The Second Coming

Gordon Murray bids adieu to the analogue era by making a true successor to the McLaren F1

- Adam Towler

THE PUREST, LIGHTEST, MOST DRIVER focused supercar ever built.’ Bold words, granted, but when they come from the man who designed the McLaren F1, they need to be taken very seriously indeed.

Twenty-seven years after creating the fabled F1, Gordon Murray is making another hypercar, and this time it’s his name that will be applied to the bodywork. Or rather, that of Gordon Murray Automotive, a sister company to his Gordon Murray Design (GMD) business, best known for its iStream design and production system.

The new car will be called the T.50, and its specification makes us wonder if Murray has been eavesdropping on our conversations in the evo office. Indeed, the legendary designer even uses the magazine’s tagline, ‘the thrill of driving’, in his press release about the new car, which he says will be ‘the last, and greatest, analogue supercar ever built’. Why? Because the T.50 shuns much of the modern doctrine on hypercars, from hybrid systems to Ring lap times and immaterial top speeds, focusing instead on a sense of involvement, and the responsiveness and vibrancy of the driving experience. The T.50 will not only be extraordinarily light, it will also be compact: shorter and narrower than a Porsche 992 Carrera, in fact.