McLaren roadster confirmed at Pebble Beach

New open-cockpit Ultimate Series model will be limited to 399 examples

Well that escalated quickly. No sooner had we caught wind of McLaren's 'classical roadster' than it is officially announced - with an accompanying pic that lays much of the car's striking form bare. Much of it is as we expected: the (still unnamed) roadster is set to be a constituent of the Ultimate Series, it will do without roof or windscreen - as our source revealed earlier this month - and, conceptually, it will sit between the Senna and Speedtail as the "purest distillation of road-focused driving pleasure."

Sounds good to us - and it looks good to us, too. Obviously the profile shares something with the other models in McLaren's lineup (there's quite a lot of 720S in that rear end) but the flanks, nose and that unabashed open cockpit are striking elements to say the least. Driver exhilaration and "an unrivalled sense of driver connection with the surrounding environment" are said to sit at the core of the roadster's ethos, and it's fair to say that the manufacturer has embodied that objective in the styling.

Even more tantalising is confirmation that the new model will be the lightest car ever produced by McLaren Automotive - meaning that it will slip beneath the 1,198kg dry kerbweight claimed for the Senna. It will be powered by the same 4.0-litre twin-turbocharged V8, too - although we're expecting it to fall shy of the its sibling's 800hp output, if only to preserve the Senna's track prowess.

Be that as it may, the roadster will be the more exclusive model - McLaren has confirmed that just 399 examples will be built, and that it is expected to come to market late next year. The firm isn't prepared to say exactly how much the car will cost just yet, but suggested that it will be priced between the Senna (£750,000) and the Speedtail (£2.1m) when it goes on sale. Expect it to be sold out long before then, of course - McLaren says it will be taking expressions of interest at Pebble Beach this weekend. So you've got till Monday.

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