Driving the McLaren P1, the world's best supercar — Porsches included

They’re all sold. If you sometimes get angry over tests of cars with sheiks and cigar-chomping industrialists for owners, all I can say to get me out of your doghouse is that they’re all sold anyway. The whole limited run of 375 McLaren P1 hypercars gone, with last deliveries due by July 2015. So put down the torches and pitch forks, and read along while McLaren sets me loose for some fast times in their P1 hybrid plug-in exotica.

Not too loose, though. This test is all on track at the Dunsfold airfield circuit south of London, the circuit set up frequently for filmings of Top Gear episodes. I’ve been here beforeand it was always raining. Not today, Clarkson be praised.

Dry tarmac is needed for what I’m about to do, or for what’s about to be done to me. The $1.15-million 2015 McLaren P1 is sort of the dark and mysterious one of the three new hypercars of the green apocalypse. The other two are the more marquee-hogging $845,000 Porsche 918 Spyder and the $1.4-million Ferrari LaFerrari. The P1’s so-called IPAS hybrid powertrain (i.e. Instant Power Assist System which is McLaren-talk for the hybrid setup used on Formula One cars), can boom out 903 hp. It slings you from 0 to 60 miles per hour in just 2.6 seconds. At maximum.

The design of the McLaren P1 reminds me of a fancy pro cycling helmet. The trick for any over-performing car is to let it go as fast as the engineers can dream while making sure that it does not lift off the ground at highest speeds, sending clients into orbit. The P1 can reach 217 mph, so keeping it on the ground is fundamental here. Acceleration to 186 mph can happen in just 16.5 seconds, way more than quick enough to launch a Cessna at the county airstrip.

It is so tempting to dive deep into the tech dreck here, but I shall mostly refrain because the best part really about the P1 is how it sets your neck hairs on fire while taking a hot corner at speeds generally thought stupid. The specially formulated Pirelli P Zero Corsa tires — 19 inches in front and 20 inches in back — work overtime with the P1’s intricate adaptive suspension to keep the action grippy and comfy at all times. It is in this portion of how the P1 compares to the Porsche 918 Spyder I tested where the P1 wins. Not just in pure straight acceleration, where the P1 dusts the 918 once speeds reach beyond 60 mph, but in the fast curves and weight shifts where the P1 absolutely glows.

If a supercar’s lateral acceleration number – i.e. the amount of sideways g-force that builds up until the car’s tires no longer hold the pavement as speed builds in a constant curve – reaches 1.2 gs, that’s considered pretty great. The McLaren P1 and its $6,000 set of specially designed Pirellis can bear up to peaks of 2.4 gs on good, dry asphalt before trouble is your middle name. It can hold 2.0 gs in a steady state until the lithium-ion battery array and fuel tank are both dry. This has never before been possible in any road car ever made.