McLaren 720S GT3X: Go! Baby go!

McLaren 720S GT3X
Go! Baby go!

The McLaren 720S GT3X has 529 kW / 720 PS

© press-inform – the press office

The McLaren 720S GT3X is the fastest racing car from the British sports car manufacturer outside of Formula 1. We drove the gun on four wheels and we couldn’t get the grin off our faces.

The combination of curves in front of the long start-finish straight on the “Circuito de Navarra” is just the prologue before the wild storm. The short left bend is still at full load, but if you step into iron too late here, you pay for the following tight right and especially for the straight section with a loss of speed. So with taste and still soulful up on the brake pedal and at the same time align the McLaren 720S GT3X. The stunt succeeds. The muzzle of the British flounder turns immediately into the curve and we can accelerate shortly before the apex. The light-emitting diodes spin to the right like a visual drum roll. Bam, bam, bam! With the shift paddle we click into the gears, behind us the four-liter, eight-cylinder biturbo screeches and saws full of fervor.

The sixth stage of the sequential gearbox has already been reached before the home straight and we press the yellow button on the top left of the wheel. “PTP” stands for “Push to Pass” and releases 22 kW / 30 PS in addition to the 529 kW / 720 PS. “Go! Baby go!”, The display cheers us on. The extra vitamins push the GT athlete, who weighs 1,210 kilograms, forward. Hot a. We grin all over our faces, but the next tricky task is already waiting at the end of the straight: first a quick right bend, followed by two curves, the last of which closes massively. Again, the Pirelli slicks in interaction with the mighty rear spoiler are required.

No problem. The dark beast looks terrifying, but can be directed cleanly. Knowing well that one careless moment is enough that you really have to do magic. So the hot ride continues. We concentrate on every inch of asphalt and have no view of the rocky massifs of the Cantabrian Mountains that tower up on the horizon. After all, this bullet, of which only 15 are built, won the “Hill Climb” at the “Goodwood Festival of Speed” and only experts with rockets fire up this climb. So if a car deserves the title “Track Tool”, it is this one.

“We just looked what we could do without restrictions to create an optimized version of the McLaren GT3”; says chief designer Sam Purvis. The specifications were clear: Simply build the fastest McLaren outside of Formula 1. Mission accomplished! The 720S GT3X takes around five seconds per lap from the GT3, which is already a weapon. These are worlds. There is more to the arms race. The 720S GT3X serves as a rolling laboratory as some of the improvements will be found in future models from the British sports car maker. It is therefore worth taking a look at the secrets of the GT racer, which is also used in customer racing and in which more than 90 percent of the parts have been taken from the production version of the McLaren 720S. But the rest has a big impact.

At the center is the hand-made 840MT double-charged eight-cylinder, in which the engineers have turned a few adjusting screws: an optimized cylinder head, reinforced pistons, larger turbochargers and, consequently, an improved intake system. This increases the performance compared to the 720S GT3 by a good 200 hp, plus the Go! Baby go! Extra power. In line with the increased performance, the brakes adopted from the GT3 also get better cooling.

The Mono Cage II, known from road vehicles, forms the carbon passenger cell around which the composite body is made. The entire aerodynamics were fine-tuned in the Formula 1 wind tunnel, including the rear with spoiler and the optimized underbody including diffuser. As if overtaking a McLaren 720 GT3X wasn’t difficult enough, the British have packed radar sensors in the rear to warn the driver if competitors are approaching from behind.

There is a lot of racing high-tech in the bolide. The motor mapping, ABS, brake balance and traction control can be adjusted using a rotary switch on the steering wheel, and all parameters such as tire pressure, motor and brake temperature and lap times can be read on the display. This is pure racing. Anyone who is now in the mood to hunt for the best times should set aside more than 700,000 euros.

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