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Anyone here know anything about the McLaren F1?

348K views 484 replies 125 participants last post by  fantomas76 
#1 ·
Ooooh, I do! I do! I do! :laugh:

Okay, so I am officially kicking myself out of L4P's fantastic "Dream Garage" thread, because while the content I was presenting there was appreciated by some, my stories and some of the images weren't really in keeping with the original theme of that thread.

So who wants to start? I just rattled off a bunch of stuff towards the end of that Garage thread you might want to skim through for ideas of additional questions or content requests, or just so that we don't need to repeat it here.

Looking forward to questions, comments and anything else you'd like to discuss about my all time favorite car.

>8^)
ER
 
#2 · (Edited)
Of course you can just start a thread like that and wait for it to generate interest, so here's some content to kick it off.

"If you build it, they will come" is kind of a cocky approach on a message forum I think, and not my style at all.

I put this together a while back and it has made the rounds in a few places, but I suspect for a lot of you some of the content will still be new.

I get occasional requests for images from random folks on the internet who know of my passion for the McLaren F1. I usually send them a handful of files - the ones that are freshest in my mind typically - but thought it would be nice to put together a larger sample of what I consider many the best McLaren F1 images in existence.

My original goal was to put together my 100 favorites, but in organizing the ones I liked the most I breezed past that magic number and was well on my way to 125, so I made that the new goal. Had I kept on going I probably could have found another 25 that should be included, but I figured this was enough for now. To keep size constraints of the full set down, I didn't include them all at their highest resolutions. If there are any you are interested in getting a larger version of, feel free to ask and I will see what I have to offer you.

I'm sure folks here will recongize some of these images, but hopefully a some are new. I tried to supply a very random sample - there have been some full sets of images that could have all been included. I am sure there are also some that I have overlooked which should be included. In that regard, I'd invite anyone else to add to this thread with a set of their own favorites that I may have missed or simply haven't seen.
Here's a link to a file hosting site if you'd like to grab the entire set all at once. The .ZIP file I hosted is 33MB in size and this site was giving me an average of 300Mbps download speeds, so the entire file was complete in about two minutes. Note, this only covers the first 125 images though, there are 10 more at the end of the string of thumbnails (126-135) that will not be included this way.

http://www.mediafire.com/?ftm0mjocuzd

If you'd rather pick and choose which ones you want, here's a complete set of thumbnails that are all clickable for the high resolution versions.









<image limit>
 
#9 ·
Just found out my dads friend has one out in The Hamptons so I am hopefully going to grab some photos of it before I go back to Colorado!
 
#11 · (Edited)
There are definitely a few in that area. Chassis #024 in silver & #045 in dark silver are owned by a gentleman named Gary Schaevitz last I knew.

Across the street from him, Ralph Lauren has F1s #055 & #074 both silver with high mirrors, and LM3, but his cars aren't always at home there in NY.

Herb Chambers has #044, another silver F1, in the New England area - showed it off at a recent opening of one of his dealerships at a "Cars & Coffee" style event he hosted. Read the article first, then watch the video here:

Roaring through Mass. in the McLaren F1 - Boston Overdrive - Boston.com

Dan Watkins has #068 in Massachusetts - you guessed it, silver F1. He took the car along on a cross-country trip to Pebble Beach this past summer with some friends along with other cars from his collection. The trip was chronicled in an article in Automobile Magazine titled "Supercars Across America" which can be read here. Quite a story! :cool:

Last but not least, I think chassis #038, originally a silver F1, but repainted by the factory for it's second owner a brilliant Candy Orange Metallic, is in Connecticut. I have heard some speculation on the newest owner's name as it has changed hands several times, but nothing positive.

Pretty sure that covers all the F1s in the New England area, but I would be happy to hear details of any others, or corrections if you know of any that have moved on or maybe I have simply forgotten about. <gasp> It happens of course - I'm not perfect.

>8^)
ER
 
#10 · (Edited)
Great to have you here to share your knowledge!

Ill start it off with an F1 I saw in Carmel Valley last year during Car Week pictured here:


Anyway, I had a blast shooting an F1, but I can't say I really knew much about this particular car, or how it differed from the "regular" F1. (I'd also like to get my photo description correct)
 
This post has been deleted
#15 · (Edited)
I should draw the line right here on asking any questions about Silver F1s. Man does that make my life difficult! :lol:

Their car should either be chassis #063 or #064. They had two silver cars at the same time that were nearly identical and even mixed together some photos of each car in different ads. One of their silver cars I believe ended up going to Japan and resides in the ZAZ Museum now, but I do not know exactly which chassis number yet.

The history I have on both cars is somewhat limited. #063 for as long as I know prior to arrival in HK was probably located in Japan. Earliest photos I have of it there are from 2003, but at the time it was just an unknown silver F1 in Japan - there were many. It hit my radar again when it came up for sale at BingoSports in December 2006. Compounding the problem there at BingoSports was they also picked up chassis #013 around the same time (but at that point no one knew it was #013) and offered it for sale. Luckily while both are the ever-popular silver, the #013 F1 had always had one unique outward feature of all the silver F1s in Japan, and that was small red stripes on the ventlines of the doors, just as Jay Lenos black F1 has. Getting accurate owner information or chassis numbers out of anyone in Asian countries always proves very challenging as they are a much more private culture than us funky Westerners.

To get the chassis numbers of both these BingoSports cars originally, it actually took the luck of my roommate at the time taking a trip to Japan, and me conning him into going into BingoSports to photograph the chassis plates through the windshields. He wasn't permitted to take a single photo by them, but called me after he left their showroom and confirmed the details on both cars. Without that who knows when we'd have gotten that info? I had friends in the USA inquiring directly to BS (hehe) in an effort actually purchase one of their F1s, but they were not interested in selling them outside of Japan they said. Bizarre...

#063 stayed with Bingo for a while and then #013 was sold and bounced around the world. So much for staying in Japan. Then #063 showed up in another random car showroom in Japan I don't recall the name of in Jan 2007. Then in Feb 2007 it appeared in another more generic for sale ad, with new photos, listed out of a European country, but some of those claims can be bogus. Still the pics were almost certainly #063 and the setting looked nothing like a showroom, but more like a finished garage perhaps. I think it was still in Japan then, but then made its way to SPS HK in May 2007.

Chassis #064 actually came out of Malmo, Sweden before its arrival as SPS HK, where it was owned by Claes Wachtmeister, apparently some kind of Lord in Stockholm. First photos I have of it connected to him there only appeared in 2005 though, so hard to be certain where it was or who had it previously. Registration records for the car from Sweden claimed it was registered there as early as 1999-10-15. Given that it was a 1997 model F1, that does leave a gap in the history.

There is one minor, but noteworthy difference on #064 - the "F1 V12" logo in the center of the steering wheel is done in red lettering on black instead of chrome on black as normal, which can be seen quite clearly in one of those interior pics on the SPS website, but I can't promise you since those are the photos they are showing, that #064 is still the car they have for sale. Those were the original pictures they put up on their site as long ago as Sept 2007 and they have never changed. There is also this set of photos on SPS's German website showing #064 being serviced by them in Sept 2006.

One sharp eyed contributor to the cause over the years spotted that same red logo on the steering wheel in some old photos of an F1 on the AutoSalonSingen website in Germany, but no idea when exactly they may have had it for sale as the pics appeared in their Photo Archive with no transaction details. They have redesigned their website since he spotted that, so I can't really link to it now, but I have all the pics in my collection and agree it would be #064. You can see one of the shots it in the middle of this page on the current version of the site. The click through to any additional images or even just a larger version of the first one is failing for me right now. So, anyway that is probably where it came from prior to the 1999 arrival in Sweden. There were apparently a lot of F1s that did originally go to German customers.

So are you lost yet? I bet you are. It's just really difficult as I don't have any great sources of info on that side of the world, the language barrier is not something I can overcome, and I would never imploy the tactics of lying about my intentions for pursuing info (like wasting someone's time pretending to be a phony buyer) just to get the info I am after. I like to believe I play fair and preserve my integrity in all of this. Maybe sending my friend on that covert op to BingoSports was sort of cheating. :D

>8^)
ER
 
#48 · (Edited)
Revisting this question again and continuing the #063/#064 dialogue, here is a link to their current ad for the car on Anamera.com:

1997 McLaren F1 for sale: Anamera

Note these photos are similar, but different to the ones that are seen on the SPS website of #064. Does this confirm that #063 is the one they still have? Not necessarily, as these are the same photos of #063 in their showroom that were first shared back in May 2007 as I earlier mentioned.

Should it mean the car they have to sell is #063 - well, I would hope so, but maybe they are just supplying them in 'File Photo' fashion? Happens sometimes, for sure. Also, the watch they show in the TagHeuer box in the final image looks very nice, but looks nothing like the watch that was included along with the purchase of each McLaren F1.

Most original owners chose to hold onto their watches, so its been said that they rarely are passed along to a new owner. The same is also true of a lot of the bits that were included in the purchase of an F50 - like the driving shoes - those hardly ever stayed with the car.

= = = = =

Also, in my earlier response I said that prior to going to HK:

"Then #063 showed up in another random car showroom in Japan I don't recall the name of in Jan 2007."

I pulled up those photos again, and looking at them more closely it doesn't appear to be a car showroom really. Name on the door says "HASUMI CORPORATION" and to the left of the car it appears they're displaying ...hot tubs? :confused:







There do appear to be car images on the walls of the showroom. I had never heard of the place myself, but a quick Google search I just did gives Sundance Spas website in return. So, hot tubs they are then. :)

Perhaps the car briefly belonged to the owner? Maybe it was loaned to them for a brief display? All plausible guesses graciously accepted.

Minor detail: Those three images are 3 years old as of yesterday, which was when I was talking about them. Strange...

>8^)
ER
 
#16 ·
thanks for all the great info man even with the "restricted" info it is quite abundant to me!!! i have always wondered about this car because i have family out in hong kong as well as shanghai and my older brother spotted zondas and such and directed me towards this site where i saw the F1 and the information you have given me is quite more than enough lol! thank you!!!
 
#21 ·
If you get the chance could you write a breakdown of model types, overall production numbers for each type and what years each type was in production? Including variations in build design and each new types intended purpose if you wouldnt mind. Thank you in advance.
 
#24 · (Edited)
Great idea for the start of the thread - get the basics out of the way.

Why didn't I think of that? :confused: :laugh:

It's easy enough to just repost something I put together a while ago:

McLaren F1 Total Production:

7 Prototypes = 5 F1 road cars (XP1-XP5), one F1 LM (XP1 LM), and one F1 GT long tail road car (56XPGT)

64 Roadcars (Normal versions with "Short" bodywork) - note that some of these cars have since been converted with the 'High Downforce LM-kit'.

28 GTRs (Racecars) - This includes the 9 '95-spec GTR's, the 9 '96-spec GTRs, and the 10 '97-spec long tailed GTRs. Again - many of these cars have since been converted by the factory for road use, but that doesn't change their original designation as GTRs.

5 LMs (lightweight and more powerful roadcars -- 2336 lbs vs. 2495 lb, 680 bhp and 520 lb/ft vs 627 bhp and 479 lb/ft). These cars were constructed to commemorate the McLaren F1's debut participation at Le Mans in 1995, where 5 GTRs completed the race -- finishing 1st, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 13th.

2 F1 GTs (roadcars with "Long" bodywork similar to 1997 GTR racecars).

1 Spare Chassis

TOTAL: 106 cars

Breakdown by year -

1992 = XP1

1993 = XP2-XP5, 1 F1 road car

1994 = 24 F1 road cars

1995 = 15 F1 road cars, 9 '95-spec F1 GTRs, 1 '96-spec F1 GTR, F1 LM prototype 'XP1 LM'

1996 = 7 F1 road cars, 8 '96-spec F1 GTRs, 5 F1 LMs, 1 '97-spec GTR long tail

1997 = 9 '97-spec GTR long tails, 11 F1 road cars, F1 GT prototype '56XPGT', 2 F1 GTs

1998 = 6 F1 road cars, 1 spare chassis
However it's better to spell it out in a little more detail I think.

One thing that is important for people to realize, is that when the F1 project started McLaren's only intention was to build F1 road cars. Gordon has actually stated that he told Ron Dennis and the rest of the team early-on not to come back to him later on and ask for a racer, as he was designing certain compromises into the car for road use that would work against it on the track (and of course now most of us know how successful it went on to become). About a year into production of the F1s, it was a small group of 2-3 customers who pressed McLaren into building a racer for use in the gentlemen's BPR series that started evolving around '93-'94 by essentially threatening to do it themselves without McLaren's support if they didn't wish to be involved. McLaren realized that in their effort to sell their road cars and control the image of the brand, that if someone else was out there commanding the race effort and it was not successful, that it would surely hurt their ability to sell the car. That is why they finally agreed to have a go with it. Had that little discussion from those three individuals never occurred, its likely there wouldn't be many things to talk about when it comes to "variants" of the F1.

I like to use visual aids to help with the story, and there can be no better visuals to outline the variants than these three shots taken from above.



We'll start with the first one - as it shows all the official variants of the F1 as they were originally conceived. Three more (I'll call them) psuedo-variants would come along later in life, again at the wishes of certain customers.

Front and center is the 'basic' McLaren F1 road car. In total, 69 were originally built if you include the 5 prototypes (XP1-XP5). That means 64 were production cars - the one pictured here, being the ever-popular silver and having no other uniquely distinguishing outward features is a mystery when it comes to the exact chassis number. The road cars featured a 627-hp 6.1L V12 from BMW Motorsports designated "S70/2" that would form the basis for all the other engines.

An interesting detail of note is that chassis numbers for the production road cars start at #001 and finish at #075.

"How can that be?" you say "You just told us there were 64." :confused:

Well this was due to a couple reasons. The first that there were some chassis that had been intended to be road cars, but were reassigned and became the earliest GTRs instead, and then that road car number was never re-used. Also, a few were just skipped over with no explanation given, and then three of the numbers match up with the chassis numbers given to the F1 GTs. Also, the road cars were not built in sequence based on their chassis number, in fact the very first F1 completed in December 1993 was #002, then in the beginning of 1994, #003 was completed, followed finally by #001. Con-fus-ing!


In the center of the image is an example of the 1995 F1 GTR - this is really the car that started it all, as that is GTR #01R pictured. It was the first GTR built, though it looked like this when originally unveiled. GTR #01R was the prototype GTR and like my story about #19R above, it didn't see any competitive use initially. Through a bit of chance, this chassis would end up being entered into the 1995 24Hrs of LeMans and was the car that Lehto/Dalmas/Sekiya trio took to victory and that was the only race it ever competed it. It's often referred to as the 'UenoClinic' GTR now, as that's the name of the company that sponsored it at LeMans. Don't Google it though, unless you need to learn more about "Penile Implants" - yeah, I am serious! :lol: Eventually, McLaren would build 9 of these 1995-spec GTRs; 8 of them have racing history, and the last (#09R) was constructed for the Brunei Royal Family as a replica of the LeMans winner, as Ron Dennis preferred to keep the original car that won with McLaren.


I've mentioned already that 5 F1 GTRs finished the 1995 LeMans race which was an amazing achievement. To celebrate this McLaren decided to build the road going version of the GTR, known as the F1 LM pictured front-right here. The LM is not just a road car with a bodykit, nor is it just a GTR with a license plate. It's really the best combination of both, and it also features the most powerful version of the F1's V12, officially rated at 680hp. It features three seats, unlike the GTRs which can only manage two due to the placement of wires and control boxes in the seat to driver's right. It has a unique interior treatment with fully exposed carbon fiber, lacks the roll cage fitted to the GTRs, and has some little unique styling elements here and there. They also kept the harsly loud straight-cut gearbox that was fitted to the GTRs, requiring an in-car headset communication system by Peltor in order for driver and passengers to communicate at speed.

The one pictured here is the prototype, chassis XP1 LM built late in 1995, and then they built five production versions in mid-1996 which wear chassis LM1-LM5. It's often stated, even in materials released by McLaren, that all the LMs were this Historic 'Papaya' Orange color as a tribute to the early McLaren orange paint their successful CAN-AM cars wore, but this is inaccurate as two were painted Black. We can cover that later though.


Down front, in Blood Red, is the first of the 1996 model GTRs, chassis #10R. These moved the bar much further towards being a real racer than the 1995 GTRs had been. Going back a bit, development of the original GTRs was given a budget by Dennis based on the 'profit' of selling just five cars. This gave Gordon just one day in the wind tunnel to work on the aerodynamics, and most of the changes made to the cars were to allow it to meet the standards required on track, like fitting a roll cage, and trying to make certain parts more durable. With the 1996 GTR effort, McLaren had never really stopped developing the car throughout the previous year, and realized there were changes that would benefit it on track like the further lowering of the engine in the chassis, and a better focus on reducing the weight among other things, which made building a whole new car a requirement for the second year. Some of the 1995 GTR customers traded up for the new car, but McLaren also created a package of upgrades for the '95s that wanted to continue on racing. In total, 9 of these 1996-spec GTRs were built.

The one pictured again acted as the development car and it's only real racing history occurred at the Pre-Qualifying event for the 1996 24Hrs of LeMans held early in the year, where it filled in for another GTR that actually competed. The car originally looked like this when unveiled in what is referred to as its "Presentation Livery", but it wasn't a popular look for the car and the yellow markings and painted wheels were removed early on. This car now belongs to drummer Nick Mason of Pink Floyd, and after a recent brush with death at the hands of a journalist that required some repairs it has been returned to its original glory with all the yellow bits added back on. I applaud that decision!

<continued below>
 
#25 · (Edited)
The final two were almost a tie, but I'll go with the order of when they were manufacturered. The car in the back-right corner of the image is an example of the 1997-spec longtail F1 GTR; in this case GTR #20R wearing it's 'Gulf-Davidoff' livery from the 1997 24Hrs of LeMans. The 1997 GTRs were obviously a large departure from the earlier racers, but were not a total clean sheet design. While the longtail bodywork doesn't strike everyone's fancy, it does serve a purpose in allowing the F1 GTR to hold its own against the increased competition from Porsche's 911 GT1 and Mercedes Benz' CLK-GTR and other purpose-built race cars that were beginning to steal pieces of the F1s glory and earlier domination in the sportscar racing series of the day. It also elicited this comment from Gordon Murray: "The first time I saw the '97 'Longtail' prototype accelerating past the pits at Barcelona - slightly nose up - with that wonderful, rising, piercing V12 shriek, I finally thought 'That's it - we've cracked it. We've finally turned the F1 into a real racer.'" Not only was the car longer and more aerodynamic, but it was surprisingly considerably lighter than the more road-car based GTRs of the earlier two years (published weights for the three versions went from 1050kg, to 1012kg, to finally 915kg on the longtails).

The V12 engines fitted to GTRs were all dubbed "S70/3" even though each revision had seen steady performance improvements from BMW over the years. Despite that work, all of them were rated at 600hp. Because of the size of the F1s V12, they were handicapped from the get-go with air-restrictors due to sanctioning rules that reduced the power to less than that of a road car. In the case of the 1997 variant, displacement actually was reduced to 5990cc from the tradition 6064cc of all other F1 engines by shortening the stroke slightly, getting it under the 6.0L bar. I believe this was to allow a slightly larger air inlet than it would have gotten being over than mark, and changed mapping to the ignition and fuel curves and other internals for increased performance where it matter. The smaller engine suffered a bit losing 21lb-ft of torque at its peak though, but BMW had also made significant weight reductions in the engine to counter act that in what was probably a delicate balancing act of weight -vs- performance.

Another big change to the longtail GTRs was the fitment of a sequential gearbox, developed by Xtrac, which improved shifting and helped with reliability of the F1s transmission that had always been a bit of an Achilles' heel in the longer racing events. The longtails were nearly successful in their quest to beat their improved rivals - one of them finishing second overall to a CLK-GTR in the 1997 FIA GT Championship series, and one taking the top honors in the GT1 Class at the '97 24Hrs of LeMans. In total, I think I have mentioned already that 10 of these were built, finishing the GTRs chassis number run at #28R.


Now the last car in that image of six was built by McLaren to satisfy the homologation requirements of the FIA GT series. Since the longtail GTR was such a departure from the regular F1, a requirement in the rules stated that in order to race this new car they had to build a new road car that matched, sell one a month before the first race, have dealers, brochures and parts back-up for it. This very special variant is called the F1 GT, and commonly referred to as the longtail road car.

The one pictured and in the second shot way up there with the other road cars might appear to be black, but I can assure you it is dark green, making it chassis 56XPGT. That was essentially the prototype for the F1 GT, and then two additional customer cars were built, one of them went to McLaren's best customer the Brunei Royal Family and was in fact black. The other went to Japan and was painted Burgundy originally, but was recently in the past couple of years refitted by the factory for its original owner with a paint scheme resembling the McLaren Formula One cars from the Mika Hakkinen era. I'm sure there will be a point later on where sharing photos of it will occur either by me or someone else.

The styling of the GT is again an acquired taste. Some openly do not like it at all, whereas others find it to be their favorite of all. I think the longtails look better as racers, but understand and appreciate why the GTs were made and with only three built, it was definitely the most exclusive of the original F1 variants.

= = = = =

Since production of the F1s ceased in mid-1998, the McLaren Customer Care group that continues to support and maintain F1s has managed to come up with a few new psuedo-variants based on customer's requests. These deserve to be mentioned, mainly because seeing one can confuse people as to which of the six categories above they fall into.


For starters, McLaren developed an option for the F1 road car called the 'High Downforce Kit' that included the deep nose splitter, wider front wheel arches and rear wing, matching the aerodynamic styling elements fitted to the short tailed F1 GTRs and the LM. Also, except with one particular F1 that didn't get the wider front wheel arches, they also changed the wheels from the standard 17" to wear a set of the 18" OZ included on the GTRs.

There were other changes that aren't as obivious that go along with this, like the deletion of the 'Brake Balance Foil' at the rear, and lowering/stiffening of the suspension slightly in order to make it all work best together. I am aware of 10 F1s that have been upgraded with this option - all but one of the chassis numbers are known. It should also be noted that no F1 road car was originally completed with the High Downforce Kit fitted - they were all added later on during refits.

One owner recently chose to have the Kit removed, returning the car to stock, which is pretty surprising.


Now of those 10... (errr, 9 now) two of the cars are even more heavily modified by McLaren to really become the ultimate variant of the F1. They feature the addition of an LM-spec engine, giving them near equal performance to the fastest F1 variant without some of the drawbacks of the LMs raw and sparsely finished interior, or any lack of creature comforts. Unlike the LMs, they do not have the straight cut gearboxes borrowed from the GTR that make communication inside the car nearly impossible at speed. The Downforce Kit on these cars was enhanced with louvers over the front wheel arches in the style used on the longtails to improve downforce, and McLaren called it the "Extra-High Downforce Kit" because of that.

Now these two cars don't have a fancy name like "F1 GT" and they should never simply be called "F1 LMs" since they are not the same. McLaren spent a lot of time on these two conversions and certainly could have fitted an "F1 LM" badge to the rear of each, but chose not too. Here's a photo of each car - #018 first, #073 second. Now, after all that, I must ask that you please ignore the platform underneath #073 where it says "McLaren F1 LM". :lol:




The final new variant that should be mentioned are the road-converted F1 GTRs. These confuse people for different reasons - but the primary one is because many of them have been resprayed in Historic 'Papaya' Orange making them instantly look like an F1 LM to the slightly-informed car enthusiast.

There are a total of 9 GTRs that have been converted. Some by the factory, others by private firms. They are all based on short tailed '95 or '96 GTRs. It has been said that converting a '97 GTR would be impossible, but I guess that depends on what set of regulatory standards you are trying to comply with as some are less stringent than others for road registration.

The chassis numbers of the converted GTRs are #06R, #07R, #08R, #10R, #11R, #12R, #13R, #14R and #16R. From that listing, the ones that are not 'Orange' (as it is a shorter list) are #06R, #10R, #12R and #13R. In each case for those four, they still wear what would be described as their original race livery, sans most sponsor decals and race numbers. GTR #16R has recently changed hands and there have been suggestions that it will possibly see a return to its original livery as well, or maybe something else. We'll have to wait and see what its new owner decides.

That covers what could be considered all the variants in a moderate level of detail. If you want further clarification on any points, just ask.

>8^)
ER
 
#26 ·
Peloton, I've seen you've post on various other forums and your knowledge of the F1 is amazing. If there is anyone that should write an "Ultimate McLaren F1" guide, it should be you.

I'll have to go digging through my photo archives, but I have a pic of the 1st and only F1 I've seen in person. It was a black example, displayed at the Blackhawk Auto museum. It was a driven one, as I remember seeing the scrapes on the splitter. If memory serves me correctly it was 2002 when I saw it and was a local owned example
 
#27 · (Edited)
Peloton, I've seen you've post on various other forums and your knowledge of the F1 is amazing. If there is anyone that should write an "Ultimate McLaren F1" guide, it should be you.
Thanks! It seems like I'll be getting around to doing that right here in this thread perhaps. ;)

Would appreciate seeing that photo you mention, which will be of chassis #072. There are only a few in circulation from it's short time while displayed at the Blackhawk and so you were quite lucky to see that car there.

The story if you don't know it is actaully kind of sad as to how it got there. The car's proud owner was a young guy in his mid-30's who made his money in the internet world. Here's a snippet pulled from an article in BusinessWeek Magazine written in 2003.

Just when Commerce One hit the skids, co-founder Thomas Gonzales Jr. died of a rare form of cancer. Last Dec. 13, more than 600 friends and colleagues gathered for an evening memorial service at the Blackhawk Auto Museum in the hills east of San Francisco. Like the treasures of a pharaoh, Gonzales' prize possessions, F1 McLaren and Ferrari F50 sports cars, were placed on display -- as were drawings of the dream house he never got to build.

At the end, people lingered in the parking lot in the dark. For some, this was the ultimate downer. Gonzales grew up poor in a cabin in California's Sierras. He had worked hard. He was a team player -- always ready to stay up all night to finish a project or fly to any city to show the company's newest technology to potential customers. And thanks to the Internet gold rush, he had attained wealth beyond his dreams. Now he had died way too young. "When Thomas died, something died within the company. The spirit went out," says Biestman.

Indeed, the Blackhawk farewell is a fitting epitaph for a whole generation of Internet startups. They came. They soared. And, like Commerce One, they're in danger of fading away without fulfilling their promise.
The F1, I was told a few years back, remains in the USA still with his family and is in permanent storage somewhere in the Western USA. It has not been seen/photographed to my knowledge since about 2004 though.

>8^)
ER
 
#30 · (Edited)
Thanks Russ - it's a nice forum and I'm glad to have "arrived". :D

** Moving this question over from the "Dream Garage" thread to provide an answer and any further discussion in here. **

Peloton, I love you. Seriously, I rarely come across someone who enjoys cars at the level you do. I was wondering though, I live in Monterey, CA, and there's a orange F1 that I've seen twice near 17 Mile Drive and stuff, know anything on it? The driver is very quick with it; the first time I saw him he floored it at the light go uphill, was amazing.

J.
Thanks!

When did you see these things happen? Recently, or several years ago - like maybe 2003 during the Pebble Beach weekend?

If a standard road car, then it is almost certainly chassis #038, pictured here in the driveway of Dan Kennedy. As noted in the garage thread, and mentioned above in the New England area breakdown, it's had at least 3 owners since DK sold it in early 2005 (one in Texas briefly, then one in Atlanta for a bit longer) and has sort of fallen off the radar with wherever it resides currently.

I do believe it is still in the USA. As recent as 2007 it was displayed at a car show in the North East I am forgetting the name of. As to the current owner, I have a name that I have been told should be it and he is someone that you might expect would and could buy a car like the F1, but it is not yet confirmed.

EDIT: Found the name of the show - Fairfield County Concours d'Elegance held at the Fairfield County Hunt Club in West Port, CT - and here are the pair of photos from Sept 17th, 2007 where it won the "Best In Class - 1976-2007" award.





>8^)
ER
 
#42 ·
Thanks Russ - it's a nice forum and I'm glad to have "arrived". :D

** Moving this question over from the "Dream Garage" thread to provide an answer and any further discussion in here. **



Thanks!

When did you see these things happen? Recently, or several years ago - like maybe 2003 during the Pebble Beach weekend?

If a standard road car, then it is almost certainly chassis #038, pictured here in the driveway of Dan Kennedy. As noted in the garage thread, and mentioned above in the New England area breakdown, it's had at least 3 owners since DK sold it in early 2005 (one in Texas briefly, then one in Atlanta for a bit longer) and has sort of fallen off the radar with wherever it resides currently.

I do believe it is still in the USA. As recent as 2007 it was displayed at a car show in the North East I am forgetting the name of. As to the current owner, I have a name that I have been told should be it and he is someone that you might expect would and could buy a car like the F1, but it is not yet confirmed.

EDIT: Found the name of the show - Fairfield County Concours d'Elegance held at the Fairfield County Hunt Club in West Port, CT - and here are the pair of photos from Sept 17th, 2007 where it won the "Best In Class - 1976-2007" award.





>8^)
ER
I would say it was about 2 months ago. The first time, I would say last semester, maybe around May or so. The first time I saw it it was coming down the road that passes a mall, and the second time I saw it was maybe a street away from the first place I saw it. It wasn't dark persay, but it wasn't light either. I remember pulling up close to him but the light turned green and he floored it up to towards 17 Mile. If it makes any difference, it had wheels that looked very close to the BMW M3s you see around and had the wing too.



I remember it in my head pretty well; I tried taking a picture but that thing is damn fast.

J.
 
#34 ·
Hey, me too. I wonder what else we will learn. ;) :cool:

Peloton 25, you and Challenge It are going to get along very well.
I hope we all do. What's with him though - big F1 fan himself I am guessing, maybe an owner? A few do actually post in message forums on the 'internets', if you can believe that.

Good to have you on here Erik! It's been a while!
Hello Stephan - one of my many sources of some pieces of good intel and, of course fantastic images, over the years. :clap:

Did you happen to get the chassis number of... nah, nevermind. :laugh:

>8^)
ER
 
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