McLaren Automotive has finally taken the wraps off its new Speedtail, with the Woking-based brand billing the newcomer – considered the spiritual successor to the iconic F1 – as its “ultimate road car”.
The Speedtail can achieve the highest maximum speed of any McLaren to date, reaching 403 km/h (using a clever “Velocity mode” to best the F1’s peak speed of 391 km/h). Just 106 will be created … and, sorry, all are already reserved (with deliveries set to start at the beginning of 2020).
McLaren describes its new model as the “most aerodynamically drag efficient” vehicle it has yet produced, thanks to the teardrop-shaped cockpit, streamlined body (which measures a full 5 137 mm in length), carbon-fibre front-wheel static aero covers, retractable digital rear-view cameras (in lieu of mirrors) and active rear ailerons.
The driver is positioned centrally in what McLaren dubs a “luxurious” cockpit, with seating for two additional passengers set slightly rearwards (there’s luggage space within both the nose and tail).
The Speedtail is built around a bespoke “monocage” carbon-fibre structure and features an all-carbon-fibre body, aluminium active suspension and carbon-ceramic brakes. Power comes from a petrol-electric hybrid (McLaren has not gone into detail here) developing a combined output of 772 kW.
McLaren’s hyper-GT tips the scales at 1 430 kg dry, rocketing from zero to 300 km/h in a claimed 12,8 seconds (for the sake of comparison, this sprint takes McLaren P1 some 16,5 seconds).
McLaren says limited production of the Speedtail has given it the opportunity to “push colour and materials design into unchartered territory”.
