British sports car manufacturer McLaren wants to impress the crowds visiting this week’s Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance in California with a new racing concept variant of its MP4-12C supercar designed for the North American market.
The one-off 12C Can-Am Edition is the work of McLaren GT, which is the new racecar manufacturing arm of the McLaren Group.
The track-focused model is based on the 12C GT3 racecar and is finished in the firm’s traditional orange hue as a tribute to the cars of Bruce McLaren and Denny Hulme from the 1960s and 1970s and is contrasted by satin black and carbon fiber details.
Like the GT3, the Can-Am Edition features a wide body aero kit that includes carbon fibre front splitter, dive planes, rear wing and rear diffuser, all of which help to offer an increase in downforce of 30 per cent over the regular model.
Given that it’s a pure design study at this stage, McLaren engineers weren’t required to abide to the regular racing regulations so they were able to revise the MP4-12C’s 3.8-litre twin-turbo V8 engine that gains a unique ECU calibration and optimized cooling system, allowing for a power output of up to 630hp. According to McLaren, the car weighs only 1,200kg (2645.5 lbs).
Other notable upgrades include the race-spec braking system that sits behind the new black satin-finished forged alloy wheels,wrapped around in Pirelli racing slick tires.
The stripped out interior of the 12C Can-Am Edition is finished in race-specification and comes with two body hugging seats complete with six-point harnesses, a full roll cage and a new removable steering wheel with the shape and grip said to be derived from that of Lewis Hamilton’s MP4-24 Formula 1 car.
McLaren says the car also features an integrated air conditioning system as it is mandatory now in a growing number of race series.
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