drivetofive

Odometer (Legend):  533,595

Odometer (ILX):  125,855

It’s fun to dream.  Most of us will never own a vehicle with a six-figure pricetag, but that doesn’t stop us from obsessing over them by doing things like making them our smartphone wallpaper backgrounds.  I was invited as a PAPA member to get a sneak-peek of the new McLaren 570S model at a dealership last Friday evening at a VIP event for automotive media.  The 570S Coupe has a base price of $184,000 and it was unveiled to the world at last month’s New York International Auto Show (photo credit to Autoblog for the above & below).  That pricetag makes the 570S the company’s least expensive car sold in the United States.

McLaren’s dealership on Raintree Drive in Scottsdale, Arizona is very simple and unassuming from the exterior.  As a matter of fact, I’d driven by in the past and didn’t even realize it was there.  Unlike other car dealerships, they don’t need balloons, bright signs, or fanfare to attract people.  When you’re spending $200k on a car, it’s a little different purchase experience than tire-kicking at CarMax.

When I arrived, there were hors d’oeuvres and cocktails being distributed by a fancily-dressed waitstaff.  The 570S was under a white sheet until 7:45 p.m. when a countdown on the flatscreen TV went from 29 to zero and the cover was pulled off dramatically.  We then heard from some McLaren employees including an engineer named Chris Goodwin who played a key role in its development and who told us he’d personally logged “thousands” of miles in the 570S as a means of testing and evaluation.  He’d flown in from the U.K.

Like other McLaren models, the new 570S has a mid-engine setup, rear-wheel-drive layout and carbon fiber construction (for strength and light weight).  The performance stats on this “baby” McLaren are impressive:  Zero-to-60 happens in a flash at just 3.1 seconds.  Product representatives told us the car can accelerate to 124 miles per hour in 9.5 seconds and has a top speed of 204 miles per hour.  Got a need for speed?  Here’s your car.  Now, if only it didn’t cost as much as I owe on my home mortgage.  You’ll need a $10,000 deposit to secure your spot in line for the car when it becomes available.  The dealership doesn’t yet know how many cars they’ll be allocated, and there will be a 4-month wait from the time of order until delivery.

The representative joked, “McLaren has no intention of building an SUV.  We are a sports car company.  Mid engined, rear-wheel-drive is what we do.”  He also went on to emphasize the fact that the brand is not going for high-volume sales and considers itself in a special niche. I was surprised to learn that despite McLaren’s longstanding reputation in automotive racing, the company has only been in the business of making “road” cars for about the last four years.  The McLaren name has been around in racing since the 1966 Monaco Grand Prix.  Today, the McLaren Formula One team is actually called McLaren Honda.  Why?  Honda builds the engines!  No wonder they’re so successful!

Here are some nitty-gritty specs on the new 570S supercar:

• 3.8 liter V8 twin-turbo motor
• 562 horsepower; 443 lb-ft of torque
• 7-speed dual clutch transmission
• Double-wishbone independent suspension
• 19 inch wheels (285 width rear tires!)
• 17 available exterior colors

Starting with just one roadgoing model, the MP4, the McLaren lineup of cars now consists of a wide range of cars, from this “entry level” 570S to the $1.15 million “P1” model.   The 570S will go head-to-head in the same general price class as the not-yet-on-sale 2016 Acura NSX.  Now that’s a drag race I’d pay money to see.  Below are the rest of the pics from my visit to the preview event.  Thanks for reading!

Bunch of McLarens in the service bay

This one in the showroom is the 650S model

Want it?  That’ll be $390,286, please.

Here’s the interior.

A few more pics of the 570S on display

Lots of carbon fiber

Are they still called “Lambo doors” when they’re not on a Lambo?

Interior

Beefy brakes!

And a couple of ‘twinning’ silver 6-speed Acura sedans last weekend for good measure.

What’s up for the weekend here in Arizona?  Well, James from Six Speed Blog and I have a couple of 2015 model year pickup trucks at our disposal.  And we’re getting them dirty :).  More on that next week.

Happy holiday weekend to all.

This entry was posted on May 22, 2015 at 1:44 pm and is filed under PAPA, Vehicle Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.