McLaren has made some exciting supercars over the past couple of decades, but as impressive as the SLR and 12C are in their own right, it won't be until the release of the new P1 at the Geneva show tomorrow that the racing team turned automaker will truly succeed the original McLaren F1. That point is not lost at McLaren, so the British outfit will be bringing an F1 to Geneva too, but not just any F1: the one-of-a-kind XP1 LM. It will be the first time the prototype will ever leave the UK.

The McLaren F1 was never designed for racing, but that didn't stop it from dominating Le Mans in 1995. To celebrate, McLaren turned the roadgoing F1 into the even faster F1 LM. Its 6.1-liter V12 was augmented to 680 hp and supplemented with even more extreme aerodynamics and a lighter curb weight. Only five examples were built and sold, but McLaren kept the original prototype – dubbed XP1 – at its headquarters in Woking. To give you an idea of how valuable the XP1 is to McLaren, Lewis Hamilton reportedly asked for it as a bonus when he won his first world championship, but McLaren boss Ron Dennis declined.