Tag: Jason Plato

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Fifth Gear Ford

Fifth Gear drives 2009 Ford Focus RS

Jason Plato from Fifth Gear has been handed a set of keys to the new Focus RS. It’s a pretty wild looking thing, and with 300bhp (225kW) powering the front wheels it sounds like a recipe for disaster. However, thanks to its tricky RevoKnuckle suspension system, which maximises grip, Ford seems to think everything will be okay.

So, it loses marks for lime green paint. It loses marks for hamfisted naming of its technology. But does the Focus RS lose any marks for the driving experience? Not on Jason Plato’s shift, it doesn’t.

Find out more about the Focus RS by downloading this PDF (724kb) or by checking our the Ford.co.uk website.

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Fifth Gear MINI Volkswagen

Fifth Gear dogfight: Volkswagen Scirocco v MINI Cooper S

The fifteenth series of Fifth Gear is currently airing in Britain and in this week’s show they pitted Volkswagen’s stunning Scirocco against the cheeky MINI Cooper S. The cars were tested at the Castle Combe racetrack and Tiff Needell and Jason Plato were at the wheel. You can be sure nothing was left in the pits.

The result was very close, but if you want the winning car you’ll have to pester Volkswagen Australia very hard to get one.

(Thanks to Lee for the tip.)

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 14, Episode 8

Apologies for the lateness of this recap—Episode 8 was the last in Series 14 and the show starts with Vicki showing us the updated Honda Jazz. You can fit a push bike in the back, apparently. Vicki reckons the Jazz is not so bad. Shame it’s not available with an ESP system (in Australia at least). Tim Shaw finally changed his pants—thank the lord for that—shame he’s still a goat. He serviced his own car and saved a few hundred squids, good for him. Oops, spoke too soon, the clown and his pants make a return in the studio.

In keeping with let’s cram as much as we can in each show theme of this series, Tom was given about 11 seconds to speak about the four wheel steering system in the new Renault Laguna GT. There was a bit of banter about a new British sportscar, the Jetstream SC250, all fine and dandy, but c’mon producers give the show some air, why bother showing this car if all you’re going to give is what amounts to a 15 second advertisement.

The next segment saw Tiff and Plato take to the track … in go-karts (see above). Tiff annoying and whiney as ever was shown the way by Plato. Result!

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Season 14, Episode 5

The shootout saw Jason Plato in a Lexus IS-F with Tiff Needell in a BMW M3 saloon. The Bimmer was quicker round the track. Just. But no surprise that the Toyota felt softer and more distant. Tom pitted the new Subaru Forester against a Land Rover Freelander II. He reckoned the Forester was tinny and under powered. He wasn’t much of a fan of the auto transmission either. A weclome addition to the cast this week was the Nissan GT-R and the Porsche 911 Turbo. Oh yeah, and Bruno Senna. Fittingly, he was fanging the cars around a wet track in conditions that his uncle would have loved (see clip above). I say, flick Tiff and replace him with Bruno.

Vicki filed a report from a tribute to Colin McRae which saw 1086 Impreza WRXs spell out his name. She also got a fang in McRae’s 1996 WRC winning car. Very tidy indeed! Tom had a go in the Dodge Challenger SRT8. I have to say it looks pretty damn good—for an American coupé. Vicki got the keys to a Vauxhall Astra VXR Nürburgring and a Ford Focus ST (XR5 to us Aussies). Geez, they cram a lot into these episodes. Plato finished the show with John Prescott in a racing Jaguar XK-R. The first three episodes of this series were a bit testing at times, but the last couplf have been much better.

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 14, Episode 4

Apologies for the late update to this week’s show. Jason Plato—AUSmotive’s preferred Fifth Gear presenter—started the show comparing the JDM Honda Civic Mugen RR v the UK spec 2000 GT. The Japanese Civic was the quickest around their test track, and by some margin, plus it sounds bloody good, too.

I didn’t want to mention Tim Shaw this week, but given he covered the revised CO2 taxes UK residents will be paying shortly, I thought it would be worth raising, given our federal government’s recent issues with its proposed Luxury Car Tax increases. I’m guessing it won’t be long until we’re paying taxes based on emissions here in Australia too. They highlighted a Volkswagen Golf 1.6 and a Citroen C4 XS, the French car expels 13 grams less in CO2 emissions, but when the new tax laws are introduced, the Citroen will cost almost AU$200 less to register. I daren’t mention the funky and frugal MINI John Cooper Works again (6.9l/100km, 165 g/km), but, well I just did.

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 14, Episode 3

Fifth Gear - Series 14, Episode 3

A much better showing from the lads at Fifth Gear this week. The shootout saw Jason Plato pit der neue Passat R36 Estate against der neue Audi A4 3.0TDI Estate. TheR36 is Volkswagen’s most powerful and quickest production car to date, but it didn’t have it all its own way against the A4 oil burner. More VAG content when VBH compared a Golf GT TDI against a Kia PRO-cee’d diesel. She reckons the Kia is getting better. While I hate to admit it doesn’t actually look too bad, I’ll take her word for it otherwise. Jonny went to the Ultimate Street Car show, or Summer Nats for chavs. He claimed there was some art and talent there, and to be fair, he’s probably right. But there’s also a crap load of wasted money, including a Civic Type R that has had £90K (AU$193K) thrown at it. Tiff drove around with Jarno Trulli in a Prius. It’s okay, they fell asleep too. Tim Shaw simply has to lose the stupid jumpers and poxy jeans, although, that would leave him with precisely no personality. A point he proved again while trying to match manufacturer’s performance claims in a MINI Cooper S, Mazda MX-5 and an Ariel Atom. Tom drove around in a new Honda Accord Jap, oops, I mean Euro. Tiff closed out the show being a prat against Australia’s own Jason Crump on a speedway track. Predictable results and a whining Tiff followed. Passable.

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 14, Episode 2

Fifth Gear - Series 14, Episode 2 - Porsche 911 GT2

So the next episode of Fifth Gear has been and gone and if you can’t wait for it to air on Foxtel’s Lifestyle Channel, here’s a quick recap. Tiff brings back the shoot-out, starting with Mazda’s revised RX-8 up against Nissan’s 350Z. Whoa, that beeping rev limiter on the RX-8 is just daft. Just as well the Zed is quicker, then. Tim Shaw—epic fail. ‘Nuff said. Vicki spent a day with Lewis Hamilton to see if she could find someone who loves Lewis more than James Allan. Jonny flashed £3K around to see what would be the best used motor on offer. He started with an E34 BMW M5, then toyed a Ford SportKa before deciding to keep half his money and buy a first gen Mazda MX-5. Plato fangs about in a new Porsche 911 GT2. Very tidy. Tom is let out in a Benz SL63 AMG and reckons the old one was better. The show ends with a Fifth Gear crash test. They used a Peugeot 306 Cabrio …  it was ugly! The crash results, not the car.

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 14, Episode 1

Fifth Gear - Series 14, Episode 1 - Rinspeed Squba

Fifth Gear is back on UK screens and Episode 1 of Series 14 saw the debut of a new presenter, Tim Shaw. No, not the Demtel man, but someone possibly as, erm, loveable. We also saw Snooker legend and resident bad boy Ronnie O’Sullivan get some advice on how to blow his Crucible winnings. He took his pick from a Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG, a BMW M3 Convertible and a Mitsubishi Evo X. Speaking of the Evo, Jason and Tiff put the Mitsubishi Evo X and the new-ish Subaru Impreza WRX STi to the test to determine which was the best track day weapon. Jonny showed that scrap metal is not always worth more than the sum of its parts. Tom tried to see if the Ford Kuga was a stick in the mud, and, well, it was, even if he reckons it’s otherwise okay. Cast your mind back the the slick Roger Moore James Bond era and you’ll see exactly where Rinspeed’s inspiration for the sQuba came from (pictured above).

See you next week.

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 13, Episode 10

my what an ugly butt you haveThis was the last episode in Series 13 of Fifth Gear. The Anglesea shootout was between the early 1990s Ford Escort Cosworth and the early 2000s Ford Focus RS. Interestingly the older Cossie took the honours and was around 1.5 seconds quicker around the track than the RS. Amazingly, and somewhat surprisingly, as seen on last week’s show, my wife’s shopping trolley (Mk5 Golf GTI) is faster than both of these, haha.

It’s new, but it still didn’t keep me awake. Lucky, then, Tiff took the wheel of the new Impreza STi. Well, maybe not if you work for Subaru. He wasn’t exactly glowing in his praise of the car. Seems that, as well as hitting the new Rex with the ugly stick, Subie have hit it with the softly, softly stick as well. Shame.

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 13, Episode 9

Oops, a bit late with this precis (Episode 10 aired last night)! Fifth Gear‘s Series 13, Episode 9 kicked off, as usual, with a shootout at the Anglesea track, and we saw the current hot-hatch du jour, the Mk5 Golf GTI take on the newly launched Subaru Impreza WRX. It seems the new Rex has been hit with a curse worse than the ugly stick. (See below for YouTube clip).

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 13, Episode 6

Fifth Gear 13x06Episode six of the current series of Fifth Gear featured the highly anticipated Nissan GT-R and Audi RS6 (see youtube clips below). In fact, Fifth Gear claimed theirs was the world’s first TV clip to review the GT-R. Jonny and Tom had a camp-off, erm, pun intended, with a pair of Volkswagen vans. The second hand star was the R33 Nissan Skyline GT-R. And Tom stacked a Renault Laguna into a big old tree. Vicki kicked off the episode by punting a Fiat 500 and MINI One around Anglesea.

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 13, Episode 5

Fifth Gear 13x05Episode five of the current series of Fifth Gear featured the much anticipated comparo between the BMW 135i and the Porsche Cayman (see two part youtube clips below). A short interview with Moto-X legend and rallying hopeful Travis Patrana showed some of his amazing career highlights. The second hand star saw Johnny looking for the best deal under £2400, I’d take his Mk2 Golf GTI 8 valve I reckon. And there was a bunch of daft scooters as well.

Other cars featured in Episode 5 include:

  • Renault Twingo GT v Fiat Panda 100hp at Anglesea
  • Land Rover Freelander v Nissan X-Trail
  • BMW 135i v Porsche Cayman
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