Richard Hammomd

      Richard Mark Hammond (born 19 December 1969), nicknamed "Hamster" due to his name and relatively small stature, is a British presenter of radio and television, best known for co-presenting the television program Top Gear since 2002. Along with his Top Gear co-hosts James May and Jeremy Clarkson, Hammond also presents Top Gear Live at the annual MPH motorshow in Earls Court and Birmingham NEC.

He has also presented Brainiac: Science Abuse, Richard Hammond's Blast Lab, and writes a weekly column for The Daily Mirror.

Along with Amanda Byram, he is currently presenting Total Wipeout, a British gameshow, Richard Hammond's Engineering Connections and Richard Hammond's Blast Lab.

In September 2006 he suffered a serious brain injury after crashing a jet car he was testing for Top Gear at high speeds (288.3 mph, 464.0 km/h). At the end of January 2007, after Hammond had recovered from his injuries, Top Gear was back on screen in the United Kingdom, showing the footage of the crash.

Life and Carrer

      Hammond was born in Shirley, West Midlands and is the grandson of workers in the Birmingham automobile industry. In the mid-1980s Hammond moved with his family (mother Eileen, father Alan, and younger brothers Andrew and Nicholas) to the North Yorkshire market city of Ripon where his father ran a probate business in the market square. Originally a pupil of Solihull School, a fee-paying boys' independent school in the West Midlands town, he moved to Ripon Grammar School, and from 1987 to 1989 attended Harrogate College of Art and Technology.

Hammond became a presenter on Top Gear in 2002, when the show began its present format. He is sometimes referred to as "Hamster" by fans and his co-presenters (Jeremy Clarkson and James May) on Top Gear. His nickname was further reinforced when on three separate occasions in Series 7, Hammond ate cardboard, and mimicked hamster-like behavior. Another running gag by co-host Jeremy Clarkson is Hammond's supposed use of teeth whitener, and it was staged to appear that he was caught looking at a website on teeth whiteners on Richard Hammond's 5 O'clock Show. Clarkson had found a pack of teeth whiteners in a car Hammond had tested. Hammond had objected, saying it was a set up.

In the first episode of series 9 on 28 January 2007, Hammond returned to a hero's welcome, complete with dancing girls, aeroplane stairs and fireworks. The show also contained images of his high speed crash, for which he made national headlines, with Hammond talking through the events of the day, after which the audience broke into spontaneous applause. Hammond then requested that the crash never be mentioned on Top Gear again, though all three Top Gear presenters have since referenced it in jokes during the news segment of the programs. He told his colleagues "The only difference between me now, and before the crash, is that I like celery now and I didn't before".

Personal Life

      Hammond has been married to Amanda Etheridge (also known as Mindy) since May 2002, the couple have two daughters. The family lives in a mock castle in Herefordshire and also have a flat in London. They have three horses, four dogs, two cats, a rabbit, and a handful of chickens and sheep. This collection of pets includes Tee-Gee/TG or Top Gear Dog. Hammond also plays the bass guitar, on which he accompanied the other Top Gear presenters when they performed alongside Justin Hawkins on Top Gear of the Pops for Comic Relief in 2007. Hammond likes to ride his bicycle in cities, for which he claims to be mocked mercilessly by fellow presenter Jeremy Clarkson. Hammond further claims that there is no reason to drive a Range Rover in town. Hammond is a fan of Porsche 911s (unlike Clarkson) and considers it to be the ultimate supercar. He is also a fan of monster trucks - a fact which can be backed up by his appearance at Truckfest '07. Much unlike Clarkson and May, he also has an interest in American Muscle Cars. He has a Dodge Charger, a Shelby Mustang, and recently he bought a Dodge Challenger from his last trip to the United States, due to the fact that Chrysler wouldn't lend Top Gear one, because apparently they are too harsh about their cars .

Hammond has quit smoking, and has attributed his teeth going white to him quitting smoking.

On July 22, 2007, during severe flooding, Hammond left his Porsche 911 - in which he had been stuck in traffic for 13 hours - to run home for his daughter's birthday. He ran 16 miles (26 km) in two-and-a-half hours (from 3am to 5:30 am), arriving home before his daughter woke up.

An interview with The Sunday Times in February 2008 reported Hammond as having moved briefly from Gloucestershire to Buckinghamshire, then back again because he missed the country life.

Hammond is also a keen motorcyclist.

In October Hereford Times confirmed he had splashed out three million pounds buying Bollitree Castle which is situated in Weston-Under-Penyard, Ross on Wye. It has been rumoured he has also bought a large house in the small town of Wantage, Oxfordshire.

      During filming of a Top Gear segment at the former RAF Elvington airbase near York on 20 September 2006, Hammond was injured in the crash of the jet-powered car he was piloting. Hammond was traveling at 288 mph (463 km/h) at the time of the crash.

His vehicle, a dragster called Vampire, was theoretically capable of traveling at speeds of up to 370 mph (595 km/h). The vehicle was the same car that in 2000, piloted by Colin Fallows, set the British land speed record at 300.3 mph (483.3 km/h). The Vampire was powered by a single Rolls-Royce Orpheus afterburning turbojet engine outputting 10,000 hp.

Some accounts suggested that the accident occurred during an attempt to break the British land speed record, however the Health and Safety Executive report on the crash found that a proposal to try to officially break the record was vetoed in advance by Top Gear executive producer Andy Wilman, due to the risks and complexities of such a venture. (The report stated: "Runs were to be carried out in only one direction along a pre-set course on the Elvington runway. Vampire’s speed was to be recorded using GPS satellite telemetry. The intention was to record the maximum speed, not to measure an average speed over a measured course, and for [Hammond] to describe how it felt.")

Hammond was completing a seventh and final run to collect extra footage for the program when his front-right tire failed, and according to witness and first responder Dave Ogden, "one of the parachutes had deployed but it went on to the grass and spun over and over before coming to a rest about 100 yards from us."

The emergency crew quickly arrived at the car, finding it inverted and partially embedded in the grass. Rescuers felt a pulse and heard the unconscious Hammond breathing before the car was turned upright. Hammond was cut free with hydraulic shears, and placed on a backboard. He was regaining consciousness at that point and said he had some lower back pain. He was then transported by the Yorkshire Air Ambulance to the neurological unit of the Leeds General Infirmary. Hammond's family visited him at the hospital along with Top Gear co-presenters James May and Jeremy Clarkson. Clarkson wished Hammond well, saying "Both James and I are looking forward to getting our 'Hamster' back", referring to Hammond by his nickname.

The Health & Safety Executive report stated that "Hammond's instantaneous reaction to the tire blow out seems to have been that of a competent high performance car driver, namely to brake the car and to try to steer into the skid. Immediately afterwards he also seems to have followed his training and to have pulled back on the main parachute release lever, thus shutting down the jet engine and also closing the jet and afterburner fuel levers. The main parachute did not have time to deploy before the car ran off the runway. "The HSE notes that, based on the findings of the North Yorkshire Police (who investigated the crash), "the accident may not have been recoverable", even if Hammond's efforts to react were as fast as "humanly possible".

The crash was shown on an episode of Top Gear on 28 January 2007; this was the first episode of the new series, which had been postponed pending Hammond's recovery. Hammond requested at the end of the episode that his fellow presenters never mention the crash again, a request which has since been forgotten about or ignored by both Hammond and the other presenters.

In February 2008 Hammond gave an interview to The Sunday Times newspaper in which he described the effects of his brain injuries, and the progression of his recovery. He reported suffering loss of memory, depression, and difficulties with emotional experiences, for which he was consulting a psychiatrist.

After the car crash the BBC website Have Your Say received more than 10,000 messages of good wishes and sympathy for Richard Hammond from people around the world.