Top Gear Polar Special

It's the ultimate test of man against machine - or should that be dog against machine - as the Top Gear team set out on their most ambitious and arduous challenge to date.

Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond take part in a Polar Special. It's an epic land race starting in the town of Resolute, Northern Canada finishing 450 miles later at the Magnetic North Pole. The terrain they tackle is some of the toughest on Earth - a mix of mountainous land masses and jagged sea ice where temperatures can drop to a mind-numbing minus 65 degrees Centigrade. And then there are the polar bears.

The Arctic is home to 80 per cent of the world's polar bear population and, when it comes to lunch, they really don't care if it's seal or human. This being Top Gear, the three presenters' modes of transport are a little out of the ordinary. Jeremy and James, of course, drive. Their vehicle of choice has been specially converted for the task by an Icelandic engineering team whose achievements include the first crossing of the Greenland Ice Cap by car.

Richard travels on something a little less hi-tech - a sled pulled by a team of 10 Canadian Inuit dogs. Richard's human companion is Matty McNair, a hugely experienced Polar explorer who has an almost telepathic understanding of her dogs. Pitting dog power against horse power may sound like a one-sided contest but, given the nature of the terrain, there's no telling who will make it to the pole first. In fact, there's no guarantee that either team will make it to the finish line at all.