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McLaren MCL33 F1 challenger debuts in Papaya Spark

New Zealander Bruce McLaren founded his eponymous race team in 1963, entered the Formula 1 World Championship in 1966, but fielded his first "McLaren orange" car in the 1967 Can-Am Championship. The following year, Bruce's F1 cars got the orange juice and birthed a mythology. McLaren F1 returns to those 50-year-old roots this year with its MCL33, painted Papaya Spark with contrasting Burton Blue and Cerulean Blue. The team hopes you won't be able to miss the #14 and #2 cars emerging from the weeds they've been lost in for three years while under Honda power. With little change in the regulations beyond the advent of the halo, the MCL33 evolves last year's MCL32. Other than the halo, the big work involved reworking the engine compartment for the Renault power unit — the first time in McLaren's 52 years in F1 that the team has used a Renault engine. There are two engine architecture philosophies in the sport now, one used by Mercedes-Benz and Honda, the other by Renault and Ferrari. Accommodating the new partner meant redesigning the back of the car, including the cooling layout, gearbox bell-house area, and rear suspension. Fernando Alonso and Stoffel Vandoorne continue their tenures with the Woking, England, team. Playing it cautious after three years of disappointments, Alonso said, "I feel incredibly excited — but also apprehensive. I know just how important this car is to the team, and I just hope that it delivers in the way we all want it to." Executive Director Zak Brown will hope so, too, so he can please the same fans who petitioned for that classic papaya livery, and so he can hide more of that paint under sponsor logos. A curious note on that Petrobras sponsorship — McLaren will actually be using fuel and lubrication products from the sponsor it signed last year, BP Castrol, while Petrobras spends this year developing fuel and lubricants for the team. The MCL33 hits the track today for a film session, then begins eight days of pre-season testing at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya next Monday. Related Video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.

McLaren weighing dedicated P1 Track version

Start drawing parallels between Ferrari and McLaren and you're not likely to be left with much white space on the page when you're done. Both are Formula One racing teams first and foremost, and only started building cars for the road once they'd proven themselves on the racetrack. They both top the leaderboards for the most F1 championships, and have probably swapped more drivers (not to mention sponsors) than any other teams on the grid, but have both fallen behind in recent years and fired their team principals as a result. Their road-going supercars compete for largely the same customers, from the ~$250k, mid-engined V8s of the 458 and 650S all the way up to the latest million-dollar, 900-plus-horsepower hybrid hypercars. But Ferrari is a bigger company and has been in the game much longer, and as a result offers its customers two things that McLaren does not. One is front-engined GTs like the F12 Berlinetta, FF and California. The other is the exclusive XX track program. While McLaren may be showing no intention of taking on the former, the latter could be in the cards. In correspondence with Autoblog, McLaren spokesman Wayne Bruce confirmed a report from Autocar stating that, following requests from a number of P1 owners, the company has contacted all 375 buyers to gauge interest in a dedicated track-only version of the P1. Similar to the Ferrari FXX or the upcoming LaFerrari XX, the P1 Track would be set up specifically for the circuit. According to Bruce, "the P1 'Track' will have (even) more power and (even) torque than the road legal P1. It will also have (even) more extreme, aero tuned styling and an (even) more minimalist interior." All of which sounds pretty promising, considering the starting point is a hybrid hypercar with 903 horsepower and 664 pound-feet of torque on tap. But that's not all: "McLaren will organise a series of track events dedicated to the P1 'Track' and its owners. There will be one-to-one driver training for this very exclusive group, too." In other words, a similar approach to what Ferrari takes with its top clients, only likely without the pretense of paying to serve as a factory test driver. Production of the P1 Track would only start once all 375 road-going versions were completed, and though "the number to be produced has not been established yet... we envisage it being in the low double digits," with application open exclusively to existing P1 owners.

McLaren considering return to Le Mans

It doesn't usually matter what number an automaker puts on the side when it reveals a new racecar, but when McLaren introduced its new 650S GT3 at the Goodwood Festival of Speed this past weekend, it wore the number 59. It was the same number which the McLaren F1 GTR wore when it took the checkered flag at Le Mans in 1995, and now word has it that the British outfit could be plotting a return. The new 650S racer was designed to meet the GT3 regulations used in second-tier sportscar racing series around the world, like the Blancpain Endurance Series and the Pirelli World Challenge. Top-tier series like the FIA World Endurance Championship and United SportsCar Championship, however, use their own GTE regulations (adapted from the previous GT2 regulations). Discussions over converging the two sets of rules (like DTM and Super GT have since) had commenced when McLaren GT was developing the previous 12C GT3, but those discussions ultimately fell apart, keeping the two categories separate... and in separate series. Autosport reports, however, that in redesigning the 650S GT3, McLaren's GT racing division kept that disparity in mind so that the GT3 could be set up as well in GTE spec, enabling it to compete at the 24 Hours of Le Mans and associated series like the WEC, United SportsCar Championship, European Le Mans Series and Asian Le Mans Series. We're waiting on word from McLaren as to the verasity of the report, but even if a 650S GTE would stand little chance of overtaking the faster LMPs like the F1 GTR did nearly 20 years ago, it would still be interesting to see McLaren (whether as a works entry or through customer teams) competing at Le Mans again. Featured Gallery McLaren 650S GT3 View 16 Photos News Source: Autosport Motorsports McLaren fia wec mclaren 650s mclaren 650s gt3