James May thinks it’s the end of an era (Picture: David Fisher/Shutterstock)
It sounds like the end of an era for Top Gear and The Grand Tour fans.
James May has some devastating news for fans of the long running motoring shows, and he’s admitted he doesn’t think he’ll ever work with Jeremy Clarkson and Richard Hammond again.
The 61-year-old TV star has presented alongside Jeremy, 64, and Richard, 54, across both shows since 2003, but he has insisted their time has come after the final Grand Tour special on Amazon Prime.
Speaking to UniLad, he said: ‘I think people would only really like us doing cars, despite what some people say – “Oh, I think you should all go off and do cooking or you should all go and do a podcast about nothing.”
‘But I don’t think so, I think we should let it lie, what we did.’
It’s been 21 years since the beloved – and sometimes controversial – trio first fronted Top Gear together, and their partnership lasted until 2016, when they launched The Grand Tour.
James doesn’t think he’ll work with Richard Hammond and Jeremy Clarkson on other projects (Picture: Matt Jelonek/WireImage)
However, that show is now set to end after eight years, with Jeremy recently explaining that they were leaving the programme because he had run out of ideas for future instalments of the series.
‘I’ve driven cars higher than anyone else and further north than anyone else. We’ve done everything you can do with a car. When we had meetings about what to do next, people just threw their arms in the air,’ he told The Times.
The Clarkson’s Farm star admitted the physical demands of the programme had become too taxing since he became ‘unfit and fat and old’.
He quipped: ‘If you’re Bear Grylls you go to a hotel – there aren’t any hotels in the Sahara desert.’
However, Jeremy has dismissed James’ previous suggestion that the trio’s working relationship was ‘fuelled by mutual loathing’.
The Grand Tour finale could be the last time fans see them together on screen (Picture: Amazon Studios/Kobal/Shutterstock)
He argued: ‘We’ve spent more time in each other’s company than our families’ over the last 25 years so I don’t think it would have lasted as long as it did if we’d hated each other as much as James likes to think.’
The trio’s former show Top Gear has been put on hold by the BBC after presenter Freddie Flintoff suffered horrific injuries in a crash during filming in 2022, but Richard expects it could to return in some form ‘one day’ in the future.
‘I don’t know. I have no doubt Top Gear will come back one day,’ he told the Daily Mail. ‘Somebody will pick it up and run with it. It’ll be a different show.’
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