Car enthusiast and TV personality Ant Anstead has opened up about being in the running to take over as a presenter on ‘Top Gear’ last year, revealing that the job was almost his until he fluffed his screen test in a major way.
To check out his abilities, BBC bosses had Ant drive a sports car worth around £85,000 around a test track, only for him to wind up writing off the car.
Oh dear.
He told The Sun: “I was asked to take around the track an AMG C63 Mercedes estate. This is a brand-new car worth around £85,000. It’s fantastic — very fast and everything you want in a car.
As we all know by now, the ‘Top Gear’ presenting job that was in arm’s reach for Ant wound up going to Chris Evans and Matt LeBlanc, following the departure of Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond.
Chris’s tenure as host wasn’t exactly well-received by viewers or critics, and as viewing figures continued to dwindle, the Radio 2 DJ announced he’d be stepping down as lead presenter after the last episode of the series aired.
Since then, former ‘Friends’ actor Matt has been promoted to lead host, and the most recent series had a better reception from fans of the show.
Although viewing figures are still behind on the show’s peak ratings from when Clarkson and co. served as presenters, they are up on last year’s, and it’s expected that Matt will return for a third run next year, alongside co-hosts Rory Reid and Chris Harris.