McLaren F1: The Oxford English Dictionary's definition of fast? It has to be Gordon Murray's McLaren F1.
In the driver's footwell of the McLaren F1 there's a carefully shaped bit of trim that covers the throttle cable as it travels
back to the engine. Beautifully sculpted,
rigorously neat and made from carbon
fibre. This tells you a lot about the car.
Designed without thought for cost, pared
down, blessed with an attention to detail
that makes heart surgeons look sloppy.
We like engineering at Top Gear and this
car is enough to give any engineering fan
strange stirrings in the underpants. Sad
then that the F1 is not famous for being a
pure manifestation of one moustachioed
man's quest to make the ultimate car.
Instead, everyone seems fixated with
its 241mph top speed and the band of
pretenders - Bugatti, Koenigsegg, some
bloke in America who's fitted six superchargers
to a V8 kit car - who have tried
to usurp that headline figure with varying
degrees of success.
But let's not forget
that the McLaren was never about one
meaningless number. In fact, although
the factory had done some complex
maths about projected top whack, the
F1 didn't actually prove what it could do
in real life until five years after it went
on sale. Because the McLaren F1 was
never about travelling at high speed in
a straight line. It was about detailing,
lightness and lack of compromise. And
that's why it's still the hypercar daddy.