James May

James May
Born	James Daniel May 16 January 1963 (1963-01-16) (age 46) Bristol, England
Residence	Hammersmith, London, England
Nationality	British
Other names	Captain Slow, The Captain
Occupation	Journalist, Television presenter
Employer	BBC
Home town	Bristol, England
Height	5 feet 11.5 inches (1.82 m)
Known for	Top Gear; Oz and James's Big Wine Adventure; James May's 20th Century; James May's Big Ideas
Partner	Sarah Frater (2000—)

James Daniel May (born 16 January 1963) is a British television presenter and award-winning Journalist.

May is best known as co-presenter of the motoring programme Top Gear alongside Jeremy Clarkson and Richard Hammond. He also writes a weekly column for The Daily Telegraph's motoring section. On Top Gear, his nickname is "Captain Slow", owing to his 'careful' driving style. He has, however, carried out some exceptionally high-speed driving. He became one of the handful of people in the world to have taken a Bugatti Veyron to its top speed of 253.45 mph (407.90 km/h) - approximately one-third of the speed of sound at sea level. For his TV show, James May's 20th Century, he flew in a Eurofighter Typhoon at a speed of around 1320 mph - around twice the speed of sound.

May and Jeremy Clarkson - together with an Icelandic support crew - were the first ever people to reach the Magnetic North Pole in an automobile (a modified Toyota Hilux). The expedition was broadcast in a Top Gear special on BBC Two on 25 July 2007. Clarkson described May as being "the first person to go to the North Pole who didn't want to be there."

Journalism career

During the early-1980s, May worked as a sub-editor for The Engineer and later Autocar magazine. He has written for several publications, including a regular column called England Made Me in CAR Magazine and articles for Top Gear Magazine, as well as a weekly column in The Daily Telegraph. In 2000 he won the Guild of Motoring Writers Journalist of the Year award.

He has written a book titled May On Motors, which is a collection of his published articles, and co-authored Oz and James's Big Wine Adventure, based on the TV series of the same name.

He has also written the afterword to Long Lane with Turnings, published in September 2006, the final book by motoring legend L. J. K. Setright. In the same month he co-presented a tribute to Raymond Baxter. His book, Notes From The Hard Shoulder, was published on 26 April 2007. James May's 20th Century, a book to accompany the television series of the same name, was published on 6 September 2007.

In August 2006, it was revealed that May has contributed to the online motoring humour magazine Sniff Petrol.^[1]

Radio and television career

Host

His past television credits include presenting Driven on Channel 4 in 1998-1999, narrating an eight part BBC One series called Road Rage School, and co-hosting the ITV1 coverage of the 2006 London Boat Show

He also wrote and presented a Christmas special called James May's Top Toys (for BBC One) exploring the toys of his childhood. This list was followed up the next year by a sequel of sorts, broadcast on BBC Two, entitled James May: My Sister's Top Toys, this time attempting to investigate the gender divide of toy appeal.

He first co-presented Top Gear in 1999, before it was axed by the BBC owing to poor viewing figures. He rejoined the show in the second series of the present Top Gear format. On 29 January 2006 he presented Top of the Pops on BBC Two.

In late 2006, the BBC broadcast Oz and James's Big Wine Adventure, a series in which May, a committed bitter drinker, travelled around France with wine expert Oz Clarke. A second series was transmitted in late 2007, this time with May and Clarke in the Californian wine country.

He has also presented a documentary for Sky about sharks called Inside Killer Sharks and a series looking at inventions and discoveries during the twentieth century, entitled James May's 20th Century.

Guest

In February 2006 and February 2007, May was a guest on the BBC Radio 3 classical music interview programme, Private Passions.^[2]

He appeared on a number of culinary programmes, including Ainsley Harriott's Ready Steady Cook on 29 December 2003. He has also appeared on Gordon Ramsay's The F-Word, where he was challenged by Ramsay in two tasks. First by a culinary test: drinking snake whiskey, as well as eating bull's penis and Hakarl ('rotting shark'); May won as Ramsay finally vomited whilst eating the shark. Then, May competed against Ramsay in the Celebrity Challenge. They both made fish pie; May won with three votes to Ramsay's two. In January 2008 he appeared on an episode of the ITV show Al Murray's Happy Hour.

In an episode of Have I Got News for You first broadcast on 25 May 2007, James appeared as a guest as team mate to Ian Hislop.

In March 2006, May was a guest in the fourth episode of Petrolheads, teaming up with Top Gear colleague Richard Hammond.

Personal life

James May was born in Bristol, one of four children: older sister Jane and younger sister Sarah, and a brother.^[3] The family moved around the country in his childhood. In early years James attended Caerleon Endowed Junior School in Newport, Monmouthshire. He spent his teenage years in South Yorkshire where he attended Oakwood Comprehensive School in Rotherham, the same town where Jeremy Clarkson began his journalistic career. He was also at school with Life On Mars and Ashes to Ashes star Dean Andrews.^[4] As a child he was a choirboy at Whiston Parish Church.^[5] A keen flautist and pianist, he later studied music at Lancaster University, where he was a member of Pendle College and was once involved in lining the walls of the corridors with paper printed with the Union Jack. May currently lives in Hammersmith, London with his cat Fusker, who was a gift from Richard Hammond's wife, Mindy.^[6].

May has owned several cars, including a Bentley T2, a 1971 Rolls-Royce Corniche, a Jaguar XJS, a Range Rover, a Fiat Panda, a Porsche 911, a Porsche Boxster S (which he claims is the first car he has ever purchased new)^[7] a Mini Cooper and several motorbikes. He has a penchant for prestige cars like Rolls Royces and Bentleys, as well as simple and basic cars.

He obtained a light aircraft pilot's licence in October 2006 having trained at White Waltham Airfield. Although he had not qualified at the time, he was still able to fly a Cessna 182 in a Top Gear challenge with Richard Hammond as a passenger. During the race they had to land and continue via Eurostar, as his VFR rating prevented him from night flying at the time (flying at night requires a night rating, which is a separate qualification). He owns a Luscombe 8A 'Silvaire' & a Champion 8KCAB Super Decathlon with the registraion number G-OCOK, a play on his trademark phrase used on Topgear^[8]. May is in the process of selling the Luscombe Silvaire.^[9]

He passed his driving test on his second attempt, and justified this by saying "All the best people pass the second time." ^[10]

As well as being known as "Captain Slow" on Top Gear, he is also known for his belief that bigger is better when it comes to testing or buying vehicles. This led to his testing an LDV Convoy, Renault Master, and a V12 Jaguar XJS, among other things. He uses a Brompton folding bike.^[11]

He admitted on the 7 October 2007 episode of Top Gear that he sometimes smoked a pipe.

He has dated the music journalist and dance critic Sarah Frater since 2000.^[12]

Dismissal from Autocar magazine

In an interview with Richard Allinson on BBC Radio 2,^[13] May confessed that he was fired in 1992 from Autocar magazine after putting together a hidden message in one issue. At the end of the year, the magazine's "Road Test Year Book" supplement was published. Each spread featured four car reviews and each review started with a large, red, drop capital letter. May's role was to put the entire supplement together, which "was extremely boring and took several months". He went on to say:

So I had this idea that if I re-edited the beginnings of all the little texts, I could make these red letters spell out a message through the magazine, which I thought was brilliant. I can't remember exactly what it said, but it was to the effect that "You might think this is a really great thing, but if you were sitting here making it up you'd realise it's a real pain in the arse". It took me about two months to do it and on the day that it came out I'd actually forgotten that I'd done it because there's a bit of a gap between it being "put to bed" and coming out on the shelves. When I arrived at work that morning everybody was looking at their shoes and I was summoned to the managing director of the company's office. The thing had come out and nobody at work had spotted what I'd done because I'd made the words work around the pages so you never saw a whole word. But all the readers had seen it and they'd written in thinking they'd won a prize or a car or something.

May's original message, punctuated appropriately, reads: "So you think it's really good, yeah? You should try making the bloody thing up. It's a real pain in the arse."

Works

Television

DVD

Books

References

External links

• Telegraph Motoring - James May's weekly column
• James May at the Internet Movie Database