“McLaren Readying Ferrari F430 Adversary” or so says the good folks at CarScoop. This has been in the wings, and on again/off again (depending on the relationship between McLaren & Mercedes) for awhile.
My first thought was, “Yeah, McLaren wants it to build a Ferrari F430 adversary, but they got a long way to go to beat that, given that Ferrari has been kicking their ass around the world for the past nine years .”
Look, I’ve got nothing against the McLaren F1; very impressive car in every respect (although Mario Andretti said the car was “aerodynamically spooky”, and the last time he said something like that was when he was racing CanAm, and THAT GUY knows whence he speaks). It’s just that lately, McLaren have been showing themselves to be struggling to maintain 4th place in the constructors championship, being stomped by the likes of Renault & BMW, let alone being able to challenge the likes of Ferrari.
Anyway, the main details come from Autocar in the U.K which basically boil down to this:
The new car, codenamed P11, will be in showrooms by March 2010, the official unveiling is slated for autumn 2009. The P11 will be available in both open-top and hardcore versions of the base model. It will be noticeably lighter and more compact than the Ferrari F430. The Mclaren P11 will be powered by a 550bhp V8 engine, built by Mahle (who bought out the old Cosworth business) in Northamptonshire, possibly based on an existing Mercedes unit. The Spider version of the P11 is expected to appear in March 2011.
OK Ron, let’s see what you can do.
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