The History Channel released a new clip today from the American version of Top Gear. Do yourself a favor and watch it in full HD:

I think it’s pretty safe to say that it’s not as good as the original British version, but remember that they’ve had over 100 episodes to refine it. Go back and watch season 1. It was frankly rather crap compared to the show we know and love today.

So please don’t be too quick to judge this American version, especially since no one says you can’t watch both shows.

Tanner Foust was recently interviewed on FOX’s Car Report. He talked a lot about SuperRally (known as rallycross in Europe) but more importantly he talked a bit about Top Gear USA. He revealed that all of the segments for the first season’s 10 episode run are nearly done being filmed and that the in-studio bits will be filmed in Los Angeles. The show will also begin airing at the end of November or in early December.

If you want to skip ahead, the Top Gear discussion starts at about the 11 minute mark, however if you have the time, the whole video is worth watching.

As you may be aware, I don’t like posting about the person who portrays the Stig. To me, the Stig is not a person but a character. It doesn’t really matter who is inside the suit and driving.

This is why I have avoided posting about the legal battle currently going on with the person who is portraying the Stig wanting to write a tell-all autobiography and give away the poorly held secret of who the Stig is. The last time this happened, the Stig wore a black suit and was subsequently killed off.

However I felt it was worth posting about it finally as Top Gear executive producer Andy Wilman has posted his thoughts over on TopGear.com. It’s worth taking a few minutes to read it.

Top Gear’s fifteenth season, arguably one of the best in a few years, will begin airing here in the US on BBC America starting on September 27th. There is no such thing as too much Top Gear, so make sure to tune in and watch!

Sorry for the next to no notice — I completely forgot to front page this until just now.

If you’re near the Nürburgring in Germany and aren’t doing anything this Sunday, you’re welcome to join some of our forum members for some laps around the Nürburgring. About 17 of them will be there. Look for the guys with FinalGear stickers in their windows and hit them up on Twitter (hashtag #ringmeet) or our forums.

Today’s Fifth Gear is now available. It’s the last of the current season (series).

Season (or series for you Brits) 16 of Top Gear has been delayed until early next year. Normally the fall/winter season would start in late October or early November and go until late December, but according to the latest Top Gear magazine, it’s been pushed back by a few months.

It’s definitely a bit of a disappointment, but you can’t rush quality and hopefully it will work out to better episodes.

The hosts of the American version of Top Gear did a bit of a press junket last week and Jalopnik has a write-up of it. Nothing to Earth-shattering or new, but still worth a quick read.

Quiky and McLightning95 have been hard at work shipping out everyone’s T-shirts:

You will receive an e-mail when your shirts ship (they should all be in the mail by the end of the week). People in the US are already starting to receive theirs (note that a signature may be required to avoid douchebags claiming they never got their shirts), but it’ll take longer for those of you outside of the US due to customs and so forth.

If you haven’t received an e-mail by August 15th (that’s next Monday), you can post in this forum thread. If you haven’t already received one as of now, be patient as e-mails are still going out.

Thanks everyone for supporting FinalGear!

The Scene never did end up releasing a rip, so here is a rip by someone in the Fifth Gear community. Thanks pitcrew!

Note that as of the time of this posting, Torrage is down so you’ll need to download the torrent from Zoink.it or using DHT.