BBC's Top Gear film race around Mansfield town centre

BBC's hit car show Top Gear has been in Mansfield filming for its forthcoming series.

The new trio of Andrew 'Freddie' Flintoff, Paddy McGuinness and Chris Harris were joined by a number of professional racing drivers to race a circuit right around Mansfield's town centre.

The 'Le Mansfield' race, taking its name from well known circuit 'Le Mans' in France, started in Mansfield's Market Place before making its way down Quaker Way, round onto St John's Street and onto West Gate, where the racers then did a short lap of the market square before restarting the lap.

The event was held 'under closed doors' in the sense that residents were alerted about a number of road closures and informed that there was a 'secret event', however very little people had been informed that the Top Gear filming crews would arrive on Mansfield's streets.

According to a security guard working on the event, the task for the racers was to see "how many laps of the Mansfield circuit they can do in 24 minutes".

Hundreds of residents took to the streets to see what the secret event would be, including Peter Brown, 51, from Ladybrook.

Peter said: "I had seen that there were road closures through the town and people were talking of a secret event, some people even suggested there would be filming.

"I'm excited to see it when it comes on television."

Television crews preparing for the race to start.

Sue Oliver. 61, was also in the crowd.

Secret event to cause road closures across Mansfield town centre.

She said: "I had no idea it was this but its exciting that something like Top Gear would come to Mansfield."

A spokesman for Mansfield BID added on Facebook: "Just to clarify the BID was kept in the dark as much as everyone else about the top secret event today.

Market Place and West Gate were cordoned off as a race track.

"We were only ask to send the road closure info out via mail chimp to all businesses we have on email and via our social media pages which we have done.

"In terms of the top secret event I’ve just been informed by member of my team who is on site it’s a TV show filming in town which in itself is an amazing opportunity for the town."

Mansfield's executive mayor Kate Allsop was at the start line to begin the race.

A number of roads and car parks were closed between 3am and 11am this morning, February 10.

The Subaru car driven by new host Freddie Flintoff.

This includes access to Four Seasons Car Park on Quaker Way and Walkden Street Car Park near the Rosemary Centre, with both car parks scheduled to be open at the later time of 11am.

It is understood that the filming for Top Gear in Mansfield will feature on the series to come next year, with filming completed for Matt Le Blanc's final series on the show - starting on February 17 on BBC1.