McMurtry Automotive plans to turn its record-breaking single-seat electric track car into a road legal sports car.
That’s according to Autocar, which spoke to McMurtry’s MD after the Spéirling stunned visitors to last weekend’s Goodwood Festival of Speed by breaking the event’s three-year old hill climb record. Indy driver Max Chilton ascended Lord March’s driveway in 39.08 seconds aboard the tiny EV, breaking the record set by the Volkswagen ID R in 2019 by 0.8 seconds.
McMurtry originally launched the Spéirling as a dedicated track car, and that focus helped dictate its single-seat layout, tiny footprint and fan-based ground-effects aero technology. But now the company’s managing director, Thomas Yates, has told Autocar it wants to turn it into something that “you can drive through the centre of London, and then take onto a track.”
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Autocar claims the road car will retain the track car’s twin fans, which can currently deliver 2,000 kg (4,409 lbs) of downforce from zero mph, but they will only be operational when the car is in track mode. Also carried across to the street will be the EV powertrain, which McMurtry has yet to fully detail, but which we know gives it a power to weight ratio of 1,000 bhp (1,014 PS) per tonne, equating to 2.2 lbs per horsepower. That’s sufficient to get the mini Batmobile to 60 mph (96 km/h) in 1.5 seconds.
And Yates told the British mag that the road-going Spéirling would retain a single-seat configuration, meaning the differences between circuit and street versions will be mostly centered on meeting legal standards for road use. The project is apparently in its early days, and no exact price or production cap has been announced. But Autocar reports that “just a handful” will be made, and that interested parties can expect to hand over at least £1 million ($1.2 m). The company also revealed that it was already working on its second car, which would be even smaller than the 126-in (3.2 m) Spéirling.