Ever since the McLaren P1 went out of production in 2015, we’ve been eagerly awaiting a successor. Confirmation came recently that we’d finally get to see it on 6 October this year, and now we know what it’ll be called: the McLaren W1.
The name continues the lineage that kicked off in 1992 with the F1, and continued in 2013 with the P1, and McLaren says it celebrates the brand’s “World Championship mindset.” The reveal date, 6 October, is the 50th anniversary of McLaren claiming its first-ever Formula 1 Constructors’ Championship in 1974. That same day, McLaren driver Emerson Fittipaldi clinched the second of his two World Drivers’ Championships. It seems appropriate timing, given that when the W1 is unveiled, the McLaren F1 team will once again be at the top of the championship.
Everything else, though, remains a mystery for now. We suspect that, like the P1, it’ll be a hybrid, with its beating heart likely to be McLaren’s current 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 – an evolution of the 3.8-litre that powered the P1 all those years ago. Being pitched as a direct successor to the F1 and P1, it’s likely to be designed with a broader use case than the track-focused Senna or high-velocity Speedtail, too.
We were rather hoping that we’d be set up for another ‘holy trinity’ showdown, as we were 10 years ago when the P1, LaFerrari and Porsche 918 all pitched up within months of one another. Reportedly, though, that’s not going to happen. While we know Ferrari’s next halo hypercar is imminent, and should provide a handy rival to the new McLaren, Porsche’s 918 successor is likely still a while off, as the company grapples with what form its next hypercar should take.
McLaren P1 – front
Still, we’ll take a two-way hypercar showdown over nothing. If nothing else, Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri, Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc are all likely to be getting some pretty sweet new company cars soon.
