“Pebble Beach” is the catchall for what has evolved into Monterey Car Week, with a focus on the weekend when the most important events like The Quail, the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion, and the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance take place every August. This year’s edition was a notable success for many top marques, but none more so than McLaren, which made hypercar history with two incredible, multimillion-dollar vehicles, in addition to other enthralling displays and debuts.
First up was the W1, successor to the iconic, $20 million McLaren F1, which made its public debut in Monterey. With 1,258 hp, the W1 is the fastest and most powerful road-legal McLaren ever, and all 399 examples of the $2.1 million hypercar have already been spoken for. VIPs got to see it up close at a private Pebble Beach party held at Chateau McLaren, a secluded mansion in Carmel Valley converted into a temple to all things McLaren, that was easily the coolest event during Car Week.
As if that weren’t enough, at the Chateau McLaren party, which had a full-on Belle Époque France theme to suit the incredible architecture, the brand staged the U.S. debut of an even more eye-popping hypercar—the “Project: Endurance”—with which McLaren will make its long-awaited return to the top class at Le Mans in 2027. McLaren won Le Mans in 1995 with the unbeatable F1 GTR but has been absent from the hypercar class (now called LMDh) for 29 years. Project Endurance could easily catapult them straight to the podium at the legendary 24-hour race two years from now.
What’s more, at the event, new McLaren Group Holdings CEO Nick Collins and McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown announced an historic opportunity for a select number of clients to own one of the cars in a highly exclusive Project: Endurance customer partnership program, the first of its kind for a currently-campaigned race car. The purchase will include full behind-the-scenes access to their upcoming return to Le Mans, plus key team personnel and drivers, as well as a comprehensive track driving program at world-famous race circuits.
“There is a huge level of excitement for Project: Endurance around the globe with customers and fans,” Collins notes. “The opportunity to be one of only a few to own this Le Mans Hypercar and be directly involved in the development and testing program is a very special proposition”—the ultimate gentleman racer’s car. Also during Car Week, the brand announced a no less exciting plan to auction one of its 2026 Formula 1 cars, in another unprecedented offering of a current race car, in conjunction with RM Sotheby’s.
All of which reinforces the fact that no other automotive brand so successfully connects clients with its racing heritage and prowess. Also on display for the first time in the Americas during Car Week was the McLaren 750S Le Mans, a special edition 750S coupe celebrating the 30th anniversary of McLaren’s historic 24 Hours of Le Mans win in 1995; as well as “States of Endurance,” a further celebration of the 30th anniversary of the 1995 Le Mans victory in which specially-designed McLaren Artura Spider and 750S supercars are driving across the country.
The growing focus on McLaren cars of all kinds as collectible automotive icons was reinforced by a strong showing at both The Quail and the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, the two keynote Car Week events. At The Quail, a pair of the most covetable multimillion-dollar limited hypercars McLaren has ever built, the Elva and P1, both in historic Gulf Oil livery, were displayed in the “Evolution of the Supercar” section by McLaren owners. And McLaren Racing showed a number of iconic F1 cars from the past 50 years in a special class celebrating the 75th anniversary of Formula 1 at the Concours, with their 1988 MP4/4 F1 car capturing a coveted Second in Class podium.
At the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca meanwhile, McLaren further celebrated the 75th anniversary of Formula 1 by bringing three iconic F1 cars to the track: The 1974 M23/05 raced by Emerson Fittipaldi, the 1984 MP4/2 raced by Niki Lauda, and the 2024 MCL38/02 raced by Lando Norris. While two of the cars were on static display, Zak Brown drove Lauda’s MP4/2 in exhibition laps to the delight of the marque’s legion of F1 fans.
Along with the display at the Concours this makes the most impressive collection of McLaren F1 cars ever assembled in the U.S. “It’s fantastic to be back at the Monterey Motorsports Reunion, it’s one of my favorite events of the year and it’s an honor to get behind the wheel of Lauda’s MP4/2, a car the team were so successful in,” Brown commented prior to the event. There were additional privately-owned McLarens at Laguna Seca as well, such as Richard Griot’s important 1967 M6A chassis number one.
All of this comes in the midst of McLaren’s winningest Formula 1 season in nearly 20 years, as it looks like a sure bet to capture both the F1 Drivers’ and Constructors’ championships this year. Much of the Car Week initiatives were made possible by McLaren’s new owners, Abu Dhabi-based investment firm CYVN Holdings, which also acquired a a non-controlling stake in McLaren’s racing division, all under a new entity named McLaren Group Holdings (MGH).
The new streamlined ownership, which has also finally made the brand debt free, is eager to catapult it to the top of the elite supercar ranks, partly by building on the synergy been McLaren’s F1 cars and road cars. “Monterey Car Week is always a great opportunity for us to engage with clients, prospects and enthusiasts alike,” notes Nicolas Brown, President, McLaren, The Americas, who was present for the various events. While not eschewing its focus on engineering, technology and performance, the brand is now making great strides on the luxury and lifestyle side of the equation as well.
At the Chateau McLaren unveiling, Nick Collins declared that this was really just the beginning, especially for McLaren owners and enthusiasts stateside, who turn up in force for events like Pebble Beach. “The U.S. market is more than half of our global volume, and also a huge amount of our global passion,” he says. “And it’s a growing passion as well, whether it’s growing through the race theme or through the road cars…. We just want to do more and more [here]. So you’ll see us a lot more of us in the U.S.” We call that another win.