replacement, I know some good surgeons.
If you have a ganglion in your wrist,
if you've got trigger finger, do Patrons contract you.
If you need to mark plastic surgery done on my knee.
What about if you want to identify a knee or an elbow?
Yeah, if it's kneels, I can't do it.
I can't do it.
That's fatal intelligence.
What is a trigger finger?
It's when you flex your fingers like this,
there are tendons which pass through thin pulleys
and they go in and the muscles that actually operate them
are in your forehand.
So what happens is when you bend your finger,
sometimes there's a little nodule in the tendon.
It gets stuck in the sheath and you can't undo it.
And you have to kind of do that.
My son, my eldest does lots of climbing now
and he's had this.
Yeah, his fingers lock.
They apparently young people get it when they climb.
It puts men's stress.
Okay, let's move on because we're 55 minutes in
and my phone's battery is bleeding already.
Here we go.
Let's go to Neil Clifford.
You should never ask for advice and never give it.
In my view, this sport, this addiction that we have,
is solitary.
I never ask advice.
In fact, this is obviously a stupid strategy,
I suppose, clever.
I never even drive a car before I buy it.
I make my mind up rightly or wrongly and I do it
and I never ask people's advice.
And actually, when friends do ask advice,
because we've all got our little WhatsApp groups
and we've got a lovely friend on one of our WhatsApp groups,
it does try to ask advice.
And then, like all men, he doesn't fucking listen anyway.
And goes and does exactly the opposite.
It's like asking advice for a girlfriend.
It's a solitary, individual, independent decision
and you have to live and die by it.
And if people ask me, I run away because they're asking me,
in my view, because if it goes wrong, they're going to bloody blame me.
Don't get me wrong then.
I don't get involved in giving people advice.
I say, you're best off not buying anything.
If you're worried about it, buy a shit-boring car.
Yeah, because are they asking for advice
or are they looking to share accountability?
They're looking to share a problem.
Yeah, Chris Cooper.
I think this is a more contentious question about advice and guidance
than relationship guidance.
I think it's more damaged than offering somebody an opinion
on the prospective partner, wife, girlfriend, boyfriend, whatever, blah, blah.
It reminds me sometime years ago when I started racing,
the subject about which we must return to.
One of the guys I was racing, a bit older than me,
he was having problems in his marriage.
There were some quite subtle signs.
Once when we were at his house, she came at him with a knife.
I noticed that.
And then when we were driving back from a race meeting one day,
I forget how far I won the race by.
It must have been quite a bit.
We went to his, I had the TVR Camilla and he had a TVR Camilla.
And we had, we can edit that out.
In fact, however many times you can say that, we're going to edit that out.
No, you're not.
And we got to, he was staying in a friend's house.
I thought, well, this is not your house.
And he said, yeah, yeah, I've moved out.
This is a mate's house.
And I thought, I'm vindicated.
I was right.
I knew she was a wrong man.
She came with you with a knife.
So I said, I'm so pleased that she was a wrong man.
She shouldn't have come with you that night.
She really shouldn't.
That is not a good sign.
Put the knife down.
And no, where's this going?
And leave home.
The following week, or the next race meeting,
there he was in the panic with his wife again.
And I've never spoken to either of them since.
So I take that lesson into offering people advice on cars.
That's true.
And I think Neil's right that sometimes people think,
they look like they're really interested in your opinion.
Because I do get asked about stuff like this.
And they go and do something else.
Because I'm slightly on that spectrum that we're all on,
I have on no occasion said, don't buy that car.
If you don't buy that car, if you buy that car,
you know it's wrong.
And you go and buy the car, I said, why did you do that?
I told you, that was the wrong car to buy.
And I sort of, I think with me, people know.
Because I sort of, I'm the antithesis of Neil.
My professional life is exclusively about giving advice.
Usually, which is why the word challenge appears above our door.
Because we tell it how it is.
We absolutely tell it how it is.
So when it comes to giving advice about, that's easy.
No, don't do this, do that.
But it is, but I think it is more damaging when it goes wrong
than relationship advice.
Because in my case of my mate I used to race with,
I never saw them again.
That was fine.
There was actually no real damage.
There was no awkwardness.
I just never saw them again.
If they buy a car, it's there the whole time.
Yes.
You know, they know, it gets in the way.
So I suppose if people are asking us for advice,
about giving advice, I think we would probably say,
just walk on by.
I can tell you that the two things that change
when you present a television show that's on a terrestrial broadcast is,
one day you realise that the blokes in the white vans,
they've just brought a copy of the sun and a petrol four court recognises you.
That's different.
It's not just people at car meets that recognise you.
And the other one is, you'll get probably 500 messages a day saying,
should I get the 240i or the S3?
And you'll go, and the first time you receive it,
you'll go, well, I replied to that.
And then you realise that you can't reply to them.
I still get 50 a day, probably.
And I don't reply to them.
You're not replying to me.
Yeah, you can't reply to them.
Sometimes if I see, if I'm browsing the messages thing in the airport,
I might see something interesting and I'll give a one word reply,
or I'll just say something deliberately harsh.
But you can't really.
In fact, in many ways, there should be a way of trying to sort of monetise this,
shouldn't there really?
But I think I'm very sceptical.
And I've always believed that the responsibility of the person
that reviews the car is to the people that might spend the hard earned on it,
not the engineers that made it.
I've always believed that.
But within that, do people really buy a car?
A lot of people say to me,
I bought that car because of your video.
I think they do.
No, no, no.
They do.
No, no.
You'd already decided to buy that car and I tipped you over the edge.
That's the closest it gets.
You never buy a car just based on that.
If you're clever enough to earn 50 grand to buy an M3,
then you're buying that car because you wanted to buy it.
It might just be that I helped you over the edge
in a sexy bit of footage or a sideways shot,
or a little comment, helped you go away.
I helped you go where you were already going.
I really do.
And I believe that.
I don't believe people.
When someone says, I bought that car because of you.
And the number of people that have come up to me actually and said,
I bought that because you said it was good and it turned out to be shit
and it ruined my life.
I mean, I have had a few of those.
I've had a bloke.
Oh, God, I had a bloke come up to me about Focus RS,
Gen 1 Focus RS, and he was ready for a fight.
I bought that car because you said it was so good.
It was shit.
And I said, I don't know where you're coming from.
Where do you want to go with this?
And he was properly, he was saying,
well, I could have bought this instead.
Well, I said, why didn't you?
He said, well, you said it was really good.
So that's fine.
But you know, my mate said the curry house was good
and I went there and got the shit.
I think being one of those people that spent years watching you
or reading you on Evo or AutoCar, YouTube, if I had,
I'm lucky now that you've moved from imaginary friend to real friend.
And now I wouldn't ask you because you're a real friend.
When you were an imaginary friend, I did feel as though I could take your advice
or Evo or car.
That's where I got my reference material.
Clearly it was in, it was on the bog.
I wasn't, I wasn't, you know, I was doing, you know,
I was just reading a car magazine.
But I did go, you know, if it's, if I thought about,
oh, I'd really lower that NSX Gen 2.
First thing I do, check it's, if it's got five stars in Evo.
Yeah.
Honestly.
And if it was four, well, four and a half, if it was four, I'm like, no.
It's Neil, is your other imaginary friend sitting next to you now?
Yes, he is.
Good.
Good.
Right.
Let's go for our reference point for episode number 92, which is Nigel.
So what happened in 1992, Manish?
I don't know, I just took a year off.
Oh, dear.
Nigel Mansel finally won the world championship.
He finally did it in Hungary.
I remember it was about half the season yet to go,
and he managed to limp up onto the podium.
And he first limped on his right foot,
then he limped on his left foot,
and Ron Dennis was sort of holding him up.
It was actually absolutely,
but you have no idea of the effort required
to win that world championship by Hungary.
In 1992.
What car was he in then?
Was he in a...
Williams.
FW14B.
Yeah, 14B.
It was the car.
The blue and white, the sort of...
The back.
The white and yellow, yes.
Yeah, okay.
It's got a funny number, red seven or red one or something.
Red five.
Red five.
I'll tell you, say something now.
I'll admit one thing.
I'm obviously, I make no secret of the fact
that I am an absolute Nigel fan.
Just wonderful.
I can laugh at the times it was absurd,
but deep down, I think I'd bleed Nigel more
than I'd probably do any other driver.
And the impact that Nigel had finally winning
a world championship was greater than the pregnancy
of any other air to the throne
that was about to get there in almost any sport.
It was, if I think about Joe Root finally
getting 100 in Australia,
I think all these things that were moments
that were supposed to happen,
but we hadn't quite got there.
For me, 1992, here I got my driving test,
lower six at school, Nigel winning the world championship
was just everything.
And do you know what?
I was so invested in it, I didn't see any of this nonsense.
I didn't read auto sport, I used to read auto car,
so I'd read a bit of Alan Henry,
but that was it, or Ian Young.
So I didn't read all the fact that people
were sort of laughing at some of this stuff.
For me, it was just our Nigel, red five,
it's going to win.
And honestly, it was everything.
It's amazing.
It was.
Amazing, because he was like twice the size in my head.
He was like a giant compared to all the little blokes.
He did, I mean, he was physically obviously tall,
but he famously in 92, because he had so many near misses.
He did occasionally, I think, well,
probably more than occasionally,
he did make a big effort on getting fit,
losing weight, and going in the gym.
And he turned up beginning 92, and he looked like,
well, okay, that's fit Nigel.
And not that he hadn't been fit,
because he had his enormous inherent strength and stamina
that he could manhandle these things
when they were personhandling, we should say.
I saw him, I mean, he was my hero.
He is my hero.
He'd still, no matter who, people would come and go.
And he was, James was a bit young,
and there'd been this barren period.
There'd been people who pretended,
and there was with John Watson, guess it.
And then Nigel finally got the drive in a decent Williams,
first race win, 1985, European Grand Prix at Brands.
I was bad.
And that famous Murray Walker commentary
as he crossed the finish line at Paris,
and he is exultant.
And all of that, and then he won the races after that,
blah, blah, blah.
And he should have won 86, he should have won 87,
could have won 91, but 92.
I was at Silverstone.
In those days, qualifying was on a Friday and a Saturday.
And I went, I stood at Luffield on the Friday.
And because I was, I was a nerd, I am a nerd,
definitely was a nerd then.
I had a stopwatch with me.
I had a stopwatch.
I'm sorry, you went to the F1 with a stopwatch?
Yes.
In, on Friday qualifying, British Grand Prix, 1992.
I had a seat, I think it was a seat in the Luffield,
on the exit of Luffield there,
when it was like a double apex Luffield, much nicer is now.
I know it's technically more demanding and interesting,
but we love the double apex Luffield.
That's how old I am.
And I had a stopwatch.
So I knew on that lap how much fucking quicker he was.
He was at 1.8 seconds faster than Patrese in the same car.
I mean, some might not, a bit more, a bit less.
He was, Martin, I was there on that Friday.
That's cool.
And the crowd was, I've never seen anything like it.
I know there's, sometimes it's actually,
they came up to track too much.
And there's that famous shot of him winning in 92, I think,
when somebody crosses the track, a live track behind him.
But it's sort of similar to some of the Schumacher hysteria
and euphoria in Germany.
Nigel was that for us.
Yeah.
It was because he was slightly unfortunate.
He wore his scars and his foibles.
He wore his emotions and his real and imagined slights
and conspiracies and the worlds against me.
But you, you're all with me.
And knowingly or willingly or cleverly or otherwise,
you know, we all got behind him.
And he was, he was, and he's our hero.
He drove that car at the Festival of Speed a couple of years ago.
Yeah, I saw that.
And I, it was so emotional.
It was so emotional.
And him not winning in 86 was frustrating.
87 was even more frustrating really, because it was just a silly accident
that a million times wouldn't have hurt his back
and he missed the last two races.
Was he with Ferrari before or after 92?
Before.
And he won his first race the very first paddle shift gearbox.
He famously booked a flight before the race ended
because he thought it's never going to last.
And of course it did last and he won the race.
And he was on the podium with his bleeding hands
because there was a sharp edge on where the trophy had been badly made.
He cut his hands on the trophy.
Second?
He cut his hands on the trophy.
On the trophy, yeah.
So yeah, and then in that year when he overtook Senna at Hungary
when they got stuck behind Stefan Johansson's Onyx.
Stop me if I get this wrong, Manish.
That you've got right.
Yes, well done.
Oh, I've got that bit right.
Okay.
Yeah, that's it.
You just got that bit right.
What the fuck about him being really good?
Yeah, no, when I saw this episode of 92, it's the mantle episode.
It cannot be anything else.
Well, I think actually we saw something this weekend.
We'll segue now into our next segment, actually.
I think we saw something similar this weekend
to what we experienced actually with Nigel in 92,
which is when it takes a certain type of individual
to drag a sport out of its specialist media audience
and onto the front pages of general news.
And that's, I think, what we saw this weekend, Manish.
What are your thoughts?
I mean, you know, Lewis winning, what did you,
you sent a text, didn't you, on our group chat,
just saying sometimes fairy tales come true, you know,
and it's absolutely, it's absolutely the case,
who would have thought that Ferrari would have the renaissance
that they're having now, who would have thought
that Lewis would just be able to master this machine
in a way that's sort of clearly even confounding Leclerc.
And I think, you know, the two times he's gone off,
he can say what, yes, Neil, he's on for his eighth.
Neil's holding an eighth up, by the way.
Yeah, I think he could happen.
It really could, I think he's turning us all into believers.
I read something very interesting in the race today,
because I was just really interested in, you know,
did the Ferrari suddenly have this incredible face?
What was it about Lewis?
And they said that probably more critically
than at any circuit, certainly this year
and quite possibly in a while,
Barcelona was incredibly hot.
And they said that the tire deck was massive,
it was 0.15 seconds per lap.
So if you've got two people who are on the same tires,
after 10 laps, their degradation is 1.5 seconds per lap slower.
So this was a race all about perfect strategy.
Normally you can't accuse Ferrari of doing that,
but they went in with a three-stop strategy,
and he was a little bit lucky maybe with the virtual safety car.
But Lewis's stints were spot on,
actually apparently if you account for this deck
and the number of laps that he did,
the Ferrari's maybe not that much quicker.
In other words, this really was about a very virtuoso drive,
right to the edge of the grip that he had
and the power that was available.
And the last thing I'd say is that Lando Norris pointed out
that the Ferrari in fast corners was absolutely untouchable,
especially in Lewis's hands.
And he's terrified that if Ferrari get a token upgrade
for their engine, Ferrari could be gone.
And can you imagine that?
If Ferrari suddenly becomes the dominant team
in the middle part of the season of the first tokens
and Lewis just keeps just striding away.
Be brilliant.
And Ginelli didn't finish, remember?
The champion didn't finish.
He dropped 18, a certain 18 points.
That was a good one.
We acknowledge that this was a drive of the ages for Lewis.
Really was.
I thought the car looked different than Martin Brundle,
as ever, the best commentator of our age,
just says what you're about to think.
That's the mark of a great commentator, isn't it?
He just, I watched that.
Barcelona is funny.
That's sort of seven and eight when you come up the hill
and you've got that fecking fast right
that comes onto the back straight,
which in a GT3 car, terrific.
I just thought to myself, wow,
that car looks different to the other cars
through that fast right.
He's got more confidence.
He's driving differently.
And Martin meant it's like we've seen the old Lewis.
He's like, he's back again.
He's like, you know, where's he been?
But this is different.
This car looks visibly different.
So I'll ask another question.
George versus Kimmy, because for me that was,
I know the way that Kimmy departed, again, great theater.
But basically he hunted George down and overtook him.
And this was supposed to be George's Renaissance weekend.
To what extent actually has the Ferrari Luce covered
the AMG situation?
Everyone's so ecstatic about,
rightly about Lewis's win.
Chris Cooper, you're good at this stuff.
Where does this leave George that weekend?
So I saw an interesting interview with him
straight after Collie, where he said,
I haven't looked at any data this weekend.
I've done my own thing.
I've trusted my judgment, trusted the car.
We've changed it to me and it works.
I'm in my groove.
And I think in Collie, he was clearly a cut above the other Mercedes.
The first part of the race, I think he was,
Bradley Lord, there was something I saw today,
that the last pit stop when Kimmy caught him up,
they made some incorrect wing adjustment
and he had understeer.
So he was...
He asked for more wing before that last stop,
because the second step didn't suit him.
He lost a lot of time and he asked for more front end.
They gave him less, apparently.
So, it's very, very...
You'd have to say that it's incredibly finely balanced.
The momentum and the scoreboard is still with Kimmy,
but it looked and sounded more like the George
that knows he can drive, rather than...
And I know the point about it.
The single biggest performance factor in motor racing
is the confidence of the driver.
If you're confident, you can do things with the car
that when you're not confident, you say...
And I remember when we raced in Germany with Jules, our engineer,
and he and, God bless him, Graham from XTC,
they worked out what was stopping us from doing something,
because they could see in the data
the car could possibly do something.
And the great question asked was,
what's stopping you from braking here or taking this...
And you'd say, I think it's going to let go of me
and I can feel it and it's holding me back
and I'm tensing up and I can't do it.
I mean, I've seen that just on the edge of the envelope
of your extraordinary skill.
In the middle.
And so, George, almost as though he came back.
So, I think more interestingly is, actually, his Ferrari...
How will it go in Austria and Britain?
Britain's going to be with three Britons,
first time in 1968 or whatever it was,
30s, Hill and Stuart.
The Charles story was quite...
You know, quite key.
You must be pissed off.
And how hard does life look for Aston Martin right now,
beaten by Cadillac?
I've just realised I've got two percent on my phone.
Oh my God, have you got a power supply there?
Yeah, I'm happy.
I've just plugged into the wall,
but I've got one of those cables that's like a mini-me cable
that's about four inches long.
So, I'm now sitting on the corner of a hotel bed.
I apologise for this.
So, can you hear me now?
Yeah, perfectly.
Good.
So, Neil, any thoughts on the F1?
Did you watch it?
I did watch it.
And I thought it was obviously wonderful
and I think he's in with a chance.
And I think we have to thank Kim Kardashian.
Because I think she has given him something
that the engineers couldn't.
Oh my God, FNAF, FNAF.
No, no, look, it's coincided.
But he turned up not dressed as the Pope and won.
I think that's more relaxed.
Let's say he's more relaxed.
Is he?
Let's move on to our two-car garage,
which we're going to ask one of you guys to read out
because I'm on my telephone.
Is that all right?
Sure.
Manish isn't his yours.
Okay, well, I said this.
You're a very successful British film agent
who's based in London but have a lot of client...
You have a lot of Hollywood clients,
so you're constantly commuting to LA.
You are not into being chauffeured,
so pick two cars that you can leave and secure a parking
at LHR and LAX.
They have to be relaxing enough to drive
when you arrive after a 10 or 11-hour flight,
but rewarding enough to drive to both airports.
Manish, what does a film agent do?
He gets 10% for making his client the star,
the co-star, or just getting them into a movie.
But what do they do?
They drill the wheels of industry.
So they...
They know what films are happening.
They know exactly who the right person is,
who your competition is.
They know who's going to be directing.
For me, the idea that Manish from the Sultan
would actually ask,
but what do they actually do
is one of the best things I've ever heard on this podcast.
I had a similar experience yesterday,
which you weren't going to.
Basically, they swank around like a big shot,
looking cool, but without actually doing anything.
No, no, no. They really do.
They make careers. They break careers.
They do.
They do.
It's one of those sad things,
representation in...
I'm not in that industry,
but I'm in a weird offshoot of it,
and you think you can get by without them,
but sadly, you can't.
Let's start with Chris Cooper.
So I think you've got to have...
I think there's got to be a Bentley in here.
Good answer.
There's really got to be a Bentley.
And I think nothing says I'm the man
in the film-agent industry
on both sides of the Atlantic.
Than an S1 continental.
Oh, what a group thing.
Beautiful. Is that in LA or is that in London?
That's a very good question.
I think this one goes in LA,
because more chance of it not getting rained on,
pissed on the whole time.
So I think you definitely have that in LA,
and it's about a million quid.
There's no budget here, is there?
No, no budget.
So I think you'd have that.
And I think...
So this is for a film-agent, not for me.
So given that you've both confirmed
you and Manish you and Mr. H,
that these are incredibly powerful people
who need to communicate that they're the one,
I think the car they'd have in London,
in a secure storage, would be...
There's only one answer.
If you haven't got this answer, you're wrong.
It's a Rolls-Royce Cullinan.
Oh, my God.
Interesting.
I think it's good.
I think it's good.
Well, I'm still reeling from that.
But actually, I like the fact that you've chosen
what is the right car,
rather than allow your own personal taste
to interfere with that appalling decision.
So let's move to Manish.
Okay, well, these guys are also incredibly smooth.
They just don't offend anyone.
They're fantastic at making deals.
I mean, they are butter.
So weirdly, demonstrating my longevity
on this pod and group think,
there is my LA car, a Bentley S1 convertible,
slightly more expensive than yours.
I mean, it's just beautiful.
1.25 million.
The irony is that only one of this
is remotely close to the capabilities
and character traits required to fulfill
the role you described in the earlier.
But we both chose the same car.
Well, there you go.
Now, the English one, I thought about this.
The thing about the British film industry,
these Uber powerful agents have to have
some kind of quiet, low profile
and also have to be a bit right on.
So I tried to find something that said,
yes, I am a powerful film agent,
but I'm also just one of the people
in my own subtle way.
And I found this.
And it's a one-of-one, 1989s,
the inverted electric Range Rover.
If you have a look at that, you'd arrive at Heathrow,
you'd get into your inverted, you'd go to Soho,
you wouldn't even pay the congestion charge.
You'd go, well, you would now, but you'd go,
you'd just be one of the people.
You basically, at parties, you'd go,
I drive an electric car.
You wouldn't say what it was,
and they'd all assume you had a Prius or a Tesla.
That would be his super smooth second car.
Well, I have to say, the first car I'm totally in favour of,
the idea of ripping out that lovely Burbly V8
and putting in a fridge is just abhorrent to me.
But there we go.
Let's go to Neil Clifford.
Right, both of these cars can be swapped
between different locations.
And we're basically thinking we are
a bit of a Simon Kiddston here, aren't we?
We arrive at an airport, and there's a beautiful car awaiting,
and you've got the right suit, the right luggage,
you've got the whole thing going on,
as our good friend Simon does that.
So in London, I'm having a Camargue.
I did think hard about Bentley,
I'm buying this Camargue, but then,
which is a very late car, blah, blah, blah,
Qatari Royal Family, all the normal stories of Camargue.
Because they are, aren't they?
Or Tom Jones or something.
But this is Qatari Royal Family,
and then I'm taking it to,
when we're taking it to Clark and Carter,
and I'm saying 500 grand, I want it modernised completely
because it's a beautiful car, I've had one,
but they break down, and I want it to be 100% reliable.
I want a new Rolls Royce engine,
new air conditioning, keep the leather,
because that leather on the Camargue is better
than what anyone can do as new leather,
but everything else is going to be brand new.
Like our friend Mr, he makes tractors and things,
Clark and Carter are the people,
if you're rich, that's where you go.
And then, I've gone against your explanation
of the type of car you need when you land in LA,
because we've all done it.
I, two or three times a year, I land in LA.
The last thing I want to drive is something smooth.
I need to be woken up in LA,
because you've no idea what time it is.
You're landing at 4pm, you're knackered,
you know you have to stay awake till 10,
because if you don't, you'll be up at 2.
You've got that whole adjustment thing to do.
So I'm actually not buying a smooth car,
but I'm buying a car that is so at home in LA.
It was built in LA.
You can go and drive up and down the mountain sting.
I'm buying a singer because of no budget.
So I've got a 1.2 million quid singer.
I think to me, that is the LA car, a singer.
If it breaks down, you can take it down to, you know,
our friends at Singer and they can fix it.
Obviously it won't break down, and you can just scream around.
You can drive Miles Holland to keep yourself awake.
You can feel like Steve McQueen, even at 5.10.
So Camargo in London, singer in LA.
The mad thing is that when I was over there a while ago,
that they still have a Bahama sort of dark sandy yellow
car they own in LA, and that's the one they lend me.
And I've driven it on my Holland.
I went up there one night on my own in that color car,
and I stood and took photos of it.
It was nothing better.
I was a bit weird.
That's one of those pinch yourself moments.
So I've gone at this slightly differently,
because I think intrinsic in my understanding
of who this person is,
is they're more interested in making money in films
than they are cars.
I don't think they're a car person.
So you need two cars that look special,
the presenters being special,
but you could imagine someone that doesn't really know
much about cars would buy them.
I think you guys have all afforded this person a car knowledge
that they probably didn't have.
So I'm going to go for,
I don't think this guy would know what a singer is.
So I think I'm going to go for in the UK.
It has to be an AMG obviously,
because I've obviously had a bit of an AMG wipe out earlier.
The only current AMG that interests me is the big one,
the S63, which has got some monster V8 hybrid in it
and about 900 horsepower.
I think it looks fabulous,
but there'll be no cheap ones to buy in 10 years time,
because they're not solely the bloody things.
So they won't be around for 10 grand,
but I think there's one for sale on car on classic.
It's a current S63.
It's actually in Northern Ireland,
but you can get that back here.
It's a white one.
S63, so it looks fabulous.
Nice.
And I think you're absolutely right.
It has to be a Bentley,
because I think the older we all get,
the more we realize that the Bentley does it all.
The Bentley can make you feel
that you can do anything from inside at any time of day.
It can wake you up when you're waking up, like Neil does.
It can make you feel cosented and looked after when you need to.
And for me, it's a Conti GTC.
So I found a green, current Conti GTC with the hybrid.
And I just love them.
You see that?
I just love that thing.
Can you imagine what it'd be like to land at LAX,
and that's just waiting for you, getting it?
You've got a little,
it's a bit like the British Airways thing.
However much you're doing a job,
you've got a little bit of England that's with you.
Whenever you get into that cabin,
you're like, oh, this is Her Majesty's,
sorry, His Majesty's land.
And I think you feel quite protected by that.
Right, some music, because my phone's about to die.
Let's go for some music, Manish.
I'm going to pick an obscure abotrack.
It's from their second album, Waterloo.
It's a reggae piece that the men sing,
and the women just harmonise with,
and it's called Sitting in the Palm Tree,
because it's summer in London.
I've never even heard of it.
Look it up.
Chris Cooper.
After the week I've had a little bit of sunshine,
so the sun always shines on TV by Aha.
Oh, that's fine.
Oh, yes.
Great tune.
Look at it.
Best end of any song.
No more heroes, stranglers.
Oh, very good.
Now, I've bought a copy of The Viz.
Because we've actually got some friends at Viz,
we now realise.
I bought a copy of The Viz at the airport.
I love the adverts.
And I've just seen there's an advert for
Electric Six.
Now, they were a slightly up,
sort of leashy band in, I think, the early 2000s.
And they, I think, made the funniest video ever made
to the song Gay Bar.
Go and watch that video on YouTube.
Electric Six, Gay Bar.
When you see the rodent run down the tube,
you'll get it.
Thank you very much to my learning friends,
Chris Cooper, to come on the 8th, Neil Clifford,
and to Manish.
I'll stick with Lola for ever.
Come on in.
Is England playing tonight?
Yes, tomorrow night.
Oh, tomorrow night.
Tomorrow night, OK.
It's tomorrow night now, but when this goes out,
it won't be tomorrow night.
It'll be the day before yesterday.
OK, so we hope you did well.
Yes.
Yeah.
OK, thank you all.
Good night.
About this episode
“What the fuck happened to AMG?” is the episode’s blunt hook, as the hosts trace the brand’s shift from V8 magic to a world of software-defined feel, hybrid four-cylinders, and “almost invisible” presence. They compare AMG’s rise and later fade against BMW M and Audi RS, revisit standout cars like the SLS and C63 variants, and debate what the badge should mean. The conversation also detours into why live recordings stay private and how used-car paperwork can mislead.
