It had to be hypercars this week, right? It isn't every week that someone tries to replace the McLaren F1 - especially not the man chiefly responsible for the original. No matter what it turns out to be like in the long run, the GMA T.50 is clearly the result of painstaking attention to detail and the uncompromising vision of its creator. We won't dwell on its spec again - you can read about it all over again here - but suffice it to say that in an era of remarkable cars, it has already established itself as an extraordinary prospect.
Of course the asking price is also extraordinary. The T.50 is another reminder that specialist car makers - even unproven ones - can virtually name their figure, even in a year financially savaged by a global pandemic. While it was not the first hypercar launched, the McLaren F1 helped establish the trend for ultra-low volume, hugely powerful road cars, and it has commanded extravagant secondhand prices ever since.
Consequently, you cannot have one for this week's budget, even with it set a preposterous £1m. There is only available in the classifieds - one of just ten F1 GTR Longtails in existence - and £1m will be pocket change to whomever takes it off Tom Hartley Jnr's hands. Nevertheless, it does unlock some truly spellbinding cars, each with its own place in hypercar history. To the classifieds...
Of all the cars which came after the McLaren F1, arguably it is the Veyron which succeeded in wrestling control of the hypercar agenda. Rather than being light and lithesome and aspiring to the spirituality of a single-seater, the Bugatti was all about power - in cartoonish quantities. Even in 2020 the prospect of 1,000hp seems unequivocally mighty - in the previous decade it was positively otherworldly.
That was its whole reason for being, of course. Its 8.0-litre quad-turbocharged W16 famously cobbled together at the whim of Ferdinand Piech to prove the engineering expertise of the Volkswagen Group beyond all reasonable doubt. Even Gordon Murray, never one to celebrate turbocharging or excessive kerbweight, is said to have conceded its achievements - which included setting the 267.856mph record for road-legal cars.
Granted, it needed a Super Sport guise to do that, and you most certainly can't have one of those for a poxy million (though there is a Grand Sport Vitesse at H.R Owen if your own budget knows no limits). But you can have a 2007 example with 9,900 miles on the clock, and a 'huge' franchise service history in the bag. Expect it to be no less mind blowing than it was at launch - not least because there's still nothing quite like it, and nor will there ever be.
NC
In 2014 the talk in hypercar circles was all about The Holy Trinity, with magazines rushing to be the first to get a triple test of the La Ferrari, P1 and the 918. Later in 2015 we watched in awe as Chris Harris got them together at Portimao; the video was surely his best calling card for the Top Gear job. It was a watershed moment, where hypercars would change forever...
... but was it? Roll on five years and you can have a 918 Spyder for less than a million quid, and there are hypercars out there just as bonkers and less electric than before. Okay, it has appreciated slightly from new, but after the warranties ran out on the trio there were reports of people having difficulties selling them on, and the Porsche is the least rare of all three - having nearly double the production run of the other two.
Still there are only 66 available in the UK at the moment and nearly a third of those are SORN'd. And let's forget you're getting something that looks fabulous, drives even better and is likely to be the last petrol-powered hypercar Porsche ever makes. Whatt more do you want?
PD
October 20th, 2002 was not a significant date, really. But it was a momentous day for 11-year-old Matthew, because Top Gear was back on the tele. And that was bigger than anything going on in Year 7. I'd bought the preview magazine, I'd speculated on what cars they might drive, I'd made Mum a bit berserk with my excitement... Top Gear was actually returning. Tonight.
And there it was, a little after 8pm: the Murcielago. Y1. As a naïve youth I didn't (foolishly) care much for the Zonda it was pitted against, nor notice the weirdly barren studio. Heck, Christina Aguilera could have been performing in the garden and I wouldn't have noticed - the Lamborghini absolutely consumed my attention. The Murcielago was probably peak supercar already, and the purple one on Top Gear just secured its status for me. Sort of forever, it would now seem.
The car evolved during its life, with Roadsters, the mighty LP640 and some weird special editions, but this is the million-pound hypercar club - I can afford to go big. So Super Veloce it is, the curtain call for Lamborghini's storied V12 and, genuinely, one of my favourite motor cars of all time. Supercars kind of do that to you, don't they? There were one or two manuals made - imagine that! - but this e-gear SV 670-4 will be more than adequate. Yellow is perfect - part banana boat, part Exocet missile - the 17k mileage is encouraging (because that means it's been driven, not left to get creaky in a collection) and £300k means I'm well under budget. In fact, given where the values of classic SV Lambos have reached, it might even be an investment...
Matt Bird
Perhaps the obvious choice here, but it would have been a huge oversight if absent from the list. Likely the poster - remember those? - that adorned many a bedroom wall during the 1990s, and for the lucky few a driving experience like no other. 480hp doesn't look much nowadays, but the infamous turbo lag and slender kerbweight - less than a Mini thanks to carbon construction, if not quite T.50 skinny - meant a wild ride was guaranteed.
I remember seeing one during a trip to Monaco back in 2003, where it sat unassumingly at the side of the road, covered in dust, with a few parking scrapes as well - evidently in daily use, and all the better for it. It summed up the place well as, even in 2003, they were still more expensive than most family homes.
To me the F40, F50, and XJ220 will always be the best hypercar; an opinion based, pretty much entirely, on having all three of them in 1:18 form parked pride of place on my childhood window sill. Alas, since then, I've only ever managed to passenger in one for a few laps around a damp Donington, but it was an experience that will last a lifetime.
I'm not a particularly great passenger at the best of times but thankfully the F40 driver, its long-term owner, really did know what he was doing; though probably only driving at 50 per cent, it still felt absolutely alive. He'd owned it for a number of years and driven regularly but confessed it still caught him out every once in a while; just how a hypercar should be. The way it got off the line, attacked the corners and deafened you with that V8 far exceeded any childhood expectations.
This one, however, looks to have been treated very differently to those cars; it has only 8,000 miles recorded, which I calculate to be 258 miles a year or just five a week - a travesty! Looks like it's had the expensive bits sorted recently, though, from Ferrari main dealers, and now has Classiche certification from the factory as well. A car firmly on the lotto list for me (in case it wasn't clear!), I couldn't think of a better way to spend £1m of my not-so-hard-earned cash.
Sam Liggett
If it's maximum performance on four wheels that you want (and I do), the McLaren Senna is about as extreme as it gets - or at least got, before the T.50 arrived. Woking's most aggressive road model unashamedly places function before form, wearing carbonfibre panels shaped to extract 800kg of downforce from the air. With an 800hp twin-turbo V8 powering just 1,300kg, the Senna has 612hp-per-tonne, yet it's rear-wheel drive. It's like a GT racing car turned up to 11; or a prototype with number plates.
For me, that nails the hypercar brief. I'm impressed but unmoved by cars with mega outputs coupled to hefty weight figures, which made my choice easy. What excites me is motorsport-esque performance and the Senna, from the very moment of its conception, was developed to ensure this. I'm yet to have the pleasure of driving one but, from Dan's verdict alone, I know of all the six-digit cars out there, this is the one to get my heart racing the most.
I'd take one in a bland spec if it were the only one I could afford, but since there's a million quid to play with I've gone for my favourite in the classifieds. I've picked it largely because of its lovely shade of blue paint, but also because the options list is longer than your arm. Rest assured I would not be leaving it with delivery miles on the odometer for very long.
SS
Before The Holy Trinity, there was another wave of extraordinary hypercars in the early part of the 21st century. There was no questioning the top speed of the Bugatti Veyron, but in terms of raw excitement there was a choice to be made between Ferrari Enzo, Pagani Zonda and the Porsche Carrera GT. However, since Ferrari only produced 399 examples of the Enzo and Pagani hasn't even made half of that in decades, good luck finding either of those within our tight million-pound budget.
This generation is the last of the analogue hypercars, before manufacturers started adding hybrid complexity to the drivetrain. So, if you want a Le Mans-proven V10 engine coupled to a six-speed manual transmission - and who wouldn't - then this is the car for you. It even starts with the turn of a key! How retro...
You only need say the number '980' to young Mr Bird and his Carrera GT switch is flicked, like one of those annoying talking dolls that won't ever shut up. He drove one once, proclaimed it his favourite car ever - thanks in no small part to that engine/gearbox double act - and then proceeded to tell every single person he met after that point about why it was so great. No, really. A special car, then, one that's finally getting the recognition it deserves as a classic prospect; built from 2004 to 2007, this is a late Carrera GT and so should be one of the best, as it's generally believed the clutch is most tricky on early cars. Last thing I'd want to do is stall with people watching...
MD
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