Top Gear court case: The Stig revealed

[N.O.R.F]

Big fan of the show. Will they use a new Stig now?

 

Top Gear court case: The Stig revealed as racing driver Ben Collins

 

Racing driver Ben Collins has been revealed as The Stig after the High Court refused to grant the BBC an injunction blocking the publication the Top Gear star's autobiography.

 

When it emerged that Collins planned to unmask himself, his employers sought an injunction to prevent HarperCollins from publishing the book.

The Stig races a variety of cars on the Top Gear programme clad in white overalls and a blacked-out visor, and only about six people - including the programme’s presenters, Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond - knew his identity for certain.

 

The secrecy elevated him to cult status and spawned T-shirts with slogans such as "My Dad is the Stig", but he is said to be unhappy that other presenters are able to earn considerable sums from book deals and promotional products.

 

The BBC claimed that the mystery driver signed a confidentiality agreement and argued that blowing his cover would spoil viewers’ enjoyment of the flagship BBC 2 show.

 

HarperCollins criticised the Corporation for spending licence payers’ money on the attempt to block the book.

 

Speculation that the Stig could be Collins, a racing driver and stuntman from Bristol, intensified earlier this month after the accounts of his company, Collins Autosport, were found to list “driving services provided for the BBC, mainly in the Top Gear programme”.

 

The 35-year-old, who has performed as a James Bond stunt double, was also “outed” as the Stig in 2009, when a builder, Jason Goody, claimed to have come across his famous white suit and gloves on display in a cabinet while working in his home.

Simon Whitehead, a Bristol gallery owner, later claimed that Mr Collins had identified himself as the mystery driver and asked if an artist could help produce a limited-edition print of him in action.

 

The current “white” Stig took on the role in 2003 after the original “black” Stig, the racing driver Perry McCarthy, outed himself in an autobiography called Flat Out, Flat Broke.

Telegraph

[Valenteenah.]

LoL...does anyone other than the BBC really care about this 'reveal'? I certainly don't! I'm sure they'll employ another stig now.

[Polanyi]

I always imagined the stig to be a SOmali bus driver. Now the BBC ruined that image.

[Qandalawi]

There is always a level of couriousity to any secrecy. Yes, we wanted to know who this stig was.

 

Besides top gear was good back in the days, it used to be one of my fav programs.

[Urban]

I'm looking forward to how they kill him off in the coming season, and I hope they bring back the stig's african cousin from the Botswana episode.

 

Some say that he is the founding member of Anonymous.