After success in
karting including a 1989 British Championship win in the Junior TKM Class,
Oxford-born Plato raced in
Formula Three and
Formula Renault. In 1996, he entered the
Renault Spider championship, taking a dominant title win.
BTCC (1997–2001) Williams Renault (1997–1999) In 1997, Plato gained the second drive in the
Williams-
Renault BTCC team, after
Frank Williams organised a test between him,
Gianni Morbidelli and
Jean-Christophe Boullion with the fastest getting the contract offer. After being overlooked by Williams, Plato travelled to the Williams base and after some convincing, Sir Frank gave Plato the drive. Plato took pole for his first three races in the Renault Laguna, and ultimately won two races as a rookie, taking third in the championship which was won by his team-mate
Alain Menu. He was fifth in the series in each of the next two years. at
Brands Hatch during the
2001 British Touring Car Championship season.
Vauxhall (2000–2001) Plato joined
Vauxhall in 2000, again taking fifth place in the championship. For 2001, the series had a new set of reduced-cost rules, fewer big-name drivers as a result, and Vauxhall had by far the best car. In a contentious and hard-fought season, Plato won the championship after team-mate
Yvan Muller's car caught fire at the last round.
ASCAR and Break from BTCC (2002–2003) With an ambition to get into
NASCAR racing, Plato moved to the British
ASCAR stock car scene in 2002, finishing third in the championship for XCEL Motorsport
Ford Taurus. In 2003, Plato was a driver coach for SEAT, returning to the BTCC with the Spanish team in 2004.
BTCC return (2004–2022) SEAT (2004–2008) during the
2005 British Touring Car Championship. Plato was employed by
SEAT to help with their driver development in 2003, and when they entered a BTCC team in 2004, he was the natural choice to lead the team. However the new SEAT Toledo needed developing if it were to become a race winner. Despite the development work needed, the car proved to be a winner right from the start, with Plato going on to win more races than any other driver (seven in total), finishing third overall in the championship. The regulations for 2004 meant that the driver who finished tenth in the first of the meeting's three races had pole (and a light car) for race 2, and the winner of race 2 had pole for race 3 (although with a now-heavier car). As a result of this, the championship rules were changed to reversing the top-ten of the race 3 grid, putting an end to this tactic, and the pace of
Matt Neal's
Team Dynamics Honda and
Yvan Muller's
Vauxhall left Plato unable to challenge for a second title in 2005. He finished fourth in the 2005 championship with only three wins to his credit during the season, with the team now run by
Northern South. at the
Oulton Park round of the
2006 British Touring Car Championship. For
2006, Plato continued in the British Touring Car Championship as lead driver for SEAT and their new
León touring car. He was the only driver in the three-driver team to compete in all 10 meetings – his team-mates, double BTCC champion
James Thompson and ex-
DTM driver
Darren Turner, shared the team's second Leon. After the first three meetings, he was a point behind Thompson and third in the championship, but had two retirements in the races at Thruxton. After winning race 1 at
Croft, race 2 was his 200th start, and he nearly won, but
Matt Neal passed him with two laps to go. He won two out of the three races at Brands Hatch to keep his faint hopes of winning the BTCC in 2006 alive, but a poor qualifying run at
Silverstone finally ended his hopes. He beat
Colin Turkington to second in the championship, meaning that he had then finished in each of the top-five championship positions. at the
Oulton Park round of the
2007 British Touring Car Championship. Winning the first two races of 2007 set the tone for a title battle with
Fabrizio Giovanardi's
Vauxhall. Giovanardi took the series lead at
Knockhill but Plato retook it at
Donington Park after fighting from ninth on the grid to come fifth in race 1 and then win race 2. He started race 3 from ninth (after spinning this position on the grid-reversal wheel) but fought through to take the lead from
Mike Jordan, with some uncertainty over whether he had passed under a yellow flag. To ensure that he was not penalised, he allowed Jordan to repass him, before retaking the lead a lap later. The battle went to the final round, with Giovanardi winning by three points to take the championship, with Plato declaring that "Fabrizio beat us the right way. He is a very worthy champion and there were no shenanigans between me and him." at
Oulton Park during the
2008 British Touring Car Championship season. In 2008, the team switched to a
diesel-powered León. The first win for a diesel car in the BTCC came in round 7 at
Donington Park. Two wins at
Snetterton helped him to close the gap on Giovanardi, but a mechanical failure in race 3 was a precursor to a similar problem in race 2 at
Oulton Park, after winning race 1. These issues typified a season in which performance was not matched by reliability, despite the same cars being largely reliable in the
World Touring Car Championship. Plato went into the final rounds at Brands Hatch still mathematically in with a chance of the title, but admitted that the large points difference between his and Giovanardi's made this unrealistic. Both he and Giovanardi had poor final rounds at Brands, allowing
Mat Jackson to leapfrog Plato for second overall in his privateer BMW.
RML Chevrolet (2009–2011) with
Chevrolet Plato's plans for 2009 had been affected by SEAT's shock announcement to pull their factory team out of the BTCC at the end of the 2008 season. It was speculated that Plato was planning to take a sabbatical from racing to focus on his TV work. However, after holding talks over the off-season with
West Surrey Racing and
Tempus Sport, Plato decided to return to the BTCC in a privately entered
RML Group Chevrolet Lacetti. After the first meeting, the team secured sponsorship from Silverline power tools and
Auto Windscreens for the rest of the season, and raced under the Racing Silverline banner. At the final round of the season at
Brands Hatch, Plato became only the second driver after
Dan Eaves at Thruxton in 2005 to win all three races, the first of which he won by a then closest-ever BTCC winning margin of 0.015 seconds, ahead of
Tom Chilton. He finished second in the 2009 championship, five points behind champion
Colin Turkington. For 2010, RML became an official
Chevrolet manufacturer team, racing the
Cruze model that races in the
World Touring Car Championship, with Plato as lead driver. Plato was a championship challenger immediately, with a double victory at Snetterton returning him to the championship lead. He dominated the second half of the season and claimed the 2010 MSA Dunlop British Touring Car Championship by winning round 29 at Brands Hatch on 10 October 2010. His win was also his 60th, equalling Andy Rouse's BTCC record. Plato remained with the same team in 2011 and won the first round of the season at Brands Hatch, setting a new BTCC record of 61 victories. He came third in the Championship.
MG KX Momentum Racing (2012–2014) In 2012 and 2013, Plato raced for the
Triple Eight Race Engineering (United Kingdom) team in their MG KX Momentum Racing MG6 and came 3rd in the Championship in both years. In 2014, with a similar but differently-sponsored car (MG KX Clubcard Fuel Save) under the same team, he came second in the championship.
Team BMR (2015–2018) round of the
2017 British Touring Car Championship. On 17 February 2015, it was announced that Plato would be driving alongside Turkington,
Aron Smith and
Warren Scott for
Team BMR during the
2015 BTCC season. He took 6 wins during the year but missed out on the title by four points. In January 2016, it was announced that Team BMR would run four Subaru Levorgs for the season. A slow start saw Jason record a best finish of 13th at Brands Hatch. Once the team developed the Levorg into a race winning car, Plato took nine podiums along with a win at Knockhill in his 500th race. He continued with the team in 2017 but a crash at the first round at Brands Hatch derailed his season before it had begun. Permanent damage was sustained to the chassis of his car that plagued him with grip and under steer issues for the majority of the season. Nevertheless, he still took four podium finishes, including another win at Knockhill, and finished the season in 12th place in the standings. Plato remained with BMR Subaru for 2018, as the team switched from using a Mountune engine to a Swindon engine in an effort to resolve the reliability issues that had hampered Plato's campaign the previous year. However, the change in engine proved to have a disastrous effect on the car's performance. Plato failed to score a point in any of the first four race meetings of the season and his only visit to the podium that season came with a second-place finish in the first race at Croft, as part of a Subaru 1-2. Plato would only score a further nine points all season after this, finishing in 27th place with a paltry 26 points.
Power Maxed Racing (2019–2021) On 20 February 2019, it was announced that Plato would be switching to
Power Maxed Racing, driving in the factory-backed
Vauxhall Astra. He finished the championship in seventh place with a total of 237 points, with a win in the final race of the season. during his final
BTCC season. For 2020, the team chose not to compete as a full time team, but retained Plato for 2021.
2021 saw the Vauxhall hampered by throttle linkage issues. Plato took one podium at the opening round at
Thruxton, finishing the year in 14th place with 156 points.
BTC Racing (2022) It was announced on 6 April 2022 that Plato would be joining
BTC Racing for his 23rd and last season in the BTCC. He finished the year in 17th place, with a single podium at Snetterton.
Other racing Plato competed in the
Bathurst 1000 twice and the
Sandown 500 once, but without any great success. His second attempt at Bathurst was with the
Holden Racing Team and was driving with the late
Peter Brock. Plato and Brock's race ended with Plato being involved in a crash which resulted in
John Cleland's car rolling on to its roof. In 1998, Plato took part in the Silverstone Rally Sprint, part of the British Rally Championship, driving a third works Renault Megane F2. He finished ninth, with co-driver Andy Wilman, (former) presenter and executive producer on Top Gear. During his 2005 BTCC campaign, Plato competed in four rounds of the
World Touring Car Championship (WTCC) for
SEAT Sport. He achieved a second-place finish in race 2 of his home round
FIA WTCC Race of UK at
Silverstone. He also won a race and finished second overall in the
2005 European Touring Car Cup. Plato often competes in historic racing and is a regular at the
Goodwood Revival and Members meeting and teamed up with celebrity chef
James Martin in a Ford Prefect and with
Craig Davies in a Corvette Stingray for the 2012 event.
Television career Plato is a co-presenter for the
Channel 5 British TV series
Fifth Gear co-starring with
Tiff Needell,
Vicki Butler-Henderson and
Jonny Smith. He previously co-presented
Channel 4's motoring program '
Driven' alongside
Mike Brewer,
Penny Mallory and
James May. Formerly with
Tom Ford (presenter) as a fellow presenter, Plato appeared opposite Ford for an episode of
Ready Steady Cook UK. Plato was injured in a
Caparo T1 supercar in October 2007 during filming for
Fifth Gear at
Bruntingthorpe proving ground. The car caught fire at an estimated 250 kilometres per hour (160 mph) and Plato described his injuries as follows: “The back of my neck is burnt and so are my face and hands. I obviously couldn’t take my hands off the steering wheel whilst braking and my right hand is more badly burnt than my left."Plato was taken from the scene by former BTCC driver
Phil Bennett and after treatment at three hospitals, including
Stoke Mandeville Hospital's specialist burns unit, Plato was able to compete in the following weekend's final race in the 2007 BTCC calendar. This incident was also mentioned on
Top Gear, where
Jeremy Clarkson called him a 'Baked Potato' after mispronouncing his name. Plato presented the
Sky One television program
Mission Implausible where he and
Tania Zaetta competed to perform three stunts over the course of each episode.
Book On 19 September 2019, Plato released his first autobiography titled
How Not to Be a Professional Racing Driver. It was published by Penguin Books Ltd. ==Personal life==