The McLaren F1 Owner's Club

[volvoman]

Originally Posted by Peloton25

As much as I am honored to be here in Italy, I am even more honored and humbled by those words Murray. Thank you, thank you. :-)

>8^)
ER

Erik please come over to the uk soon i would love to meet you

[Peloton25]

Russ - I don't have quite the unlimited budget that we all wish to have so at the moment my trip to the UK will have to wait a bit. I am hoping to attend next year's Goodwood Festival of Speed so we will see how those plans go and of course if I come to the UK I will try to let people know in advance unlike this little jaunt to Europe where I kept things pretty hush, hush.

You are on the list of people I would love to meet. I also want a ride in the crazy yellow T5-R.

>8^)
ER

[volvoman]

Originally Posted by Peloton25

Russ - I don't have quite the unlimited budget that we all wish to have so at the moment my trip to the UK will have to wait a bit. I am hoping to attend next year's Goodwood Festival of Speed so we will see how those plans go and of course if I come to the UK I will try to let people know in advance unlike this little jaunt to Europe where I kept things pretty hush, hush.

You are on the list of people I would love to meet. I also want a ride in the crazy yellow T5-R.

>8^)
ER

Hi Erik

We are all on a budget so understand completely i would be honored to give you a ride in the mad yellow volvo please keep in touch sorry to go ot

Russ

[Peloton25]

Okay - the veil of secrecy has been lifted this evening courtesy of our host, Ray Bellm.

Allow me to kick this off with a list of the chassis numbers - 19 in all.

01 - XP3
02 - XP4
03 - 001
04 - 007
05 - 009
06 - 018
07 - 024
08 - 038
09 - 046
10 - 062
11 - 064
12 - 067
13 - 069
14 - 072
15 - 05R
16 - 06R
17 - 07R
18 - 10R
19 - 12R

The red/white car everyone was asking about is indeed #072 fresh from a refit at McLaren. There are still a few more adjustments to be made before all is complete.

MUCH more to follow.

>8^)
ER

[nicklm79]

Wooow!! I can't wait for the pictures...

[PatrickT82]

I would love to see all those together myself

[Peloton25]

Not that this is any kind of competition, but it was amazing to leave America having seen 14 cars, then see one each in the first two days in Italy (#007 and #18R) for a total of 16. Then arrive at the owner's event on the third day and instantly double that number to a total of 32 cars. Absolutely incredible!


Patrick - you were very near the top of the list of people I wish could have been given an invite given your goal and dedication to seeing all the chassis. If and when there is another event like this I will make certain you can join in if your schedule allows.

Since I already have this pair resized, lets start off with them. This was the upper parking area which McLaren had set up their base camp for any technical support. On the day the cars arrived they were bringing them down here in stages from the transporter before moving them onto the grounds of the hotel for the owners. You might notice the two Dark Silver cars paired up, one with the High Downforce Kit and one without. I thought it was very special to see that side by side. An employee of McLaren pointed out both cars also wear the same registration plate - one from New Zealand and one from Australia. They also traveled the farthest to join the event.



I would also like to mention before this gets going too far that I am not a photographer. I am a guy who takes pictures of cars that are occasionally decent in order for others to hopefully enjoy my experiences. There were a couple of true photographers along for the trip and as much content as can be shared will be in the coming days and weeks.

>8^)
Erik

[Peloton25]

Here's a photo shared just now by Phil (cabrio92) on the MCLF1.com Facebook page.



His caption: "It's difficult to describe how amazing the event was and how lucky we were to be there"

To that, I can only add "Amen!"

These are some pictures I took yesterday for Simon Kidston while out in his car. Quite proud of a few of them. Hi Res versions will have to wait on these for now.



















Simon never put a wheel wrong that day. It was a massive drive of over 450 kilometers and the car performed beautifully - in fact all the cars performed beautifully over the three days of driving. I wish I could say the same for my stomach on the 26 Lacets we were descending on the Sella Runde.

Hundreds upon thousands more pics will emerge. I was taking nearly 1,000 shots per day myself. You'll just need a bit more patient while I work through them. I have an early morning trip planned to visit Pagani if we are lucky and Galleria Ferrari and perhaps a few other spots in and around Modena/Bologna. Then I blast back here tomorrow evening for one more night in an incredibly beautiful place. Then I have another long day planned for Saturday before I fly home Sunday morning. So, over the next three days I will be traveling A LOT and not able to put as much effort as I would want to into sharing additional content. I will do what I can though, as certainly I recall what it felt like after the event at the MTC in 2010 when we all waited for EVO Magazine to satisfy our curiosities.

Also there were plenty of members of the general public snapping away at the cars - especially today while we waited for the ferry to cross the lake on the return trip and while the cars were being loaded on transporters to head home. That said, if you find any stuff out there related to the 20th Anniversary F1 Tour, please do not hesitate to share it in this thread. I have a strong feeling the eyes of the F1 world will be on us and I would like to build this thread into a massive archive of event content to be enjoyed by many F1 enthusiasts for years to come and would love any help in building that up.

>8^)
ER

[Sparco_bro]

...simply incredible

[Peloton25]

Glad to see you boys made it home safely.

"Genius!"

>8^)
ER

[Sparco_bro]

"Maybe that's a bad idea. But sometime I like bad ideas!"

Can't wait to see all pictures you took in these days!

[F1GTRUeno]

Truly amazing stuff.

The car, the sheer amount of them, the roads, just perfection.

Thank you Erik for sharing your photos and the info and you certainly deserve all of this.

Cannot wait to see what the guys do in future. Can't believe #009 and #018 made it over but that's just bloody cool that they did.

It's a damn good time to be a fan of the F1.

[carbuilder2002]

Seeing chassis 001 and the 2 XP's has to be very special.

[Sami Aaltonen]

I think Erik; after you go back to home; you will not sleep couple of months after this journey.
Thanks for the images, absolutely superb stuff. Really superb.!

And I think now we can finally ask you this question:
Was and Is; McLaren F1 that kind of car what you have imagined all your life? This week every possible has come true of your dreams.
Was and is it what you have allways expected?

[WaZzZuPpP]

Best. Thread. Ever.

As a F1 "virgin" its incredible seeing just photos of such a gathering. It makes me incredibly envy too (j/k). Being on such an event must be a dream for every F1 fan, so I'm happy for the guys who experienced it

More videos here: http://www.youtube.com/user/BabyloNordschleife

Erik, is that you in the beginning of 'part 1' with 062?