TG US hosts have no idea about driving off road?

rlaxton

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With the recent reseeding of whole seasons of TG US I thought that I would check it out and see what the US made of the iconic show. Having watched up to mid season 2 now, it strikes me that either the hosts of TG US are deliberately being stupid or they truly have no idea about how to drive off-road. Aside from the ludicrous speeds they try to drive, the biggest thing would be simple tyre pressures. As far as I can tell they are running high road pressures while trying to navigate rocks and sand which is just not on. The step in the "Americas toughest trucks" episode would be an easy crawl with the right pressures and right line.

Am I being too harsh?
 
The exact same thing can be said about the UK presenters...

THE EXACT SAME THING.
 
And given the evidence of their three attempts at it, neither could the hosts of TGAUS. So put that in your pipe and smoke it, Bruce.
 
No TG presenter since New Top Gear appeared under Jeremy Clarkson has been able to drive offroad for crap. Not even the Russians.
 
IDK if it's just Texas where I used to live but no one there knew how to drive anywhere. People would tailgate going 75mph in the middle of an icestorm and cut across 5 lanes of traffic in 300 feet to get a highway exit. Doesnt suprise me they cant drive off road either.
 
So, are they all really that bad (after all, Richard Hammond has a 4WD and apparently drives it off road) or do the producers just think that slamming through obstacles and breaking stuff just makes for better TV?
 
I suspect the latter contributes much to it.

On the other hand and to pick just one example, Clarkson's gotten stuck in his former Land Cruiser a bunch of times on dirt roads. In the dry with no cameras watching. So inability to drive offroad isn't all feigned either.

For that matter, probably something like 90% of the first world population with licenses has no idea how to drive offroad.
 
The second you start taking TG (any TG) serious is the second you don't "get" what the program is about, not saying that I wouldn't want to see it changed a bit but it has never been about being amazing drivers, it's actually the whole point. Just have a look at Tiff and you'll instantly know why because he's boring as hell.
 
For that matter, probably something like 90% of the first world population with licenses has no idea how to drive offroad.

we don't have any off road...
 
I think Tanner Foust may know a thing or two about driving off road.... Take the rental car off road challenge for example.
 
You guys need to remember that TG is mainly about entertainment. Proper off-road driving is incredibly boring for a TV show. "Ok, so we need to lower the tire pressure slightly and gently creep up this hill to prevent wheelspin." It would take them 10 minutes of airtime to get up one damn hill. Also, part of the appeal of the show (UK and US) is that the presenters are regular blokes, who happen to be passionate about cars (Tanner is an exception obviously). They do not need to know everything about every type of driving.
 
I agree that they clearly have no experience offroad and someone who knows what they are doing would have gotten through anything seen on the show so far unscathed and intact. You can see the most experienced guy, Tanner, doing a much better job then the others. Still, he is more of a go fast rally guy and less Rock Crawler type, so its understandable that he wouldn't have a ton of experience through rocky terrain.

I do disagree that all Rock Crawling stuff is boring and unwatchable though. Plenty of it is, and I've been known to bore people with some of my videos since I have a Toyota with dual transfercases that can crawl at half a mile an hour. You don't have to destroy things and almost flip to make it look cool though. You might have to ramp up the difficulty levels with it though, since video does no justice to most offroad obstacles.

At the end of the day I didn't really care that they suck and that they break stuff all the time. At least they are self-professed noobs, which can't be said for that other stupid show where the Jeep gets dropped off on a mountain and the "professional offroad driver" has to drive it down. Not only is it the single worst example of the biggest taboo in offroad (that being going off the desginated trail) but there are so many ways that the dude sucks at picking routes and his driving technique is very questionable too.

There are some good shows that do an allright job showing off some decent entertaining offroad driving that doesn't involve destroying stuff. Dangerous Roads does a good job, Xtreme 4x4 is pretty good, and I'm sure I've seen others. Heck, even TGUK has done some fun stuff with the Bowler wildcat that was plenty entertaining but non-destructive.

I think it would be neat to put them in some tube buggies or something and take them on some truly hard and scary stuff. Looks like the TG UK guys might be headed to Baja in the next few episodes, so that should be interesting.
 
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