New McLaren Ultimate Vision launches for Gran Turismo series

The McLaren Ultimate Vision is a new 1,150bhp hybrid hypercar that will be available to drive from 17 October.

We say ‘drive’, but perhaps ‘control’ would be more accurate – because the Ultimate Vision has been exclusively developed for the latest release in the Gran Turismo PlayStation game series, Gran Turismo Sport.

McLaren is quite clear the Ultimate Vision is “not a prototype for any future McLaren model”, but says, rather, that it “showcases the kind of car that McLaren could produce beyond 2030.”

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Designed at the request of Gran Turismo Sport’s creator, Kazunori Yamauchi, the McLaren Ultimate Vision has a unique driving position that sees the driver sit face-forward as they would on a motorcycle, with their head almost directly above the car’s front axle. McLaren is no stranger to unconventional driving positions, as both the F1 supercar and the forthcoming BP23 “hyper GT” have three seats, with the driver placed centrally.

Powering the McLaren Ultimate Vision is a 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 petrol engine driving the rear wheels and a brace of electric motors driving the fronts. Being predominantly built from carbon-fibre means the Ultimate Vision is light, tipping the scales at just 1,000kg.

Cutting-edge, centrally mounted carbon-ceramic brakes, actively opening, downforce-boosting air vents and a “spine-tingling” petrol-electric powertrain soundtrack are among other highlights.

And although it would be fair to say that the McLaren Ultimate Vision only exists as a collection of pixels, zeros and ones, we should point out that McLaren’s P1 hypercar features a petrol-electric hybrid setup, while the 720S has a 4.0-litre V8 twin-turbo engine. To that extent, McLaren has kept the Ultimate Vision within the realms of possibility.