In Abu Dhabi right now, there's a three-year-old McLaren 12C for sale. Its "volcano orange" paint, combined with beautiful silver-painted alloy wheels, makes for a visually arresting supercar. It has covered just 13,715 kilometres from new. It's loaded to the gunnels with expensive optional extras, including an upgraded "Iris" infotainment system, its interior is liberally covered with black leather upholstery and Alcantara, and there's carbon-fibre trim throughout. It has only ever had one owner. It is, in every respect, like new, except for one thing: its price.
As you may or may not know, the 12C (the “MP4-” prefix was sensibly dropped by McLaren in 2012) was replaced more than a year ago by the 650S – a bona fide supercar that remains one of the world’s very finest. Along with Ferrari’s new 488 GTB and Lamborghini’s Huracán LP 610-4, it has set new standards, and despite my misgivings about its front-end styling, is a car I would dearly love to own. There’s only one problem, and that’s the enormous cost of getting one – the entry point is more than Dh1 million.
But here’s the rub: that 12C in Abu Dhabi, which is every bit as good as a 650S in almost every respect (and actually looks much prettier), could be yours for Dh495,000. In three years, it has lost half its value; no doubt more when you consider the options it was specced with.
Almost any new car loses a huge chunk of its asking price over the first two or three years, but Dh500,000 is an enormous amount of money for the majority of us. Simply put, that 12C has cost its owner a whopping Dh36 per kilometre in depreciation alone. Add to that servicing costs, fuel, insurance and all the rest and you’d be forgiven for thinking that person has more money than sense. For those of us with more sense than money, however, that 12C could represent an extremely sound purchase because, as with many of these kinds of cars, the first full production McLaren will no doubt soon reach the bottom of that depreciation curve and begin a steady climb through the stratosphere.
McLaren Automotive is quite shy when it comes to disclosing production numbers, but it’s believed approximately 400 12Cs were built in 2011 and fewer than 1,500 per annum after that. When you figure in the fact that production ceased in 2014, this means we’re looking at approximately 3,500 examples in total, the majority of which will be the open-topped Spider variant. So the 12C Coupé is a very rare beast, indeed, and always will be.
A quick scan of Dubizzle reveals that you could even beat that Dh495,000 price, as 12Cs are available for Dh45,000 less. But the one I first mentioned has one specific advantage: it’s being sold through McLaren’s “Qualified” approved pre-owned scheme. It comes with a full manufacturer’s warranty and has passed McLaren’s stringent quality tests, meaning it’s by far the safer option as a used-car purchase.
Even though it’s basically half price, it still represents a serious amount of money, and if you’re thinking along the lines of one of these being a long-term investment, you’re better off involving the real experts. Who better than a car’s maker to say whether or not it’s up to scratch?
So when McLaren asked me to get behind the wheel of an early 12C, as a refresher of sorts, to revisit the model that shook the supercar establishment to its very core in 2011, I was intrigued to see if there were any real problems with its design and construction that the current 650S might embarrass it with. Are there any fundamental issues with a 12C that might put off a potential McLaren owner? Or is it, as I suspect, as good now as it ever was? When I first drove one in February 2012, I went on record saying it was the finest car available. “Yes, I want one,” I wrote in these very pages. “It’s undoubtedly quicker than the 458, even if only slightly. It’s more comfortable and almost as practical as a 911 Turbo and it’s better on a track than a GT3. In fact, for me, right here, right now, it’s the greatest sports car there is.”
I have been known to change my mind about cars after the initial euphoria has died down – after all, when you've spent an entire day hooning around British back roads and the Top Gear test track in a supercar, it can be difficult to remain completely objective. But when the MP4-12C is delivered to my in-laws' home in North Wales for me to try out while I'm on a supposed holiday, I'm not expecting it to be quite so special. The car you see here is the very first MP4-12C to roll off the bespoke production line in McLaren's Woking headquarters, and as its guardian explains to me, I'm the first journalist anywhere in the world to have its key for a day. Sometimes – just sometimes – it doesn't suck to be me.
Keith Holland is the man from McLaren who has driven this incredibly special car through the night so I can experience it on familiar Welsh roads. To him, it’s a car that represents a milestone in the history of the company he works for. He tells me that this example, known internally as “Job 1”, was used as a development car for a long while after customers took delivery of theirs and, not long ago, he found it languishing in the grounds of McLaren HQ. Thankfully, he decided to bring it back to its former glory and include it in McLaren’s heritage collection. Its paint is fresh and the oily bits have been quality checked, but otherwise it’s basically as it was the day its build was completed. The Iris system has remained the same as it was because, as Holland rightly states, this is part of the car’s story and should be left well alone, despite its flaws.
As I look over this prized piece of engineering, I can’t help thinking it’s a far prettier car than the 650S or even the Ferrari 458. There’s perhaps a lack of aggression to its nose that disappointed some observers, but to my eyes, it’s clean, purposeful and won’t date like its newer sibling. From the A-pillars back, the original design has remained almost untouched to this day; the 650S represents little more than a “cut-and-shut” mishmash of the ultra-exclusive P1 hypercar and this thing.
Holland leaves me to my own devices and we arrange to meet back at the ranch in eight hours’ time – enough for me to re-familiarise myself with the first McLaren road car and weigh up its pros and cons. The roads around my family’s home on the island of Anglesey, as well as those that snake through and around the nearby Snowdonia mountain range, are easily the finest driving routes I have ever encountered in the United Kingdom. This is my old stamping ground, so I know exactly where I’ll be able to let this formidable performance car off its leash.
But it really isn’t formidable in the slightest. My first impressions of the model, penned more than three years ago, still ring true today. On the road, it’s as easy to pilot as a BMW 5 Series and almost as civilised, with none of the “bump-thump” you get from most mid-engined supercars. It’s quiet, until you stamp on the loud pedal and it soaks up road surface imperfections with aplomb – so much so that I can almost understand why some journalists and critics initially were left feeling wanting, suggesting that this car wasn’t all that exciting.
Those thoughts are diminished the instant I get to a weaving ribbon of deserted B-road that’s unseasonably devoid of tourist traffic. I knock it down from sixth to third, get on the gas and let this piece of motoring history utterly destroy the tarmac in a ferocious flurry of indescribable speed, spine-tingling noise and razor-sharp dynamics. I haven’t felt this enthralled by an automobile since driving Ferrari’s all-new 488 GTB a couple of months ago and, before that, the aforementioned 650S I had for a few spring days in Dubai. It’s a phenomenal performer, but more than that, it feels reassuringly communicative, allowing me to keep on pushing, exploring its deep reserves of driver satisfaction.
You might naturally expect a company famed for its 49-year motorsport history to produce an absolute blinder of a road car with its first attempt, but let’s not forget the enormous challenge embraced by McLaren when it developed the 12C. By 2011, supercars had become ridiculously good, entirely usable both as daily drivers for the office commute and adrenaline-rush providers on the world’s racetracks. Reliable, well-built, deeply desirable – they had transcended way beyond the expectations of them just a decade or so beforehand. That the MP4-12C was so good, so well resolved from the word go, so worrying for the competition, was totally unexpected.
Yes, there were teething problems, and some of these are still present on Job 1. The door-release sensors are difficult to use – especially embarrassing when there’s an audience gathered around the car (these were soon replaced by rubberised items that allow you to actually locate them without fumbling like a buffoon) – and the Iris infotainment system, with its dodgy in-house mapping and questionable interface, is frankly better left switched off. But these are minor annoyances in the face of such crushing ability on road and track.
After an entire day of 12C immersion, seeking out old favourite routes and enjoying their heady delights in such a brilliant and rewarding car, I remain convinced that its abilities are the same as they ever were. Ferrari has only just followed its example by turbocharging its V8 engines, and truth be told, I doubt there’s very little to separate them when it comes to real-world performance. And that performance is now more accessible than ever, thanks to McLaren’s Qualified programme.
It has been an enlightening day, and when I finally have Job 1’s key prised from my shaking hands by the man from McLaren, I head indoors to start scanning the classifieds. One day, I tell myself, I will own one of these things – I just hope it’s sooner rather than later.
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