Mclaren aims to raise the supercar bar with P1
MCLAREN has revealed the first official pictures of its new supercar, the P1, which will make its world debut at next week’s Paris Motor Show in concept form.
The successor to the legendary McLaren F1 of the 1990s, the P1 is designed with one simple goal: to be the best driver’s car in the world on road and track, says McLaren.
Following the design study at the Paris show, a production version will be revealed next year which the company aims to put on sale within 12 months.
“The McLaren P1 will be the result of 50 years of racing and road car heritage,” says McLaren Automotive Executive Chairman Ron Dennis. “Twenty years ago we raised the supercar performance bar with the McLaren F1 and our goal with the McLaren P1 is to redefine it once again.”
The British sports car maker won’t reveal what drivetrain lurks beneath the dramatically-styled body, but says the goal is to make the McLaren P1 “the most exciting, most capable, most technologically advanced and most dynamically accomplished supercar ever made.”
“The aim is not necessarily to be the fastest in absolute top speed but to be the quickest and most rewarding series production road car on a circuit,” says McLaren Automotive Managing Director Antony Sheriff.
When the McLaren P1 goes into production later next year, it will sit above the MP4-12C and 12C Spider, in terms of both price and performance. While no further information will be revealed until the Paris show, it’s speculated that the P1 will make use of a tuned version of the MP4-12C’s 3.8-litre bi-turbocharged V8, possibly linked to a Formula 1-style Kinetic Energy Recovery System (KERS) for an output of more than 520kW.