Ed JamesBBC Radio WM and
Tanya GuptaWest Midlands
Silverstone Festival
Presenter Richard Hammond raced a classic 1960s sports car at Silverstone, in August, for the show
TV presenter Richard Hammond says he had to “bring out the big guns”, or his mum, at his car workshop, the focus of his new TV show.
The documentary series follows his real-life car restoration venture, The Smallest Cog, in Herefordshire.
Hammond, from Solihull, said he knew about cars, drove them round race tracks and had run production firms, but when it came to managing the workshop, he said: “I’m outside my comfort zone”.
Describing his mother as “terrifying”, he said: “I couldn’t get the lads to fill in their timesheets which I absolutely need…and I just couldn’t get them to do it – so I brought her in. She’s only tiny but she did [it], they listened to her, so they do it now.”
Key moments in the series, which premieres on Discovery+ later, include painting an Aston Martin pink, after a request by the customer, racing a classic 1960s sports car at Silverstone, and repairing a Mercedes SL given to Debbie McGee by her celebrity magician husband Paul Daniels.
Hammond said each car came with a great story, whether it was a multi-million pound Ferrari or an old Ford Escort, because each one had someone’s dreams or memories wrapped up in it.
Motor trade ‘in my blood’
The business began four or five years ago, he said, after he had worked as a broadcaster talking about cars for 30 years, but wanted to be part of the industry.
He described the motor trade as being “in my blood”, because his grandfather was a coachbuilder at Mulliners Ltd in Birmingham and finished his career as an inspector at the end of the Jensen Interceptor line in West Bromwich.
“I thought, ‘Well, I’m going to set up this workshop, I’ll do it in near home and I’ll put some blokes in it and brilliant, now I’m part of the industry, good’, and then I thought that might make a good telly show.”
The key thing was it was a real business, he said, adding: “These are people’s jobs. The guys working for me are painters, welders, fabricators, mechanics.
“This is their job. They pay rent and mortgage from the money, so I can’t just go, ‘Now I’ve had enough, let’s just fold it’, because it’s their jobs so I’ve got to make it work.”
