Thoughts On The Mclaren F1.

As I mentioned in a post a couple days ago, I recently got to ride in one of the most amazing cars in the world, the Mclaren F1. This is an opportunity that doesn't come along very often, so I thought I would take a little time to expand on whatever insights I could offer thanks to my brief and slightly overwhelming trip.

First off, my ride was, quite literally, around the block. So I'm not sure that I can glean much that hasn't been said by much more experienced hacks. I did though, for one instant, get shown that I had never, never been in a really fast car before. I've driven some cars with over 400bhp, and all wheel drive, but they're pale shadows of the acceleration offered up by the Mclaren. Nothing, I have ever felt, compares with the huge push of that BMW V12.

Beyond that, the sheer sound of going fast in the F1 is unlike anything I've ever heard. the car seems to have three settings, burble, roar, and overrun. The car can run just about everywhere through town without going above its fast idle. But when the throttle is opened more than a crack, the motor's whole tone changes, and everything starts to happen very quickly. the engine wakes up ans shouts its approval of the situation as the car is thrown up the road. We must have covered 300 ft before my brain caught up with what was going on, and I don't think the owner floored it. Second gear is demolished in an instant of noise and violence, and third seems to take no longer to run out. All the while the engine is yelling at you right over your shoulder; if you turn your head to the side, you can look right at it as it powers you along. The noise is just as powerful when the throttle is closed, with a series of percussive pops and bangs from the exhaust on the overrun. The sum of all this vocal talent is one of the richest, most involving rides I've ever had. though I do wonder what all that racket would be like day to day.

Another thing I can tell you about the Mclaren is that I don't fit in it. Working for several months at an 11-hour desk job has made me fat and weak, and the car's tiny passenger pods, mounted wither side of the driver are just not up to absorbing my increased mass. Maybe it's an insurance policy on the light weight of the F1; perhaps Gordon Murry didn't want passengers adding so much weight that they could affect the performance and handling, I don't know. What I do know is that a Mclaren is the best weight loss incentive I can think of; a person will do anything they car in order to fit inside and experience the unique sensations it produces.

It's a very attractive car too, and not one that looks its best in photos. I've always liked the way it looks, but at the same time, I've always preferred the beautiful, full curves of Jaguar's XJ-220, or the more alien angles of Lamborghini's Diablo, or Murcielago. In person though, the Mclaren attracts the eye with its better proportions, and more interesting graphic. It is also pleasingly small. I know that's not new information, but until you see it in person, it won't dawn on you just how good a packaging job the crew at Mclaren did. The Jaguar by comparison looks like acres of useless extravagance.

But the most profound thing I discovered while riding in the Mclaren, was a new understanding of the word quality. In many cars, as with all consumer durables, there is a tendency to take the idea of quality and tack it onto a product. The current Bugatti Veyron is an example of what I mean. While I'm sure it's a terribly capable thing, and that sitting in it must be a luxurious and indulgent experience, I'm convinced that much of what goes into the Veyron's feeling of luxury is facade. The cabin is swathed in miles of leather. Every control not wrapped in cow sees to be made of knurled and rare mineral.

But it's all added in later. In the Mclaren, most of what you come in contact with is made out of the lightest thing that could be found to do the job, and there's as little of it as can be made hospitable. Much of what you see, and touch is the bare structure of the car, and all of it interfaces with the mechanics as directly as possible. Those mechanics are also as light, ans strong as they could be made, and they're tuned to feedback as much of the road as you can take. it's this sense of quality being engineered into the tiniest of components, until it pervades the car as a whole, that sets the Mclaren apart from cars like the Veyron, and maybe even more so, the Spyker. there's now jewelry, not barrier between you and the parts of the car you came to enjoy.

In terms of that other great love of gearheads everywhere, the watch, it's the difference between a Hublot Big Bang, and a Stainless-Steel Rolex Cosmograph Daytona. The Hublot is a fine thing, and both are totally unnecessary in a world where a Casio can tell time just as well. But in the Rolex, all the sense of quality comes from the machine itself. There is no mother of pearl, or tacked on carbon fibre; there's no frippery. It's just a machine, one that's been designed from the start, to do it's job better than any other machine like it on the planet. Likewise the Mclaren is just a car, one that just happens to be the best I've ever encountered. Not bad for around the block huh?