Even if you're not an automobile or motoring enthusiast, there is nothing like Top Gear to rev up your spirits. That's because the engine that powers this vehicle comes in the form of the hit show's three hilarious hosts: The formidable Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond.

And as the show has evolved over the years - its original format debuted in 1977 - Top Gear has become less of a car magazine show and more, in May's words, "an elaborate slapstick sitcom with a car theme" that deals with "the perversity of three blokes who see the whole world through cars".

The trio are indubitably the sparkplugs of the show, but making Top Gear is very much a team effort, especially when it comes to thinking up new crazy ideas for testing out wheels, engines and drag strips. Hammond revealed that they have an office full of "bright-eyed young things who prance around full of ideas". He said: "When I first started 10 years ago, one of the guys, Jim Wiseman - who since moved on to other things - was only 21 years old, a researcher or something, sitting in the office chewing a pencil and thinking out loud. He said, 'How many motorbikes do you think a bus could jump over?' And we all went, 'I'd love to know', so we did it."

Still, you might be tempted to think that crochety Jeremy Clarkson is the boss of it all. On whether or not he actually is the main man, Hammond said: "If you were talking to Jeremy, the answer would be a definite yes. But pretty much anybody else in the world it is no. No, we're really a free-thinking triumvirate of individuals allowed to express ourselves as we can. Jeremy is the biggest and the loudest, but he is also a coward. The arguments are really, really interesting. We naturally are mates; which means we both hate and kind of enjoy each other's company."

When asked if he was sometimes embarrassed by Clarkson's frequent politically incorrect comments, May deadpanned: "I am permanently embarrassed by Jeremy if I am with him because he is just such a social and intellectual liability and he looks terrible."

Now to get down to business we all want to know about: What's the best car in the world? "I have always maintained that the best car in the world was the Citroen AXGT of 1991, if you have to consider everything including the cost, the maintenance, but you want it to be good to drive, you need some space, and all the rest of it," said May.

Hammond opined: "I love Pagani Zonda and Pagani Huayra because it's an enticing blend of technology; it looks like it's just landed, which I think is rather exciting. It's everything I think a car should be. It's also ludicrously expensive." TRANSCRIPT COURTESY OF BBC KNOWLEDGE.

Catch Top Gear Series 18 on Sundays at 10pm on BBC Knowledge (StarHub TV Ch 407).