One of seven McLaren F1s exported new to the United States through Ameritech, chassis no. 062 has enjoyed just three private owners, including Oracle software CEO Larry Ellison who bought it new in 1997.

This was the 53rd of 106 road F1s or racing F1 GTRs to be built by McLaren at Woking, and was required to pass federal safety and emissions approval to be registered as road legal in California. However, it is believed that this invasive federalization work was only carried out to the first car imported, rather than subsequent cars following, resulting in 062 never being modified for federalization following its completion by McLaren.

Remarkably, it remains California legal to this day, and for its whole life has resided in the car-friendly climate of the San Francisco Bay Area, during which time it has covered just under 6,500 miles from new.

MCLAREN F1 – A SHORT HISTORY

Thirty-five years on, the McLaren F1 is still the fastest naturally-aspirated production automobile ever built.

It would be McLaren’s second GT. Twenty-two years earlier, Bruce McLaren’s M6 GT project, a coupe based on his all-conquering CanAm cars, had ended with his death in a 1970 Goodwood testing accident. Following McLaren’s success in Formula 1 in the 1980s, the time was right to highlight the marque’s technical excellence in both delivery and name, and after an airport lounge discussion following the 1988 Italian GP, the four McLaren principals—Ron Dennis, Mansour Ojjeh, Creighton Brown, and Gordon Murray—decided to go ahead.

“The stars all sort of lined up really. So it was, okay, let’s start a car company,” remembers Gordon Murray, who has 50 grands prix wins and five Formula 1 World Championships under his belt with Brabham and McLaren. He designed the F1 as the world’s first ground-effect road car; stylist would be former Lotus designer Peter Stevens.

It took its aerodynamic cues from the 1971 Ferrari 312P sports racer, which had a low frontal area without too much wing, and ground effects would be achieved “with the floor absolutely flat with nothing sticking down.”

Murray’s requirements were that the monocoque-chassis F1 would be all-composite, utilising carbon fibre and Kevlar; it would have three seats, in arrowhead formation with the driver centrally-located (“I wanted to give the driver the panoramic feel of a single-seater”); it would have no electronic driver aids; it would be the ultimately-engineered car; and it would be the ultimate driver’s car.

Initially envisaged to be powered by Honda—whose NSX had impressed Murray, “the good being its ride and handling, the bad being the construction quality”—he had to look elsewhere when the Japanese company declined.

Murray mandated a power output of at least 100 bhp per litre, and it was McLaren’s Formula 1 partner BMW which came back with an offer in just 45 minutes of an engine providing a greater output! Thus, a naturally aspirated 6.1-litre quad-cam V-12 designed by Paul Roche, which produced 627 bhp at 479 lb/ft torque, found its way into the engine bay of the nascent F1, with a McLaren TAGtronic engine management system one of its few concessions to the electronics age. Transmission was a six-speed manual transverse gearbox. Lightweight alloys were used throughout, and the engine bay was lined with 16 grams of gold foil, which reflected the heat from the 7,500 rpm V-12 to protect the composites.

For all its power and performance, however, the F1 was so compact that it had a footprint smaller than that of a 986-generation Porsche Boxster, and weighed 100 kg less than the contemporary BMW 3-Series saloon.

From the moment the F1 was launched at the Monaco Sporting Club during the 1992 Monaco Grand Prix—priced at $1 million including taxes—it caught the attention of the world’s media, many of whom dubbed it “The Car of the Century,” capable of accelerating from zero to 100 km/h in 3.2 secs, hitting 320 km/h in 28 secs.

After Britain’s Autocar magazine road-tested one, it wrote, “the McLaren F1 is the finest driving machine yet built for the public road, and will be remembered as one of the great events in the history of the car, and may possibly be the fastest production car the world will ever see."

And it remains so to this day, for a normally-aspirated car. Before the decade was out, Jaguar’s Le Mans winner and F1 GTR test driver Andy Wallace would set the world record for the fastest road car, hitting a top speed of 391 kph (242.95 mph) at Volkswagen’s Ehra-Lessien test track. That 1998 record has been surpassed only by turbocharged or supercharged sports cars.

It also caught the attention of automobile connoisseurs, who had placed their orders before a seven-year production run started at Woking in 1992, ending in 1998 with 106 built (inclusive of 64 road cars, 28 GTRs, 6 LMs, 3 GTs, and 5 prototypes). The Beatles’ George Harrison, Pink Floyd’s Nick Mason, and fashion guru Ralph Lauren were among them.

062 – A CALIFORNIAN F1

Road sales went global, cars going to Europe, Japan, the Middle East, and to the United States, where tough federal laws meant that modifications would have to be made in order for the McLaren F1 to be street legal. Larry Ellison’s car was finished in Magnesium Silver, as were six of the seven US imports, alongside a black leather interior with grey driver’s seat insert. The seven cars were 042, 044, 045, 055, 067, and 074 in addition to 062. Interestingly, 067 was later bought by Ellison’s Silicon Valley contemporary Elon Musk in 1999.

Delivered to him in August 1997, Ellison kept his car for over a decade with 062 wearing a California vanity license plate “ORACLE8”, logging less than 2,600 miles, before it was purchased by another car collector and resident of the San Francisco Bay Area via Ferrari Maserati of Silicon Valley in 2005. That second owner then sold it at auction in 2010 to its current, third owner, having been driven less than 3,500 miles from new by that point. Remarkably, the car would stay in the San Francisco Bay Area with its new owner, making it likely the only F1 to have changed owners multiple times…but never changing its immediate geographic location!

After sending 062 to McLaren Special Operations in the UK for a service, new radiators, and upgrades to the air conditioning to further enhance its drivability, the car took part in the 20th F1 Anniversary Tour of 2012, based around Lake Garda’s Grand Hotel a Villa Feltrinelli. It is shown among the F1s and F1 GTRs in Porter Press International’s McLaren F1 Anniversary Tour book.

Chassis no. 062 is offered with a number of McLaren Special Operations upgrades in addition to the aforementioned upgraded radiators and air conditioning, including aluminium fuel tanks and a sports exhaust (the original exhaust accompanies the car), and is on its original magnesium wheels, with a spare set finished in matte black. It is accompanied by the original owner’s manuals, the original luggage set, the tool roll, a travel suitcase, garment bag, car cover, F1-branded Auto Glym detailing kit, the service modem/laptop, and torque wrench.

The F1 was sent to McLaren Philadelphia in October 2023, one of eight global service centres where servicing and repairs can be carried out in a factory-approved manner on an F1 (and the only facility in North America with a McLaren F1-certified technician). At this point, the car received a rebuild of the transmission (which was handled by McLaren Special Operations in the UK), the fitment of four new tires on the original wheels, fitment of 12 new spark plugs alongside an 18-month service, some repairs to the gold foil in the engine bay, a new battery, and the aforementioned replacement of its fuel bladders with the aluminium fuel tanks. November 2024 saw further service work by McLaren Philadelphia to address the car’s air conditioning system. This work was carried out on location at the owner’s collection.

In March of this year, a detailed condition report was carried out by Kevin Hines, the aforementioned factory-authorized McLaren F1 technician based at McLaren Philadelphia. This report (which is available for inspection to qualified bidders) summarized that “it is evident that this vehicle has been well cared for during its current and previous ownership, being in very good cosmetic and mechanical condition.” Under advisement of the report, the car’s windshield was replaced with a correct, original style windscreen sourced from McLaren Special Operations in the UK. Further to the report, the car’s exceptional history file includes numerous invoices and documents dating back to the original Ameritech invoice to Ellison for the purchase of the car in 1997.

Considering their driver-focused nature, many McLaren F1s have been used and enjoyed by enthusiastic owners and therefore have accumulated high mileage, with some involved in accidents necessitating repairs. As a result of McLaren’s outstanding customer support, many owners upon their purchase decided to send their new F1 car back to the factory to be repainted and retrimmed to suit their own tastes. Thus, the number of factory-original F1 road cars represents a small fraction of production.

Chassis number 062 has been carefully looked after by its three private owners, all prominent figures in their respective industries, with no expenses spared regarding maintenance and upgrades. It remains as one of seven F1s road legal in California and perhaps more significantly, one that has been California registered since new, with each of its three owners residing in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Special thanks to Mark Cole, author of The Ultimate McLaren F1 GTR, for providing this description. All quotations are courtesy of his book.