I was born and brought up in Liverpool with my clever little sister Jemma who is 14 and wants to be a vet. My mum Jane is an administrator and my dad Peter is a taxi driver.

When I was a kid my step dad started this business and would go out and get lost cows and stuff. He was part-time truck driver farmer and cowboy. He taught me how to ride from an early age.

Before breaking into music I had various jobs: forklift driver driving a courier. But I was forced into working rather than doing it off my own bat because that was my dad's way: you got a job and paid your way.

People are so bad at driving cars that computers don't have to be that good to be much better. Any time you stand in line at the D.M.V. and look around you're like Oh my God I wish all these people were replaced by computer drivers.

I don't care what other people think as long as I am happy. The day I die or retire I have blown all my chances because I don't have the chance any more to change my image as an F1 driver.

I'm not a bad driver. And I never will be because I took lessons when I was quite a boy. I never had to pass a test because there wasn't such a thing when I first started driving a motor car. So I didn't have to pass one.

I assure you that the training that you get in a midget in a sprint car and perhaps in a Silver Crown car is really the kind of experience that makes you into a damn good race driver.

I get appalled when I see good drivers being left on the sidelines because they haven't come up with the half million to a million to put themselves in a competitive car.

Then as everything like I say things started to come together when things started to go our way that's when you results started to come. I was no different driver. I was certainly learning every time I went in the car.

On the dance floor as much as you say 'Ladies you are the car. He is the driver. You can only go where he takes you ' they still try to be in control.

You don't have to worry about whether the car is set up right or not you know it is and it's down to you. Ultimately that's what every driver wants.

Every little kid has always wanted to be a race car driver. This gets some of that out.

No in Lethal Weapon I was a taxi cab driver that Mel jumps in front of the taxi and pulls me out of the car and steals the taxi. Then I did some other indie driving for some of the car sequences.

The driver of a racing car is a component. When I first began I used to grip the steering wheel firmly and I changed gear so hard that I damaged my hand.

I think there's a suspicion in the South of people putting on airs. You see it in most successful Southern politicians but you also see it in someone like Richard Petty who may be a multimillionaire stock car driver but he's also beloved because he has a nice self-deprecatory way about him.

I feel comfortable around every driver out there and each driver is in charge of their own car but you feel very secure racing the competition out there.

You cannot expect the guy who drove the car into the ditch to navigate it out of the ditch. You have to put a new driver in the seat. I'm not saying the new driver is going to be any better but we need a new driver. Kerry is the only choice.

I think fear is what keeps us from going over the edge. I mean as a race car driver I don't think what makes a good race car driver is a fearless person. I think it's somebody that is comfortable being behind the wheel of something that's somewhat out of control.

To drive an F1 car you have to be a little mad. On the morning of a race there's a mix of excitement and fear. If it's a wet track then it's worse as you're not in control most of the time which is the thing all drivers fear the most.

But I have a driver so I can return calls while I'm in the car.

The year most of my high school friends and I got our driver's permits the coolest thing one could do was stand outside after school and twirl one's car keys like a lifeguard whistle. That jingling sound meant freedom and power.

When I saw all those other drivers I realized that they wanted to win that money just as much as I did. But I didn't have to worry. A tire came off my car and I was lucky I got it off the track.

The irony is that it was tougher to rent a car from Cerberus when it owned Alamo than to buy a semi-automatic. To rent a car one had to provide ID a drivers' license and get insurance coverage. To buy a gun? Cash and carry from the back of a station wagon at a gun show. No concerns about downstream liability or risk.

My grandma's the most careful safe driver in the world. You put her in a rental car and she's doing doughnuts in the K-Mart parking lot!