Top Gear: Season 5, Episode 6

5 - 6: £1500 Porsches

On a cheap-but-not-so-cheerful Top Gear, Richard, James and Jeremy saw what sort of Porsche £1,500 buys you, and weren't impressed. And a member of the public got to have a spin on our track. What would you do if someone handed you £1,500 and told you to buy a car? Most people would pick up a well looked after Fiesta, or a Polo. When we buy second hand, we aim for the top. So we told James, Richard and Jeremy to each buy a Porsche for as little money as they could cobble together. We then got them to perform a number of challenges. Of course, Jeremy went totally over the top and bought a 928, which was a bucket of bolts. James did much better. While he lost 'cool points' for buying a white car, his 944 was the second-most reliable. Richard trumped them in terms of reliability. His 924 was powered by a truck engine, and therefore could probably survive anything. Ultimately, there were no winners. James' car blew up when the Stig drove it; Jeremy's blew up on the way down to Brighton. And Richard painted his a stupid colour. Our conclusion: you really can't get a decent Porsche for £1,500. When Billy Baxter wrote and asked for a go on the track, we couldn't resist. Billy had just one slight disadvantage: he's blind. He made it round in a touch over 2 minutes, which beat both Terry Wogan and Richard Whiteley.