Originally Posted by Zeus

I have purposely stayed out of any discussions involvong the P1 on Rennlist, because I have literally written books on other forums. So I will just say for now that I agree with this post, and it only scratches the tip of the iceberg.

My latest immature rant from Teamspeed:
Originally Posted by salihbjk ğ
I've learned today that the car went significantly faster than the 918. That's all I can say.


So, what then can you add exactly? I'm not attacking you personally Salihbjk, so apologies in advance.

But that is the same type of statement made 300 times a day on the internet about this car. Everybody on the "inside" knows exactly how fast this car is; yet every car enthusiast or possible future McLaren buyer is made to eat crow until when exactly? Oh, releasing numbers are a "risk" now. “It doesn’t matter to anyone except those who will own the P1.” others have mentioned. Bollocks! What about ‘future’ owners of the brand? Does the company’s reputation matter now, or are we all in it for the quick buck?

McLaren can suck it and it's 'Ring time. How long has the car been out now and not a single independent number has been confirmed by a 3rd party source? McLaren can bulls**t the rest of the world into believing the performance was all about the Nurburgring, yet so many other racetracks exist. Safer ones too. Oh...it's winter. Right. There are only racetracks and roads in the northern hemisphere... They’re worried Ferrari will one-up them down the road. It goes round and round.

No journalist has driven the car without a McLaren employee sitting in the passenger seat, and not a single 3rd party entity has been given the car thus far with the exception of Top Gear. And their numbers are where? Not EVO, AmS, CAR magazine, no American car mag, no Austrailian car mag, not a single drive by Chris Harris or any other reputable journo, nothing.

We’ve heard it all now:
‘Ring times way under 6:57, 9.8 @ 152mph quarter mile times, 0-186mph in 16.5, 3.9 G’s in the corners, stability at speed unrivaled by GT3 race cars, braking better than any other road car in history, the list goes on… Care to test that last claim against a 991 GT3 with PCCB’s? Think you’ll ever see a P1 vs GT3 vs C7 ZO6 vs GTR vs LaF vs 918 vs Viper vs ? at the 2014 Motor Trend driver’s car of the year? Keep dreaming.

McLaren claims that ‘Ring times are dangerous, unofficial and open to cheating. They are right of course. But why not take the higher road here? Release the car. A customer spec car. Not a Ferrari press car. Give it to the journos to test. Tell them to get real world numbers on the car. Hell, tell them to go out and try to break the car if they can – show them and us that they are confident in their creation.

Porsche essentially builds a car, for good or bad, and in due time tosses the keys to the motoring world and asks, "How'd we do?" McLaren, Ferrari, Nissan, et al build one-offs, bring teams of engineers and sometimes multiple cars along with them to 3rd party tests under threats and then hide behind their history while misdirecting and obfuscating their own accomplishments behind walls and changing politics.



IF the statement in bold above in CarMaven's Rennlist post is proven to be true, then McLaren will have lost nearly all of my respect and possible future business. The pieces are starting to come together as to why there has been no independent 3rd party testing of the P1.

On a positive note, I do believe that the claim of 2G's cornering ability with street tires is actually possible, and here is why:

Link to MotorTrend's 2013 Best Drivers Car: http://www.motortrend.com/features/p...r/viewall.html

In reference to Motor Trend's Best Driver's Car 2013 - if you scroll down and take a look at the data sheets on each car & the track numbers at Laguna Seca you will notice that the G's recorded in the corners on many of the cars exceeds 1.5 G's. The winner, although not the fastest, was the 991 911 C4S which recorded 1.80 Lateral G's in Turn 8a for instance.

Now imagine what a 991 GT3 might accomplish, same day, same conditions. Enter the P1 with nearly the same weight as a GT3, almost twice the power and gobs more downforce. Is it possible? Not to toss another rumor out there about the P1, but there was a turn or two on the 'Ring where apparently the P1 generated 3.9G Lateral. But then we're back to the speculation...

Food for thought, but anyone is welcome to correct me if I'm wrong...

Originally Posted by mousecatcher

That, I agree with. And disagree.

A fast time around the ring represents a fast time in real world conditions -- long straights, bumpy corners, etc. I mean, it's WAY more representative than manufacturer test tracks or public tracks. eg, a :30 faster car at the ring has either way more power or way more lateral grip or both, and a real user will notice that.

Anyway I challenged you because that's not what you actually said earlier. Smart folks treat the data smartly, but ring times do matter to regular people, not just the "journalists". I mean part of owning any performance car is bragging rights!

Yeah, but I don't see many regular people buying $1m hypercars, with maybe the exception of select oil-rich nationals.

The reality is that most of these cars will be bubble-wrapped garage queens, and on the very rare occasion that a wealthy owner does venture onto a mixed track day they're likely to get smoked by skilled drover in lowly GT3 or Vette.

Is the Ring a good development tool? Sure. Is it resulting in cars we'd all want to own, could own, and would actually drive if we did own? Not so sure. Hyper-horsepower, hyper-priced, hyper-tech cars hold little appeal to me.

My dream street/track-day toy would be a 991 Cup with current Mezger motor and a manual trans plus minimal bits to make it street legal; no ABS, no AC, no radio, no PTV, no RWS, no SPASM, no traction control, no cup holders, yadda, yadda, yadda. Obviously I'm not holding my breath

That said, on public roads you just can't get to those kinds of speeds and as a recent FR-S owner I'm now a staunch believer in crappy tires. The beauty of that car is that you can actually reach the limits of the car at public road speeds and DRIVING the car at the limit is so much fun.

Now we're talking. One of my all time favorite cars to drive from years past was a Fiat X1/9. Being young and impressionable had a lot do with it, but what really did it for me was how easy and plain fun it was to fling around corners sideways. Skinny tires and mid-engine handling make for endless entertainment.

I think when it comes down to it we are probably not too far away from each other's position and if we had a beer I bet we'd convince each other of our version of the Truth.

Without question.

Originally Posted by brake dust

Who is the manufacturer of the engine in the P1? Is it McLaren?

I have always like the fact that Porsche (and Ferrari) develop and build their own racing engines. You see a transfer of that technology back and from race to street.

Seem to recall that the 12c engine is outsourced. Know that the F1 - a magnificent car has a BMW engine (race proven) in it. Guess racing heritage is important to me -like the fact that the technology that Porsche is developing will find its way into sports cars.