Not everyone who can afford a W1 will be allowed to buy one.

When it comes to the wonderful world of supercars, the old adage, “If you have to ask how much it costs, your can’t afford it,” certainly applies. But in the case of the McLaren W1, it’s possible to be able to afford the USD $2.1 million price tag, and still not be allowed to buy one.

That’s because McLaren has become so exclusive, that they’re asking would-be buyers to apply for the privilege of owning one of the 399 W1 supercars they’ll be building for the global market.

Chris Green, General Manager at McLaren Toronto explains the process potential W1 buyers have to go through in order to get on the list for one of only a few vehicles that will be available here in Canada.

“We have to submit an interested customer’s profile to McLaren,” Green says. “So if someone says they want a McLaren W1, I would create a full profile on that person—a biography, basically. I would upload the profile into our internal portal, explaining which cars that person has owned, which McLarens they’ve owned, if they’ve completed their service with the dealership, if they participate in [McLaren] events, if they have social media, if they’re a good brand advocate, and if they’re planning on driving the car. These are all criteria that McLaren are looking for. The dealer doesn’t choose who the customer is. The manufacturer chooses who is going to be receiving an allocation for this car.”

Choosing the right buyers

McLaren can afford to be this picky, Green explains, because the brand is strong enough to choose who they sell to, and the cars are exclusive enough that the company wants to make sure the right people will be buying one of the few units available around the globe.

“Knowing that there’s only 399 of these cars, McLaren want to know about the customer,” Green adds. “They want to confirm that the customer is real, confirm that they’re not flipping the car, confirm that they’re not another dealer, confirm that they haven’t flipped cars in the past for profit, all because they want people to genuinely drive this car.”

Although Green doesn’t know exactly how many W1s will make it to Canada, he estimates that McLaren will likely allocate “about a dozen” for our country, and that they’ll have to be shared by the three core McLaren dealers in Canada, located in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal.

“I think the three of us are hoping for more than a dozen vehicles, naturally,” Green adds. “Since McLaren Toronto is their number one dealer in the world for 2023, I’m begging them to help support their number one dealer by giving us more cars, because I have people calling me at all hours of the day, night, evenings, weekends, holidays, saying, ‘I need a car, I need a car, I need a car.’”

Race inspired & road legal

What makes the W1 so appealing to McLaren fans is the fact that it builds upon a history of other supercars from the legendary brand. As Michael Leiters, Chief Executive Officer at McLaren Automotive explained, “The McLaren W1 is a celebration of both the excellence of the iconic McLaren F1 and McLaren P1 and the manifestation of McLaren’s World Championship mindset. With our new Ultimate supercar, we are again pushing the boundaries of real supercar performance with an epic hybrid powertrain featuring our all-new MHP-8 V8 engine, the most advanced aerodynamic platform of any McLaren road car and extensive use of advanced lightweight materials. This allows us to engineer a supreme track driving experience from the same car that gives unparalleled driving enjoyment on the road.”

The W1 transitions effortlessly from road to race mode: The ride height lowers by 1.46 inches at the front and 0.7 inches at the rear, the suspension stiffens, the front and rear active wings are deployed, and a long rear spoiler extends 11.8 inches to assist in generating 2,205 lb. of downforce.

Power comes from a 4.0 L twin-turbo V8 that makes 903 hp, coupled to an electric motor that makes an additional 337 hp, for a total output of 1,240 hp. According to McLaren, that’s enough to rocket the W1 from 0-60 mph in 2.7 seconds, 0–124 mph in just 5.8 seconds, and 186 mph in 12.7 seconds.

Oddly enough, McLaren chose to channel all this power to the rear wheels, in order to, “to retain the purity of a rear-wheel-drive chassis.” While other supercar manufacturers have opted for an all-wheel drive approach to harnessing this amount of power, McLaren says they can, “successfully achieve acceleration of this magnitude with… a rear-wheel-drive supercar, thanks to their extensive heritage in Formula 1, which exclusively deploys power through the rear wheels to reach the pinnacle of performance and ultimate steering precision.”

As wonderful as the W1 sounds, would-be buyers are invited to “apply within,” and hope for the best.