Mariam Nihal Saudi Gazette With a price tag nudging the SR5 million ($1.3 million) mark McLaren's latest ‘super' car is more of a “superlative” car. As well as pushing the price ceiling for the mere mortals, the latest iteration of the all time classic the F1 supercar of the 1990s pushes all the boundaries of a road-legal car. The P1, launched just ahead of the Paris Motor Show, takes much of its technological and spiritual inspiration from the company's Racing division. The company says that the P1 has one simple goal: to be the best driver's car in the world on road and track. The input from the racing division hints at what the P1 will produce in terms of performance. One thing is certain, the main consideration will not be straight-line top speed. After all, where's the fun in that? “Our 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. “It is the true test of a supercar's all round ability and a much more important technical statement. It will be the most exciting, most capable, most technologically advanced and most dynamically accomplished supercar ever made.” Though the top speed will be a quite modest 200mph or so, modest by British supercar standards with the four-door Bentley Flying Spur S and a clutch of Aston Martins perfectly able to keep company, the P1 will shrug off the competition on real roads with corners in them and the race-track. McLaren's already have an enviable reputation for road-holding ability, delivering an almost clinical predictability under the extremes of both road and track driving. Coupled with the driver-confidence coming from sitting in a carbon fibre safety-cell (which McLaren invented and is mandatory on al F1 cars) that constitutes the central structure of the car, the driving experience should be quite exceptional. “P1 will be the result of 50 years of racing and road car heritage,” said McLaren Automotive Executive Chairman Ron Dennis. “Twenty years ago we raised the supercar performance bar with the McLaren F1 and our goal with P1 is to redefine it once again.” The super-light P1 can sprint from standstill to 100kph in under three seconds but really shines when the half-century long racing heritage tempered by the white heat of Formula 1 competition that has produced its leech-like ability to cling to the road with its highly advanced suspension system and the perfect balance of the all carbon-fibre body. The P1, when it goes into production in 2013, with first deliveries in September, it will be the jewel in the glittering crown of the McLaren stable, with the MP4-12C and MP4-12C Spider alongside.
