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  Photography by Brian Bailey

Still Fastest After All These Years

Jan Morgan

June 4, 2002

It doesn’t matter that McLaren introduced its road-going F1 nearly 10 years ago—with a 240-mph top speed, the F1 easily maintains its status as the fastest production car ever built. (Jaguar’s XJ220 provides its closest competition at 212 mph.) And its other performance numbers aren’t shabby either. An F1 covers the quarter-mile in 11 seconds; the dash to 100 mph takes only six. “It’s not just the rate of acceleration,” says McLaren owner Jay Leno, “but also the sophistication of it. There is no flywheel effect, no delay. If you drive a Corvette or even a big block Cobra and mash the gas, you’re amazed as to how quickly you get to 100. In the McLaren, you hit the gas and find that you have a buck sixty. You blew right past 100 before you knew it. Nothing pulls like this car.” He adds, “The steering is light and has excellent feel. And the brakes are very powerful, as you would expect.”

The roller coaster thrills come down to a simple formula of low weight and high power, courtesy of sophisticated, race-inspired engineering. Coupling an F1’s scant 2,500-pound curb weight with an engine generating 100+ horses from each of its six liters is comparable to endowing Ferrari’s 550 Maranello with an extra 100 hp or dropping a 600-hp motor into a Mazda Miata. “All the new proposed supercars are 1,000 pounds heavier,” says Leno. (Click image to enlarge)

The BMW-supplied 60-degree dohc V-12, designed and built specifically for McLaren, bears no relation to extant BMW motors. “Other manufacturers were considered to build a bespoke engine, but modifying an existing engine was never considered,” says Harold Dermott, McLaren’s head of customer care. “It would have been a compromise.” And it’s all done with natural aspiration; no turbochargers, no superchargers. “Nothing else gives the instant response and drivability.” (Click image to enlarge)