Photo: savagegarage/instagram
Imagine the following scenario: a brand new car is launched. A few months later, you grab an example, drive it to the drag strip, albeit with a really quick stop at your favorite tuner, and pull the kind of quarter-mile run that can one-up hypercars, as well as many serious builds. Welcome to the world of the McLaren 765LT, ladies and gentlemen drivers.
Ever since it returned to building road cars back in 2011, McLaren has been refining its twin-turbo-v8-inside-carbon-tub formula that kicked off with the now-senior MP4-12C (here's our review). And while there are meaner evolutions out there (we're looking at you, Senna), none of them is below the $500,000 mark (for the record, the 765LT kicks off at $358,000).
As far as straight-line dominance is concerned, we've already seen this Longtail model (the moniker is a nod to the motorsport-derived McLaren F1 GT of 1997) treat the 720S like the latter treated its competition since it landed back in 2017. In case you've missed it, here's the 765LT-vs-720S drag race we're talking about.
Of course, in this age when builds happen at the speed of light, not least thanks to social media spicing up the competition between vloggers and the shops that cater to their need, seeing the 765 pulling 9.4s quarter-mile runs in factory form only made us wonder what would happen once tuners got their hands on the mid-engined vessel.
Well, we now have a brief answer - how else would you describe a drag strip adventure that's over in 8.X seconds?
Heck, that 8s run makes Instagram's one-minute limit for videos seem like an eternity. Speaking of which, the Insta clip below, which comes from Blake Boddiford (a.k.a. Savage Garage) shows racer Gidi Chamdi pulling the said stunt inside a McLaren 765LT owned by an entrepreneur named Fred (you might know him as Pet Fred). You'll find some of their previous adventures behind those highlighted letters.
Now, California-based M Engineering, the aftermarket specialist that massaged the Woking missile's V8, took to Instagram to show the feat of the vehicle (see the second post below). The shop mentioned that the only mods required to enters the 8s arena were the downpipes and an ECU tune (oh, and the machine might be using Toyo R888R tires, which are street legal).
So, it looks like ICE fanatics are working overtime to prepare for the next move of the EV camp (you know, the later-in-2021 arrival of the tri-motor Tesla Model S Plaid).
As far as straight-line dominance is concerned, we've already seen this Longtail model (the moniker is a nod to the motorsport-derived McLaren F1 GT of 1997) treat the 720S like the latter treated its competition since it landed back in 2017. In case you've missed it, here's the 765LT-vs-720S drag race we're talking about.
Of course, in this age when builds happen at the speed of light, not least thanks to social media spicing up the competition between vloggers and the shops that cater to their need, seeing the 765 pulling 9.4s quarter-mile runs in factory form only made us wonder what would happen once tuners got their hands on the mid-engined vessel.
Well, we now have a brief answer - how else would you describe a drag strip adventure that's over in 8.X seconds?
Heck, that 8s run makes Instagram's one-minute limit for videos seem like an eternity. Speaking of which, the Insta clip below, which comes from Blake Boddiford (a.k.a. Savage Garage) shows racer Gidi Chamdi pulling the said stunt inside a McLaren 765LT owned by an entrepreneur named Fred (you might know him as Pet Fred). You'll find some of their previous adventures behind those highlighted letters.
Now, California-based M Engineering, the aftermarket specialist that massaged the Woking missile's V8, took to Instagram to show the feat of the vehicle (see the second post below). The shop mentioned that the only mods required to enters the 8s arena were the downpipes and an ECU tune (oh, and the machine might be using Toyo R888R tires, which are street legal).
So, it looks like ICE fanatics are working overtime to prepare for the next move of the EV camp (you know, the later-in-2021 arrival of the tri-motor Tesla Model S Plaid).
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