I am a big fan of Top Gear and While watching it, the UK Top Car Show, I found that neither Jeremy Clarkson or anyone on the team seem to understand what torque really was. So while youtubing, I found this comment which takes a good example of hitting a fence and explains the meaning behind each word.
“UNDERSTEER” is when you hit the fence with the front of the car.
“OVERSTEER” is when you hit the fence with the rear of the car.
“HORSEPOWER” is how fast you hit the fence.
“TORQUE” is how far you take the fence with you.
I hope that kind of clears out what people actually mean about these keywords and that it gave you some sort of understanding. So the next time you start watching Top Gear, you know exactly what they are referring to.