A new BBC program filmed an unusual experiment here.

TV’s wine expert Oz Clarke and Top Gear’s James May attempted to run a high performance racing car fueled by our single malt whisky.

The charismatic presenters were filming for Oz and James’ Great British Adventure a new third series that follows on from their tours in series one and two of French and Californian vineyards, which will be broadcast later this year on BBC2.

We managed to get a zappy 150 mph Radical SR4 racing car thanks to Radical Sportscars, the Peterborough-based independent car manufacturer and Le Mans contender.  

Clearly it was important that the engine was not modified in anyway for the new spirit. In 1881 the young Harvey brothers set out to make the purest spirit in Scotland when they built a state-of-the-art distillery on Islay. The testament to their successful design is that nothing has changed in 127 years. And the spirit is every bit as pure.

X4 was inspired by Martin Martin’s fantastic 1695 tasting note of a 4 times distilled spirit he encountered. Translated from the Gaelic as perilous whisky, “it at first taste affects all the members of the body: two spoonfuls of this last liquor is a sufficient dose; and if any man exceed this, it would presently stop his breath, and endanger his life.” Ideal then to run a racing car engine in this über-refined state.

Obviously Islay spirit cannot be called whisky until it is matured in oak casks for 3 years, but on the day it was first tasted by wine & spirit expert Oz Clarke for verification as single malt spirit before being filled in to the car’s fuel tank. Then, using an Atlantic shore road closed to traffic by the island’s entire police force - and cleared of sheep and cattle - the car achieved a hair-raising 0-60 in 3.5 seconds.

Distillery manager Duncan MacGillivray said “the exhaust smells much better than petrol. With fuel here being a whopping £1.50 - £1.60 a litre VAT, It’s potentially a sustainable ‘biofuel’ but there are catches: the duty paid to the government makes it a ridiculous £26 a litre, and besides, imagine desperate thirsty folk trying to syphon out your fuel...”

After the successful run, the police suggested breathalysing the car itself, but fortunately had the wrong type of breathalyser.

Previousy distilled X4 in 2006 and 2007 that has been matured in new oak casks has taken on exciting deep colours and highly evocative flavours of cinnamon and spices. A small release of X4 will be bottled in the autumn - but at a more down to earth 55% ABV.

Ordinary whisky would damage a car’s engine and management system and should not in any way be used to replicate this experiment.

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