Articles by Greg Stolz

The world’s most popular TV show, Top Gear, has been turned away by the Gold Coast because of noisy car concerns. Top Gear host Jeremy Clarkson wanted to come to the Coast next week to film a new Microsoft Xbox-sponsored V8 Supercar at the Holden Driving Centre at Norwell, in a deal brokered by racing legend Mark Skaife.But Gold Coast City Council bureaucrats put the brakes on the show, watched by an estimated 350 million people in 170 countries, when they failed to relax noise restrictions in time. Top Gear will now film in Warwick – a nice place but hardly Australia’s tourism capital. The council snub has angered driving centre boss Paul Morris, who said the Coast had lost the chance for "priceless publicity"."It’s an unbelievable lost opportunity," Mr Morris, a racing car driver and team owner, said. "We are talking about the world’s biggest TV show and the council, which is always banging on about how the Gold Coast is open for business, can’t even facilitate it. Clarkson was going to drive the car himself. It’s bureaucracy gone mad. The pen-pushers are strangling this town with red tape."Mr Morris said the driving centre, despite being located in the northern Gold Coast cane fields, operated under strict noise restrictions because of surrounding homes. He had applied for a temporary relaxation but was told it could not be done in time for Top Gear’s tight scheduling.Mr Morris said the council "should have moved heaven and earth" to get the show. "The guy cutting cane next door makes more noise with his harvester than the V8 car," he said. Deputy Mayor and Norwell area councillor Donna Gates said the council had been given only 24 hours’ notice to approve the noise relaxation."We offered to move forward on it but it would have taken a few days," she said. "I’m disappointed in any opportunity like this that we miss. Top Gear obviously has a really big viewing audience and it would have been great promotion for the city. But there are issues related to noise from the driving centre and my job is to ensure the residents of that community are not to severely impacted."

... for this week's V8 Supercars race in Surfers Paradise. It's stilettos at 30 paces as contestants in the Miss Indy quest - which helped launch the career of Jennifer Hawkins - go toe-to-toe with the Miss V8 Supercars girls in a battle for the hearts and minds of motor racing fans. The chequered flag fell on the Indy race for the last time two years ago when the US-based racing series ended its long association with the Gold Coast event, and the V8s have driven up to fill the void.  But that hasn't stopped Miss Indy organisers from continuing to run their pageant in opposition to the official Miss V8 Supercars title. However, the Miss Indy girls have been banned from the Surfers Paradise street circuit and are not being recognised by officials from the Gold Coast 600 V8 race.  "They've done everything they can to block us out,"Miss Indy spokesman Andrew Drake said. "This is our 20th year and we helped put the Gold Coast race on the map, so it would have been nice to be recognised.  The Indy name is more famous than the V8s and it's largely due to Miss Indy.'' Reigning Miss Indy Ashleigh Sudholz said it was "a shame'' this year's finalists would not be able to parade pit lane and take part in other official race activities.  "We don't get to go on track but it's still going to be a great event and everyone knows Miss Indy,'' she said. "There are 28 Miss Indy finalists and only 16 Miss V8 Supercar finalists, so we dominate - and I reckon our girls are way hotter.''  The Miss Indy winner will still get to grace a racetrack - but it will be at the US Long Beach circuit in California, where the Indy race will be held next April.

A Bentley once owned by the late disgraced stockbroker Rene Rivkin — and now by a former Gold Coast vice king — could be sold for as little as 1c under a radical new auction system.The Azure convertible was part of Rivkin's luxury car collection auctioned off as part of a fire sale before his suicide in 2005.It was snapped up for $281,000 by former Fitzgerald Inquiry figure Ron “The Pom” Kingsnorth, who in the 1980s owned one of the Gold Coast's most notorious brothels, the Geisha Bathhouse.British-born Mr Kingsnorth, once an associate of infamous London gangsters Ronnie and Reggie Kray, says he is “a bad boy who's gone straight” and is now out of the vice trade.Now in his 70s, he has married “a nice young Ukrainian wife,” Olga, and is involved in property development.He said he had decided to get into the “reverse auction” business as a sideline, and to raise money for charity.Unlike traditional auctions where the highest bid wins, goods sold at reverse auction are knocked down to the lowest unique bidder — the person with the lowest bid no one else has chosen.Last year, a $350,000 Broadbeach high-rise unit was sold at reverse auction for $62.92.Promoters make their money by charging a bid fee — in the case of the Bentley, $9 (or three bids for $20).The maroon convertible — which cost more than $700,000 when new and can go from 0-100km/h in six seconds — will be auctioned online for between 1 and $6000, to whoever makes the lowest unique bid.But if the auction is a success, Mr Kingsnorth stands to make hundreds of thousands of dollars.Mr Kingsnorth said he was abused as a child in East London and was donating part of the auction proceeds to the Abused Child Trust.He said that if the auction works, he plans to sell luxury homes and boats using the same method. People can bid for the Bentley online.