"We're going to create a car company," was the bold announcement from McLaren's chairman, Ron Dennis, in 2009. Ambitious, though, given McLaren's previous foray into road cars had produced the iconic F1 supercar, not a proclamation to be taken lightly. But McLaren Automotive wasn't going to produce just one car – it was going to create an entire range.
Six years later, McLaren’s chief executive, Mike Flewitt, reveals McLaren isn’t just on time with its growth plans, but it’s doing so profitably. It’s also ploughing an incredible 30 per cent of its profits back into research and development, underlining its ambition to be a technical leader. Few, if any, car firms have had the sort of success that’s defined McLaren’s introduction. The discipline and high-stakes competitiveness of Formula One have no doubt aided that success, with McLaren, at its very core, an engineering- and technology-driven company.
Flewitt is realistic, too. The sports and supercar market is a rarefied one. McLaren’s intent within that arena is simple: to be the best in each segment it competes in. Flewitt is resolute in stating that it won’t be a firm that, like many of its rivals, increases volume by adding an SUV to the line-up. That might limit the company to relatively low-volume niche on the global stage, but it’s one where Flewitt is determined McLaren can succeed.
“We’re trying to build a brand, an iconic sports-car company, cars that are close in character. That builds credibility,” he says. “I’m not saying in 50 years’ time we won’t have a broader product range, but not in the next seven to eight years. It’s our niche for the foreseeable future, and there’s breadth to it.”
Flewitt is in Portugal for the launch of the company’s new Sports Series model – the 570S, unquestionably the company’s most important car if it’s to continue its successful sales trajectory. It’s significantly cheaper than its Super Series relations, though like them, it features a carbon-fibre monocoque at its core and a twin-turbocharged V8 petrol engine mounted behind the driver and passenger. The 570S’s name refers to its power output, and though it’s billed as the entry point to the McLaren line-up, its performance is very much in the supercar sphere.
With the Sports Series in full production, Flewitt anticipates about 4,000 sales annually, with about two-thirds of those being Sports Series and the remainder Super Series. Ultimate Series models, will, says Flewitt, only happen when there’s another step-change in technology to allow it.
The 570S pitches McLaren into territory that’s occupied by cars such as the Porsche 911 Turbo S, Audi R8 V10 Plus, Aston Martin V12 Vantage S, Ferrari’s California and some left-field choices. McLaren describes it as a different proposition to its Super Series models, with the emphasis more on the driver than outright performance. There’s talk of engagement and a lack of aerodynamic downforce, and McLaren promises that the 570S is a car that’ll be enjoyable and usable for a wider customer base. There’s no active aero, and the suspension is more conventional than that of its 650S relation.
Sitting in the beautifully finished interior, you’d be hard pushed to describe the 570S as an entry-level proposition. There’s a choice of more sporting trims or greater luxury, though whether you’re sitting in the tight, body hugging lightweight sports seats or on the more comfortable though still supportive standard seat, the interior is a demonstration of McLaren’s obsessive attention to detail.
I’m sitting in the fantastic sports seats, with a leather-rimmed steering wheel to grasp. Thumbing the starter button has the 3.8L V8’s starter whirr momentarily, before the engine catches and fires. The instruments are digital, borrowed largely from the P1, while the paddle-shifters have the McLaren signature of rocking the other side like its Formula One cars do. For a firm with only six years of heritage (if you can ignore the F1, that is), sitting in its latest product is an evocative environment, and one that should really trouble its rivals.
It takes little more than a few hundred metres of driving it to realise McLaren isn’t lying when it discusses greater engagement. The steering is key, its weighting perfectly balanced with enough heft and resistance to make sure your inputs are deliberate and measured, but providing a level of information back through the wheel that’s unusual in a world numbed by electrically assisted power-steering systems in the ever-increasing race for efficiency. It’s a hydraulic system with electric assistance, and Mark Vinnels, McLaren’s executive director for programme development, admits that if it were down to emissions alone, the 570S would have an electric system, as the hydraulic system’s pumping losses account for a surprisingly large portion of the 570S’s overall carbon dioxide output. The trade-off was worth it and, says Vinnels, core to the 570S’s appeal as a driver’s car.
The 570S steering has precision and detail that’s pretty much unrivalled. The losses it represents have been clawed back elsewhere – that carbon-fibre monocoque construction keeps the weight down (it weighs just 75 kilograms, but is 25 per cent stiffer than aluminium). That’s been achieved despite McLaren dropping the sill height to improve access, making the 570S easy to get in and out of with some semblance of grace.
That monocoque’s stiffness allows the suspension to work beautifully, too – the 570S features a more conventional spring, damper and anti-roll bar set-up, those dampers being variable with a choice of three settings. The drivetrain and stability and traction systems have a choice of four, going through Normal, Sport, Sport Dynamic and Track, each relinquishing ever greater amounts of freedom to the driver to explore their ability and the 570S’s potential.
To do so is totally immersive. Thanks largely to that crisp front end, the 570S feels exceptional at ordinary speeds; it’s not necessary to have the right pedal pushed to the bulkhead and your fingers grab for more gears as the engine chases to its redline. Do that, though, and the performance is otherworldly – the 570S is able to reach 200kph just one-tenth of a second slower than the original F1. The 0-100kph benchmark is covered in 3.2 seconds. The engine’s ferocity, almost regardless of revs, is hugely impressive, helped by the 570S’s relative lack of mass. Push the accelerator, and there’s instantaneous urge – the engine rarely betrays its turbocharged nature, though even when fitted with the optional sports exhaust, it’s lacking in some of the aural appeal of some of its rivals.
Where the 570S really moves things forward is in its ride. It might lack the 650S’s sophisticated set-up, but the ride comfort is extraordinary. That’s to its benefit both as a usable daily proposition, and in its ability to carry speed, almost regardless of the road’s surface. The body control it exhibits is remarkable – it’s stable, controlled, yet rides with the sort of supple refinement that’s more saloon than supercar. With the steering communicating all the information you could possibly want, it’s a car that’s easily read, its electronic systems assisting quietly rather than obstructing. That doesn’t translate to a drive that’s in any way anodyne, however – the 570S’s most appealing facet is the accessibility of its performance, and the engagement it brings.
To really reveal its best requires a track, and McLaren’s test route swings usefully by the Portimao circuit in Portugal for a few hot laps. Its Super Series relations would be quicker, but only marginally. Outright speed, even though there’s plenty of it, isn’t the 570S’s focus. It’s the purity of response, the way the 570S moves around under you when pushed and its sheer visceral engagement that defines it.
That’s something that McLaren has only recently discovered – its pursuit of ultimate speed, seemingly having followed the F1 idea that it’s at the expense of everything else. That idea has been fundamentally changed with the 570S. In its six years, McLaren has shown it understands what it is to be a road-car company first and a technology and engineering firm second. The 570S stands testament to that, and those 4,000 sales shouldn’t be an issue at all.
motoring@thenational.ae
