25 Things Every Fan Should Know About Top Gear's Chris Harris

In the immediate aftermath of the iconic trio of Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond leaving the BBC 2 TV show Top Gear, few hoped for a better, if not the same Top Gear as ours.

Then, up until February 2016, the focus was on star Chris Evans and his co-host Matt LeBlanc.

The duo was then joined by Chris Harris, followed by Rory Reid during the show's revamp. Viewers soon noticed that Chris Harris was the show's secret weapon.

Harris was soon able to impress audiences with his driving ability, enthusiasm, and extensive knowledge of automobiles. He showed he was in a completely different league from co-hosts Matt LeBlanc and Chris Evans.

But should this come as a surprise?

Although Chris Harris' face was not familiar to prime time television, he is a very popular automotive journalist. Chris Harris intersects with everything related to the car. Clearly, he is an icon who has made a huge mark on the automotive journalism industry.

In the past, Harris has written for major automotive magazines and publications. He wrote for Autocar magazine and became the official road test editor.

The British-born sports journalist is also very popular on social media. In fact, he has a very large fan base - more than four hundred thousand subscribers on YouTube. The channel is called Chris Harris on Cars.

Many car enthusiasts visit his channel to watch his periodically uploaded videos and car reviews. But do they and you know everything about this person?

Keep reading. You will learn 25 amazing facts about Chris Harris.

25 His mother was a race car driver

If you're wondering where Chris Harris' automotive genius came from, then you need to take a closer look at his genealogy.

Chris Harris born 20^th January 1975 day to the Harrises. He grew up in Bristol, England. He currently resides in Monmouthshire. His father was an accountant and his mother was a racing driver.

Yes. Chris Harris' mother was a professional race car driver in the early 1950s.

It is believed that his mother's life was one of the factors that influenced his love of cars. Not surprisingly, she was the first person he called when he was assigned to appear on BBC 2's main auto show, Top Gear. He mentioned this when he was interviewed by BBC 2's car and engine department in 2017.

24 Chris Harris sees Abu Dhabi as his dream location for Top Gear filming

When recently asked in an interview with BBC 2's Motors and Motors department about his dream location for a Top Gear show, and why? He said that his dream location would be Yas Marina in Abu Dhabi, UAE.

Why?

He has a lot of respect for Yas Marina. “Yas Marina in Abu Dhabi has a great track to deal with oversteer,” he said. He also mentioned that filming can take place all night in this location due to the powerful spotlights that shine brightly at night.

If you were a fan of Top Gear during its heyday with Richard Hammond, James May and Jeremy Clarkson, you'll remember that the Porsche 918 Spyder was reviewed by Richard Hammond in the same place.

23 The first memory of Chris Harris's car was….

“I remember in 1980, when I was 5 years old, I was sitting in the back seat of my father's BMW 323i,” says Chris Harris in an interview with a British motoring magazine. This first automotive experience made Chris Harris the automotive genius he is today.

From that day on, Chris' interest in cars quickly waned to the point where, 38 years later, he became a world-famous automotive journalist.

The fact is, to this day, he still has a vivid imagination of his father's BMW 3 Series.

When asked about his reaction whenever an image of a BMW 3 Series comes to mind, Chris answered in one word: "Epic."

22 He started from the bottom in the automotive journalism industry.

Chris started working for Autocar magazine when he was 20. When he first joined the company, he had to do all sorts of odd jobs. He did a lot of cleaning, ranging from mopping floors, cleaning ashtrays, etc. In fact, it didn't look like luck was going to shine on him anyway.

But just like a Mazda Miata in a race against a V12 Lamborghini, his enthusiasm and diligence continued to drive him. He never gave up his job because he knew what he was striving for. Finally, after years of hard work and hard work, he got promoted to Autocar magazine and became the official road test editor.

He soon gained wide popularity, writing a lot of car reviews. He also had a regular opinion column.

21 Harris earned the nickname "The Monkey" while working for Autocar magazine.

There is not a single famous Top Gear presenter who has gone through the show without a nickname. Richard Hammond was known as "The Hamster" and James May was the self-proclaimed "Captain Slow". Chris Harris' nickname "The Monkey" is unrelated to the series.

He got this name while still working for Autocar magazine. In fact, almost all of his work colleagues knew him as "Monkey".

It was to the point that some of the new employees who had recently joined the company did not know his real name as Chris Harris. Rather, they knew him by his nickname "Monkey".

So how did he get this name?

The name appears to have come from the character "Munky Harris" from the British sitcom Only Fools and Horses, which aired on BBC 1 from 1981 to 2003.

20 Chris Harris was once the co-founder of a web platform called Drivers Republic.

By the end of 2007, Chris Harris left the British automotive magazine Autocar. At this point, he was ready to try something fresh and interesting. So, in the spring of 2018, he decided to try his hand at a personal automotive magazine.

But this time it was over the Internet. The magazine consisted of a customized social community for drivers. He led not only an online magazine, but also a video channel for drivers.

Together with Richard Meaden, Steve Davis and Jethro Bovingdon, the Drivers' Republic started online. They merged under the dome of NewMedia Republic Limited.

However, the company stopped publishing in August 2009 due to some disagreements the co-founders faced over how the magazine and video content was produced.

19 He wrote his first article for Evo magazine on October 12, 2009.

Shortly after the closure of the Drivers Republic web platform, Chris Harris became a writer and columnist for Evo magazine. The British magazine has offices in Northamptonshire and Wollaston. It is owned by Dennis Publishing.

Chris Harris debut at 12^th In October 2009, he worked together with famous car enthusiasts. Several times they have included Jeff Daniels, Gordon Murray and Rowan Atkinson.

He published for Evo magazine every month. It was before 21^st December 2011, when he had to go on temporary leave. But in April 2015, Chris Harris returned to Evo magazine.

18 Chris Harris partners with Drive on YouTube to review for 2 years

In the spring of 2012, Chris Harris partnered with Drive on YouTube. Drive is a popular automotive YouTube channel that provides online videos for car racing enthusiasts. They feature driving adventures, race reports, car reviews and in-depth luxury car reviews for wealthy users.

Officially, it began just a day after the New Year 2012 celebration. It is known that this was the first Google initiative to create original content for new series, aired this year. The team consisted of Chris Harris, Jalopnik.com's Michael Spinelli, TheSmokingTire.com's Michael Farah and Gumball 3000 veteran Alex Roy.

17 He launched his own automotive YouTube channel in October 2014.

After two years on the Drive YouTube channel, Chris Harris left the network to start his own. Precisely 27^th In October, Chris Harris launched his own YouTube channel called "Chris Harris on Cars".

Chris has already created the "Chris Harris on Cars" brand while still working with the Drive YouTube channel. It has already gained a huge audience with over 3.5 million views, 104 videos uploaded to the Drive YouTube channel in 2 years.

So it's no surprise that in its first year it has amassed over 30 million views and over 350,000 YouTube subscribers.

16 He started writing for Jalopnik at the end of 2014.

Chris Harris received a recording contract for Jalopnik on the 27th.^th October 2014. It came to him shortly before he launched his personal YouTube video channel "Chris Harris on Cars".

At the time, Jalopnik was a subsidiary of Gawker Media.

In 2016, Gawker Media filed for bankruptcy due to a cash decision. This was prompted by wrestler Hulk Hogan's sex tape lawsuit that was filed against them. Because of these issues, Gawker Media was acquired by Univision Communications in an auction.

At this time, the contract of Chris Harris had to be terminated due to events and changes.

15 At least half of the cars Chris Harris drives were donated to him by car manufacturers.

This does not apply to the cars he is considering. This applies to the cars he owns.

In total, Chris Harris has 16 cars. Most of them he purchased from car manufacturers whose cars he looked at.

So how did it happen?

In most cases, a car manufacturer gives a motoring journalist "cars for the press" in the belief that the journalist will get a positive review. They do this when they put a new car on the market.

They use this medium as a subtle way to increase the sales of a particular car. For Chris Harris, these cars are magnetic.

In some cases, he receives them for use for a certain period of time. An example is an Audi RS 6 that Audi gave him for 6 months.

The extra gear show kicked off on February 27th.^th April 2016. This is a British online car series broadcast by BBC 3. It is streamed strictly on the internet. It is also available as an on-demand service on the BBC iplayer in the UK.

Extra Gear is a sister show to Top Gear. The British motoring series goes online after every Top Gear show is televised via BBC 2.

K 29^th In May 2016, Chris Harris was added as one of the main hosts of the Extra Gear car show - which suits him very well, as he was the host of Top Gear at the time.

13 Chris Harris went from being a paycheck to paying others

In the early years of Chris Harris's career, he lived off the salary of Autocar Magazine and Evo Magazine as an automotive journalist. As his career as a motoring journalist developed, he began to pursue his own private business.

Harris depended in part on sponsorship through various brands and YouTube ad revenue during the production of Chris Harris on Cars which was featured on the Drive YouTube channel.

Now Chris Harris maintains his current production series "Chris Harris on the Machines" on his own YouTube channel. He pays both his editor/cameraman Neil Carey and himself.

12 He had a collision with a Ferrari

Via: Automotive Research

When it comes to talking about the car, Harris isn't shy about expressing his feelings. In doing so, he is fearless towards a car manufacturer, whom he upsets in the process.

This was evident when he wrote for Jalopnik. He clearly stated that "the pleasure of driving a new Ferrari has now almost been superseded by the pain of frequent association with the organization."

This statement led to him being banned from driving a Ferrari. This happened between 2011 and 2013. However, he gave his review of the F12 TDF in the third episode of the latest Top Gear series in 2017. The review likely suggests that the relationship is now moving in the right direction, though you have to admit Ferrari can be a bit picky at times.

11 He remembers what first sparked his love for cars.

When he was only 6 years old, on a cool Saturday, Chris went to his father's office. But when he probably got bored, he excused himself and left his father's office.

As soon as he left his father's office, he went in search of entertainment. Whether by fate or simply by a fascination with gasoline, his eyes were fixed on a magazine that lay steaming in the receiving company. The magazine was called "What car?"

He immediately took the magazine and looked through it, he fell in love with it. This stimulated his love for cars. Apparently, he still has this valuable issue.

10 He's something of a supercar expert.

You would be interested to know that Chris Harris has had so many supercars over the years. This may be one reason why Harris is also involved in testing vehicles supplied by manufacturers.

One of Harris' supercars is a Ferrari 599. He also owns a Lamborghini Gallardo. However, Chris Harris seems to be a big fan of Porsche. In fact, this love for Porsche inspired him to take the bold step of building the 911 of his dreams.

The Dream 911 is a green car from 1972, equipped with the characteristics of a modern Porsche. In fact, the car was so good that he subsequently decided to name the car Kermit for reasons best known to him.

9 He feuds with Lamborghini

Being a very honest car reviewer, Chris Harris was set to feud with another company shortly after he trashed a Ferrari in a Jalopnik post. And this time he took the bull by the horns.

Once again, Chris Harris was quite expressive when he reviewed the Lamborghini Asterion, or rather gave his opinion on this concept car and the previous Lamborghini he has driven.

He described the Lamborghini car as "the perfect car for those who can't drive and want to be seen."

It didn't end there as expected, rather he took it one step further by declaring that the company's future was "dark". This led to a ban on consideration of Lamborghini cars.

8 He believes there is a link between car ownership and happiness

Via: car throttle

Chris Garry told the story of how his father was angry because he bought a 1989 Club Sport 911 Porsche until he made up his mind.

He said his father asked him why he had a job that seemed to bring him nothing. This announcement came as a result of Harris's inability to pay rent despite having a job.

But on reflection, his father remarked that despite his inability to pay rent, he had a 1989 Porsche 911 club sports car and was happy.

According to Harris, it was the first time his father acknowledged the connection between car ownership and his happiness.

This instilled in my father the belief that everything would work out in the end.

7 Surprisingly, he had no conflicts with Mazda

When Chris Harris reviewed the Mazda MX-5 Miata, he made offensive comments. He said he was "not entirely sure of the existence" of the machine. He also stated that the car drove with all the precision of a boneless limb."

After so many comments addressed to him about his words, he took his time to give Miata another chance. He did this to make sure that he was not mistaken in his decision.

After the second shot, he admitted that he was a little hard on the Miata at first. But he said that this does not mean that he abandons his previous point of view.

Surprisingly, despite his comments about the Mazda car, he was still allowed to review another Mazda model.

This was due to the fact that Mazda had no problem with his criticism.

6 It works with both old and new cars.

Chris Harris has so many cars. These cars are a combination of old and new cars. He has a BMW E39 523i. He described this car as one of the greatest production cars in the world. The 1986 BMW E28 M5 is also part of his collection.

The 1994 Range Rover Classic did not stand aside either. He also owns a Range Rover 322 and an Audi S4 Avant, which he calls cars with an appetite for DSG transmissions.

The Peugeot 205 XS, Citroen AX GT and Peugeot 205 Rallye have not gone unnoticed.