Fifth Gear/The Greatest Cars in The World Special

The Greatest Cars in The World
Thumb 1Thumb 2Thumb 3 Title card. The McLaren F1 GTR. Tiff talks about the 360 Modena.
No.	12
Next ep.	James Bond's Cars
Prev. aired	Series 1, Episode 11
Next aired	Series 2, Episode 1
Airdate	8th September, 2002

The Greatest Cars in The World Special of Fifth Gear aired on the 8th September, 2002. As a standalone special, the programme was the 12th episode overall. It was the 12th programme to air in 2002 out of a total 22. The Greatest Cars in The World Special was originally broadcast in 576i at a 16:9 Widescreen aspect ratio on British television channel Channel 5. The episode was presented by Tiff Needell and Vicki Butler-Henderson, with no other hosts presenting a piece to camera that week. Quentin Willson and Adrian Simpson are also credited, however, no footage featuring these two presenters is presently known to have surfaced, and may just be a miscredited appearance.

Synopsis

The Greatest Car in The World was a special filmed at a race track where Tiff and Vicki set out to determine the greatest car ever made.

Opening up with a seductive shot of Vicki walking in a pair of stiletto high heels while rubbing her finger along the bodywork of a Lamborghini Murciélago, she announces the purpose of the episode before a few close shots of a Ferrari 360 Modena are shown. Accompanied by a Ferrari Daytona and Dino 246 GT, Tiff Needell exclaims that contrary to popular belief, he believes the greatest Ferrari ever made is not one of their well-renowned classic models, but rather their (as of 2002) most recent sports car; the 360 Modena.

Airing history

Channel	Date	Time	Cut	Definition	Type
	8th September, 2002	20:00	Original	Standard	Premiere

After this, the episode aired on the Discovery Channel sometime on or immediately prior to the 21st July, 2003, where it was recorded, digitised, and uploaded to the internet by Jabba355. From there, it was likely sold to Viasat for its Explorer television series, as part of the 48 programmes distributed to the network in mid-2004, where it would have been reshown countless times until early 2007.

Soundtrack

The Greatest Cars in The World Special, contained the following tracks:

▶️ David Lowe - Fifth Gear Theme: Plays during the opening and closing sequences.
▶️ Duar Vila - C'Mon: Plays during the scene where Tiff drives the F1 down city streets.

Of the episode's soundtrack, an uncertain number of songs featured remain unidentified. Throughout the episode, an Oasis-like Britpop instrumental is heard, which is interspersed with an electronic track which may or may not be part of the same piece of music.

Preservation status

Due to the work of archivists, The Greatest Cars in The World can be watched in a largely-intact form, albeit not at the original resolution, aspect ratio, nor bitrate, with approximately one third of the episode remaining missing. Otherwise, the episode would be considered lost media. As of the 2020s, this special is completely extinct on the internet since the deletion of Ely Liu's webspace and disappearance of the file from P2P networks and other file sharing means such as eD2k.

Trivia

• This was the first non-regular episode of Fifth Gear to air, and is not included in most episode guides.
• The Ferrari 360 Modena featured in the episode, RV02 ONL, was a very well-known press car from around this time. It appeared in promotional material, as well as the introduction sequence for Top Gear's 2002 relaunch, in addition to an episode of Used Car Heaven, where it was driven by Richard Hammond, and several magazine issues including one for Top Gear Magazine, as well as the June 2003 issue of Auto Italia.
• The McLaren F1 GTR featured in the episode, 13 MAC, better known by its internal designation of Chassis 020, would later appear in Series 2, Episode 1 of Top Gear, where it was driven by legendary Formula 1 commentator Murray Walker. This film would be omitted from later broadcasts, but was thankfully retained in an abridged version for the programme's 2003 home video release Top Gear: Back in the Fast Lane.