Top Gear Tonight: Renaultsport Clio 200, Peugeot 208 GTI, Ford Fiesta ST & New Reasonably priced car

Top Gear is back tonight (series 20) with a hot hatch shoot out, a new reasonably priced car, racing a Yacht in New Zealand and plenty of famous faces.

Photo Richard Hammond in Renaultsport Clio 200 Top Gear

Richard Hammond tests the Renaultsport Clio 200 (pictured), Peugeot 208 GTi and Ford Fiesta ST in tonight’s Top Gear

It’s been a while since Top Gear filled our Sunday evenings, but it’s back tonight – Series 20, Episode 1 – at 8pm on BBC 2.

The usual mayhem and madness (and silliness) will ensue. but the series needs to be set up first, because there’s a new reasonably priced car.

The last RPC was the Kia cee’d, which was better than you’d expect and certainly better than the Suzuki Liana and Chevrolet Lacetti that went before, but it’s time for a change.

But what’s Top Gear’s new reasonably price car, you may ask? It’s a Vauxhall Astra. It seems James May didn’t manage to convince the team a Dacia Sandero was the way to go.

So the new reasonably priced car will be introduced with the familiar format of inviting famous faces – including Warren Davies, Joss Stone, Jimmy Carr, Rachel Riley, Brian Johnson, Charles Dance and more – to come and set a time

Away from SIARPC we get James May and Jeremy Clarkson on the other side of the world – in New Zealand – with James aboard Americas Cup Yacht Oracle in a race against Jeremy in a red Toyota Corolla (well, an Auris if you’re a Brit), ending in Spirit Bay in the Far North of NZ.

Richard Hammond gets to play with a trio of the latest hot hatches – the Renaultsport Clio 200, Peugeot 208 GTi and Ford Fiesta ST – to see which is the current king of hot hatches.

If Jeremy was in on this it’d probably be the Fiesta ST, but with Hammond making the choice we expect it’ll be the Clio 200. We’ll see tonight.

Episode 1 (of 6) of Top Gear Series 20 airs tonight in the UK at 8pm on BBC2. Set your Sky+.