Top Gear star injured in Christmas special stunt

Top Gear's James May was rushed to hospital with severe concussion after hitting his head on a rock while pulling co-host Jeremy Clarkson's car out of a ditch in the Syrian desert.

Top Gear's James May was rushed to hospital after injuring himself while performing a stunt for the show's Christmas special.

The 47-year-old motoring expert suffered severe concussion and required stitches after falling and hitting his head on a rock while pulling co-host Jeremy Clarkson's car out of a ditch in the Syrian desert.

James joked: "I stood in the line of where the tow rope went taut. I told the driver to move off and became part of a giant catapult.

"They gave me a brain scan but to be honest I think the Syrians were just excited to be able to use their new scanner."

While the star admits his injuries were "very worrying", he claims the accident was nowhere near as bad as colleague Richard Hammond's, who was put in a coma in 2006 when a car he was driving overturned at a speed of 300mph.

He told The Sun newspaper: "There was a lot of blood. It was all very worrying. We were a hundred miles from a building of any sort.

"I don't want to pretend I had an accident as bad as Hammond. He bashed his head on the whole of Yorkshire, I just hit mine on a stone."