The Stig

The Stig is a character from the British motoring television show Top Gear. Created by former Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson and producer Andy Wilman, the character is a play on the anonymity of racing drivers' full-face helmets, with the running joke that nobody knows who or what is inside the Stig's racing suit. The Stig's primary role is setting lap times for cars tested on the show. Previously, he would also instruct celebrity guests, off-camera, for the show's "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" segment.
The identity of the original "Black" Stig, Perry McCarthy, was exposed by a Sunday newspaper in January 2003, and confirmed by McCarthy later that year. The black-suited Stig was subsequently "killed off" that October in the series 3 premiere, and replaced in the following episode by a new White Stig who lasted through to the end of series 15.
In series 13 episode 1, the show jokingly unmasked the Stig as seven-time world champion F1 driver Michael Schumacher. In the hiatus following series 15, racing driver Ben Collins was revealed to be the Stig in a court battle over Collins's impending autobiography, titled The Man in the White Suit. In series 16, debuting in December 2010, Collins was replaced by a second White Stig, who was revealed by Clarkson in 2024 to be racing driver Phil Keen.

Creation and name

The idea for the character was part of former host Jeremy Clarkson and former producer Andy Wilman's concept for the relaunched Top Gear show, bringing a new format to the original version of Top Gear which ceased production in 2001. The relaunched show introduced a live studio audience, the Stig, a racetrack, and madcap stunts. Clarkson is credited with having come up with the original idea for the Stig.
Clarkson and Wilman wanted to have a professional racing driver as part of the show's cast, but ran into difficulty finding a driver sufficiently adept at speaking on-camera. Clarkson then asked Wilman why the driver needed to speak at all, and they decided that the Stig's role would be silent.
The name Stig derives from Wilman and Clarkson's time at Repton School, where new boys had always been called "Stig". "Stig" is a pejorative referring to someone from a poor background with a poor dress sense.
According to the original Stig, Perry McCarthy, speaking in 2006, the producers had first wanted the anonymous driver to be called "The Gimp", referring to the use of gimp suits in BDSM sexual role-playing. After McCarthy objected, they settled upon the name Stig. McCarthy had said of the idea at the time that "I don't want to be forever remembered as the Gimp".. This was later confirmed by Andy Wilman.

Characteristics

Anonymity and silence

When introducing the Stig in the Top Gear premiere, Clarkson said, "We don't know its name, we really don't know its name, nobody knows its name, and we don't want to know, because it's a racing driver."
According to a 2006 article in The Sunday Times, most of the Top Gear crew did not know the Stig's identity; one camera assistant reportedly observed the Stig eating his lunch in the back of an ambulance to avoid being spotted. In 2009, another Times article reiterated that only a few production staff, the show's presenters and other BBC journalists knew the Stig's true identity.
Former Stig Perry McCarthy described in 2009 how, to maintain his anonymity, he would put on the Stig's helmet while going through the Top Gear security gates, and then change into his racing overalls in a special room behind the gatehouse before driving into the studio areas. He would speak as little as possible in the backstage areas, and put on an accent which some mistook as French. McCarthy also explained that hiding his identity while coaching the celebrities for "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" proved difficult. He said that he did reveal his true identity while coaching Ross Kemp and David Soul, as he had previously known them and they promised that they would be silent about his role. For other drives, if celebrities asked if he was a particular person, he would just say "How did you know?", adding that more often than not, the suggestion was Michael Schumacher.
The Stig is never shown talking on screen, although he does talk with celebrities off-camera while training them to drive around the track. Clarkson has joked that he is "not a very talkative chap". When asked about his identity in a rare spoken interview for the show Veronica Vibes of a Dutch channel, the Stig reportedly said, "I don't remember; my memory was erased when I got the job." The Stig's muteness has extended to appearances in other media, such as the "Brain Stig" video released by the BBC on YouTube in 2009.
Clarkson has written in his newspaper column that the Stig is not permitted to talk or comment on the cars he is given to drive because "the opinions of all racing drivers are completely worthless", going on to explain that, because of their familiarity with cars equipped for track racing, racing drivers believe any and all road cars are inferior to racing cars.

Driving ability

The show has often compared the Stig's driving ability to others, particularly Formula One drivers. When Jeremy Clarkson said that the Stig believed that the Suzuki Liana, the show's Reasonably Priced Car at the time, could do a lap time of 1:44.0, former F1 driver Nigel Mansell, appearing as a guest on the programme, duly obliged by posting a time of 1:44.6; the Stig then posted a time of 1:44.4. After Rubens Barrichello became the first person to beat the Stig's time, the show repeatedly referred to a jealous rivalry between the Stig and Barrichello. Sebastian Vettel then further beat this time by posting a time of 1:44.0. A while later, Lewis Hamilton did a second lap and got a 1:42.9. Clarkson has often mentioned that F1 drivers seem to take a different racing line on the test track than the Stig, such as on Jenson Button's drive; however, during Barrichello's and Lewis Hamilton's visits to the show, Clarkson observed that they took the same line around the track as The Stig. F1 driver Mark Webber's appearance on the show was marked at the conclusion of his lap with Clarkson presenting him with an "I AM THE STIG" T-shirt.

Introductions

The Stig's introductions on the show have underlined his oddness. Initially the presenters heralded his appearance with simple humorous introductions, such as "His Holiness, the Stig!" Beginning in series 6, the introductions began to follow a format of, "Some say that . All we know is, he's called the Stig." Characteristics described in this format include:

He gets terrible eczema on his helmet
When he was born, he drove himself home from the hospital
Wherever you are in the world, if you tune your radio to 88.4, you can actually hear his thoughts
He has no face
He has a digital face
He has a full-sized tattoo of his face on his face
He never blinks
He blinks horizontally
His tears are adhesive
His ears aren't where you'd expect them to be
His ears have a Paisley lining
His earwax tastes of Turkish Delight
He can catch fish with his tongue
His teeth glow in the dark
His breath smells of magnesium
His voice can only be heard by cats
In the autumn his arms go brown and fall off
His nipples are explosive
The outline of his left nipple is exactly the same shape as the Nürburgring
His heart ticks like a watch
His heart is upside-down
His genitals are on upside-down
He has webbed buttocks
When he slows down, brake lights come on in his buttocks
When he sees a woman, his third leg will go up
His legs are hydraulic
He has two sets of knees
He has to take his shoes off with an Allen key
His sweat can be used to clean precious metals
His skin has the texture of a dolphin
On really warm days he sheds his skin like a snake
He is allergic to the Dutch
He naturally faces magnetic north
He lives in a tree
He roams around the woods at night foraging for wolves
He sleeps upside-down like a bat
The drinks cabinet in his car contains 14 different types of custard
His favourite T-shirt has a picture of a T-shirt
He will charge you if you attempt to remove his helmet
He thought Star Wars was a documentary
He knows two facts about ducks and both of them are wrong
He thinks the credit crunch is a breakfast cereal
He won a BAFTA for Best Original Smell
He thinks when he dies he will go to Devon
His favourite flower is the potato
He thinks crisps are animals
If he caught fire he would burn for 1000 days
He can swim seven lengths underwater
His favourite football formation is 8-8-19
He once threw a microwave oven at a tramp
He has twelve GCSEs, all of which are in domestic science
He has some terrible plans involving the Moon
His New Year’s resolution is to eat fewer mice
He keeps a photograph of his wallet in his wallet
He can’t eat mashed potato for religious reasons
He refuses to acknowledge the existence of Nottinghamshire
He got engaged to James May’s lawnmower following the vote on gay marriage
He is married to one of Princess Anne's hats
He has no understanding of queueing
He is confused by stairs
He has no understanding of clouds
He is absolutely baffled by urinals
He doesn’t know what dogs are for
He doesn’t understand the word “envelope”
He submitted a 20,000 pound expenses claim for some gravel for his moat
He invented November
He invented Branston Pickle
If he felt like it, he could fire Alan Sugar
If he could be bothered, he could crack the Da Vinci code in 43 seconds
He appears on high-value stamps in Sweden
There is an airport in Russia named after him
He had an affair with John Prescott
He is wanted by the CIA
He has been banned from the Chelsea Flower Show
He is banned from the town of Chichester
He is not allowed by law within 100 yards of Lorraine Kelly
He is illegal in 17 U.S. states
He is afraid of bells
He is terrified of ducks
He is terrified of Scouts
His first name really is "The"
If he went on Celebrity Love Island, they'd all be pregnant, including the cameramen
He once had a vicious knife fight with Anthea Turner
If you lick his chest it tastes exactly the same as piccalilli
His crash helmet is modelled on Britney Spears's head
He isnt machine-washable
All his potted plants are called Steve
His scrotum has its own small gravity field

Some introductions have referred to current events and stories in popular culture, such as:

"If you insult his mother, he will headbutt you in the chest"
"If you give him a really important job, he'll skive off and play croquet"
"Has dreams about what Rubens Barrichello would look like in a ham slicer"
"If he was getting a divorce from Paul McCartney, he'd keep his stupid whining mouth shut"
"He always wears a helmet because a man once smashed him in the face with a model of Salisbury Cathedral"
"He's banned from the town of Chichester and..., in a recent late-night deal, he bought a slightly dented white Fiat Uno from the Duke of Edinburgh"
"If you hold him in the wrong way, he doesn't work properly"
"He regrets buying his new holiday home in down-town Cairo"
“That sixty years ago this week, he too became a Queen”
"He contains 47% horse"
"He used to work in Rome, but gave up his job to be able to keep up with his work here"
"As a result of buying Pirelli condoms this week, he now has seventeen children"
"On a recent trip to Cornwall, he stopped off for one of his special, big wees in Somerset"
"If he had worked for CNN, he wouldn't have got such pitifully low ratings that his show got cancelled"
"While we were off air, his iCloud was hacked and now everyone in the world has seen his helmet"
"Last week, he was found in a locked room, tied to a chair with German piano wire"
"He once punched a horse to the ground"
"Long before anyone else, he realised that Jade Goody was a racist, pig-faced waste of blood and organs."
"He is in no way implicated in the Cash-for-Honours scandal."
"If he'd been the video ref for the World Cup of Rugby final he would've seen that of course it was a try you blind Australian half-wit."