Jeremy Clarkson Reveals Why The Grand Tour Is Ending

Back in November last year, we heard that The Grand Tour would be coming to an end after a further two specials are released this year, bringing the show to a close after nearly eight years, and wrapping up over 20 years of car TV fronted by Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond.

Now, in an interview with The Times, Clarkson has revealed more about his decision to wind things up, saying that filming the show is “immensely physical… when you’re unfit and fat and old, which I am.”

In 2019, the show ditched the episodic studio format it had run with for the first three seasons to concentrate on producing feature-length ‘specials’ involving epic journeys in the style of the old Top Gear specials. With these, the show has visited exotic and far-flung places such as the Mekong Delta, Madagascar, the Arctic Circle and, erm… Scotland.

The upcoming final episodes have been filmed in the African nations of Mauritania and Zimbabwe, respectively, and will both stream at some point in 2024. Clarkson, 63, mentions camping in the Sahara Desert in Mauritania as being particularly brutal: “If you’re Bear Grylls you got to a hotel - there aren’t any hotels in the Sahara.”

He also says that the show is effectively running out of fresh ideas: “I’ve driven cars higher than anyone else and further north than anyone else. We’ve done everything you can do with a car.”

As well as shedding some light on his childhood and how he takes a certain amount of delight in causing controversy, Clarkson throws in his two cents on electric cars and the future of automotive broadcasting: “James May thinks there’s never been a more interesting time for how we move around… but I don’t think it’s very good television. An electric car is no different from a chest freezer or a microwave oven. There’s no glamour or excitement… I think it suits the written media more.”

Of course, the end of The Grand Tour doesn’t quite mean the end of Clarkson, Hammond and May on TV, as each is continuing with their solo projects. A third series of Clarkson’s Farm is on the way, and he confirms he’s about to start shooting the fourth. May, meanwhile, is continuing with his Our Man In… travel series. There are of course, still those two final specials to look forward to.