This is the incredible new 800hp McLaren Senna

The McLaren Senna – simple as that. Obvious really, but then recalling the late, great F1 ace’s name does mean this new car has rather a lot to live up to. As the newest member of McLaren’s Ultimate Series, filling the shoes of the P1 and P1 GTR, the machine previously known as P15 appears on course to justify its star billing. 

It had better be; this, after all, is McLaren’s riposte to other imminent new racing-cars-for-the-road: the Adrian Newey-designed Aston Martin Valkyrie and F1-engined Mercedes-AMG Project One. 

The key thing to take in with the Senna, once past the extreme form-follows-function styling, is its fulsome power/weight ratio of 659bhp per tonne. This is not achieved through any particular trickery, rather a back-to-basics emphasis on weight saving and pure combustion engine goodness.

Hi-tech hybrids come and go, but the message here is that you can’t beat a V8, a light but strong structure, and simple rear-wheel drive, all of which the Senna delivers. Ayrton would probably approve; Gordon Murray is probably saying “I told you so”. 

McLaren is not as yet publishing performance figures. One thing for certain, as the latest Ultimate Series model the Senna has to be able to leave the P1 for dead around a circuit. 

The engine, based on the 4.0-litre twin turbo V8 in the 720S, is McLaren’s most powerful road car unit ever, even if its 789bhp is behind its electrically-boosted Aston and AMG rivals. Where super-Mac scores is on a kerb weight of 1198kg. That’s getting on for 400kg (four big blokes!) lighter than the McLaren P1 and very nearly as light as the 1990s supercar apogee, the McLaren F1. 

You can drive it on the road but best not to the shops or on holiday with your partner. The Senna “deliberately compromises” the breadth of usability we have come to expect of McLaren supercars in order to deliver its on-track performance.

True there are two seats, airbags and leather or Alcantara seat trim, but the car is under-equipped and the interior left unfinished in a way that normal road cars just aren’t these days. That’s weight-saving for you. 

With its snorkel roof air intake and unique engine mounts, it also promises to be noisy; McLaren says it’s like having the V8 alongside you. Luggage space? Yes – but only if your luggage is two helmets and a pair of race suits. McLaren’s take on the car is that it has been “legalised for road use but not sanitised to suit it”. 

The Senna, then, is a car you drive on the road only in order to get to the circuit. Where, says the company, everything has been honed to deliver the “most intense circuit experience of any road McLaren” with everything calculated to deliver the utmost accuracy and feedback.

This single-minded focus is certainly unmissable in the looks department, with McLaren’s normal shrink-wrapped body ripped asunder in an orgy of extrusions, wings and orifices, all to keep the V8 cool and the air pressure sucking the car to the tarmac. It’s a brutal look. 

Aerodynamic highlights? That’s one heck of a rear diffuser. And an even larger rear wing; it’s an active, hydraulically-controlled number that automatically adjusts to optimise downforce (as well as working as an air brake, like the 720).  

Chassis and body are carbon-fibre, with at the car’s core a version of the carbon Monocage III safety cell from the 720S, complete with dihedral doors that fold over into the roof. Only a small section of window opens, while panels in the door can be specified in glass for a see-through look. McLaren says this reinforces the visual connection between driver and track. 

The brakes are carbon ceramic, the steering electrohydraulic and the suspension double wishbones derived from the race cars, with hydraulically linked dampers and anti-roll system, as well as the variable ride height set-up from the P1. The tyres are bespoke Pirelli P Zero Trofeo Rs on ultralight centre-lock alloys.

You fire up the engine with a button in the roof console. The cabin is clutter-free – and there are no buttons at all on the steering wheel. In front of you is the folding driver display from the 720 and in the centre of the dash a simple infotainment screen. 

There are just three drivetrain modes – Comfort, Sport or Track – and big carbon paddles behind the wheel to swap ratios when the dual-clutch seven-speeder is in manual mode. Typical of the attention to detail is that the paddles have been designed to fit hands in racing gloves. 

It all amounts to a track performance that, according to McLaren’s Ultimate Series boss Andy Palmer, is “accessible and attainable yet at the same time exciting and challenging for the best drivers in the world.” 

One of whom of course is Ayrton’s nephew Bruno. He just happens to be a McLaren ambassador, but wearing his family hat he has this to say: “This is the first project that really connects with Ayrton’s racing spirit and performance. The McLaren Senna honours my uncle because it is so utterly dedicated to delivering a circuit experience that allows a driver to be the best they can possibly be.”  

Want one? It’s understandable. This is a mega McLaren, far more F1 than P1, and, well, calling a car the Senna is just the coolest thing ever. There are to be 500 of them, at £750,000 apiece, and yes, you’ll have to join a queue.