Tiff Gear: The Autobiography of Tiff Needell

Written with honesty and humour, this is the engaging story of Tiff Needell's life around cars and motor racing. For nearly 25 years Tiff has been a well-known television personality, first on "Top Gear" - where he worked alongside Jeremy Clarkson - and then on Channel Five's "Fifth Gear". Besides this, Tiff had an incredibly varied and long motor racing career that saw him reach the heights of a Grand Prix drive at Monaco and escape unharmed from a horrific 200mph crash at Le Mans. He tells his unique story with pace and style in a book that all his fans will relish.

Table of Contents

Brought up in the 1950s with a father who was a motor racing enthusiast and a designer of boats, and with an uncle who helped to sink the Bismarck - but there was no money to help Tiff's dreams of being a racing driver come true. The tortuous road to motor racing stardom begins with a competition prize - a Formula Ford racing car given away by Autosport magazine in April 1971. Working his way up in motor racing: lots of lean times, short of money, but eventually Tiff gets a Formula 3 drive in the Unipart team - and a company car! The Grand Prix driver: just nine years after winning that competition Tiff reaches the heights of Formula 1 at the 1980 Belgian and Monaco Grands Prix - there's no full-time drive but he's made it to the top on talent alone. Le Mans becomes a speciality: his second visit to the famous 24-hour race ends with a 200mph crash (he escaped unscathed); he would take part in 14 Le Mans races in all, achieving a best result of third place in 1990. Top Gear star: Tiff's break came in 1987 and he would be part of the team for 13 years; alongside Jeremy Clarkson he helped lift the programme to immense popularity. Out of Top Gear and into Fifth Gear: when a new BBC2 controller decided to call time on Top Gear Tiff opened the door at Channel Five and the whole BBC team followed him over to create Fifth Gear. Previous hardback edition ISBN: 978 0 85733 089 5.

Author Biography

Tiff Needell is a racing driver and television presenter. In motor racing he enjoyed an incredibly varied career, including driving in Grands Prix and the Le Mans 24 Hours. He has been a television presenter for 23 years, first with Top Gear and now with Fifth Gear.