By writing this book, which was published in 2010, Ben Collins effectively called an end to his time as The Stig on BBC television’s Top Gear as his contract required him to be anonymous. He was quietly replaced by Phil Keen after the end of series fourteen and Keen continued to set lap times and coach celebrity drivers whilst wearing the white suit until Top Gear came to an end in 2023. To be fair to Collins his identity was becoming known through 2009 and was being hinted at in newspapers just as Perry McCarthy had been revealed as the original ‘Black Stig’ (so called as he wore an all black racing outfit) in 2003 but that didn’t stop the BBC pursuing a legal case to try to stop publication of this book.

The first chapter details Collins’ ‘interview’ for a role he hadn’t been told about, just being asked to go to Dunsfold Aerodrome and do some circuits. He had no idea that Dunsfold was where Top Gear was filmed, as that didn’t become general knowledge until much later, and he didn’t know the shows producer, Andy Wilman, who did the timings so it was a very strange day for a racing driver, just driving a not very good car around an airfield and not being told why. He didn’t hear anything for several months so assumed that whatever it was for hadn’t happened. The book then leaps backwards with Collins growing up and his father was always attracted to fast cars and driving although never as a racer so you can see where he got his love of speed. The story continues with his first forays into racing and the fact that he never raced in Formula 1, but got as close as being offered a test driver role but the team wanted him to put up £1.5 million as his way in which he clearly didn’t have access to. Instead he raced at Le Mans and Daytona in various formats including the GT championship, ASCAR (the European answer to NASCAR) which he won the championship in 2003 in his first year as The Stig and competed in Formula 3.

Collins was also a member of the British Army and interestingly the book covers his training and physical endurance testing to become a member of the Parachute Regiment in parallel with his early days as The Stig, eventually after four years in the army he had to quit as his work as The Stig and racing at circuits around the world didn’t allow for his time in the forces. He then increased his time racing and also became a stunt driver, particularly for the James Bond films although I was quite surprised that quite a few of the segments for Top Gear where The Stig appeared but didn’t actually do any driving were still filmed by him as frankly anyone could have stood in for him on the episode where they raced across London using different modes of transport with The Stig using the Underground and buses. It’s a really good autobiography and the 323 pages flew by but the paperback is rather annoying as at the back it includes acknowledgements for the photographs which were presumably in the hardback but which were removed for the paperback edition.

On the 30th November 2025 Collins and Wilman appeared in a Youtube video where they are talking about Wilman’s new autobiography but they keep hinting that they are going to deal with the publication of ‘The Man in the White Suit’ and finally at about 38 minutes in they address the various issues and the court case. However the entire video is well worth watching and can be seen here.

If the title feels familiar then you are remembering an Ealing Studios satirical comedy film made in London and Burnley in 1951 starring Alec Guinness as a scientist who invents a pure white fibre that never wears out or gets dirty, in fact it cannot even be dyed. To promote the material he has a suit made but eventually it dawns on people that an indestructible garment that doesn’t need to be cleaned would bankrupt the textile industry as nobody would need to buy any more clothes once they had a few items and he is pressured to abandon the invention. Even the book jacket reflects the aesthetic of the original film poster with its red and black background.