720S

Make
McLaren
Segment
Coupe

Racing fans rejoice: the 24 Hours of Le Mans will soon be entering an exciting new era. Next year, manufacturers will be allowed to enter prototype racing cars that more closely resemble their road car counterparts in the new hypercar class. Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus recently revealed its new retro-inspired hypercar it hopes will become the first American racecar to win Le Mans in more than 50 years.

Toyota is also building a new racecar based on the GR Super Sport Concept and Aston Martin will enter a hardcore racing version of the Valkyrie hypercar. If that wasn't already exciting enough, Gordon Murray, the legendary designer of the McLaren F1, could race his upcoming T.50 supercar in the new hypercar class, which is being billed as a spiritual successor to the McLaren F1.

According to Motorsport Magazine, Murray is in talks with ACO, the Le Mans organizer, about entering the T50 in the 2021 24 Hours of Le Mans hypercar class. Like the F1, the T.50 is being built as a driver-focused, road-going supercar with a centrally mounted driver's seat, but its light weight and sporty driving dynamics should make it formidable on the race track. Murray describes the T.50 as "the purest, lightest, and most driver-focused supercar ever."

Powering the T.50 will be a Cosworth-developed 3.9-liter naturally-aspirated V12 that produces 650 horsepower and 331 lb-ft of torque and revs to 12,100 rpm. Power will be sent to the rear wheels through an H-pattern six-speed manual transmission. Remarkably, it will also only weigh 2,160 pounds.

Gordon Murray Automotive will produce just 100 exmaples of the T.50, some of which will be delivered to US customers thanks to a partnership with Canepa Group. Hypercar class regulations require manufacturers to produce at least 20 road-legal models over two years. We'd love to see the McLaren F1 successor battle it out on the track with the Aston Martin Valkyrie if Gordon Murray's proposal is successful.