This year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed has hosted the public debuts of many new exciting cars and among the most head-turning, and unexpected, is the McLaren P1 Spider from Lanzante.
The British company released the first sketches of the car in the lead-up to the event but even they can’t prepare you for seeing the car in the flesh. To our eyes, it looks so stunning that it’s a shame McLaren itself never actually offered the P1 hypercar as a Spider.
Speaking with YouTuber MrJWW about the car, Lanzante says it was first approached by a P1 owner who was looking to transform their car into a Spider. The company took on the project and has decided that it will build five examples of the car.
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Lanzante’s creation looks exactly like a P1 Spider would have looked like if McLaren built it. Creating the stunning shape wasn’t easy. One of the key components used to cool the 3.8-liter twin-turbocharged V8 of the P1 is its central roof scoop but with no roof, Lanzante had to re-shape the decklid in order to cool the engine without messing with the car’s timeless design.
The matter of modifying the carbon fiber monocell also required quite a lot of attention and to make up for the lack of a roof, Lanzante has had to reinforce and strengthen the base of the A-pillars. Another big challenge has been redesigning the doors which ordinarily have hinges on the A-pillars and the roof.
A host of changes have also been made to the interior of the P1. Most cabin surfaces are now upholstered in a special SuperFabric that is both weather- and UV-resistant. Various touches of satin carbon fiber and gloss black have also been applied throughout.