Richard Hammond expects the BBC to bring back Top Gear
"Yes, it ended after Freddie's crash, and my reaction was, 'Oh god, poor Freddie, that sounds awful.'
Richard Hammond appears on Clarkson's Farm season 4
(Image: PRIME VIDEO)
Richard Hammond is confident that Top Gear will return to screens in the future.
The BBC motoring programme has been on hiatus since presenter Andrew 'Freddie' Flintoff suffered nasty injuries in a terrifying crash during filming in 2022 but Hammond – who hosted the show alongside Jeremy Clarkson and James May from 2002 until 2015 – pointed out the corporation has taken it off the schedule in the past.
The 55-year-old star – who suffered serious injuries himself in a high-speed accident during filming for the series in 2006 – told the Oxford Mail: "It's been off-air before. It had been off the air for a few years when we took it on, and we did our thing, and then they gave it to another team, and they did their thing.
"Yes, it ended after Freddie's crash, and my reaction was, 'Oh god, poor Freddie, that sounds awful.'
"To the show being taken off air, the BBC has big-name shows that it rests, and then brings back."
Hammond left Top Gear alongside his co-presenters in 2015 after Clarkson's contract was not renewed following an altercation with a producer - with the trio going on to host the Amazon Prime series The Grand Tour - and admits that filming days for the BBC show were "anxiety-ridden".
On a visit to the defunct Top Gear set in a video filmed for May's YouTube channel, Hammond said: "You'd think about what was in it [the show].
"If you had a really good film that you were pleased with, or there'd be a tricky bit in the news that you'd be dreading, or a really long complicated link that had a lot of stuff you'd have to remember."
May added: "I think we did [get anxious], but I think we got used to it and that was just the way our lives were."
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His former co-star then replied: "Anxiety-ridden. How the hell did we get away with it for so long?"
The trio's presenting partnership came to an end as they left The Grand Tour in 2024 and Hammond previously confessed that it hadn't sunk in that the extraordinary period of his career is "over" – more than two decades after he first hosted Top Gear.
He said: "I never thought I'd be part of something that big. I'm just a little bloke from Birmingham who likes cars and doing radio and TV but that doesn't mean you end up on one of the biggest shows in the world with an audience who follow you for 22 years. I think six months from now I'll suddenly sit bolt upright and realise it's over."
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