Useless Info - McLaren Edition

Inside McLaren’s Lair of Speed

McLaren is, first and foremost, a Formula One racing company that also happens to build road cars. So named after company founder and racing legend Bruce McLaren, who died in a trackside mishap nearly a half-century ago, McLaren earned its bona fides as a Formula One racing superpower ever since. Making it onto bedroom posters is nice, but no mistake, making racing cars is job one.

The McLaren grounds are awash in history, particularly inside the yin-yang-shaped headquarters, called the Technology Center, which houses the Formula 1 Racing Team, McLaren Applied Technologies, McLaren Automotive (the car-building arm), and the McLaren Technology Group. Built in 2010, the glass-and-steel architectural gemstone contains McLaren’s corporate offices, a wind tunnel, a gym for employees, another gym for the F1 team, a swank cafe, and a trophy case half the length of a football field.

McLaren’s F1 cars are built right there in the Tech Center—in plain view—by Hugo Boss-clad engineers, so access to its grounds is only granted to a privileged few: high-rolling customers, members of McLaren’s own F1 race team, and McLaren employees. Rarely, McLaren invites Formula 1 fan clubs and similar groups to open houses, but McLaren certainly wouldn’t want members of, say, the Ferrari team poking their noses around unattended (even after some recent disappointments.)

The very spine of the building is “The Boulevard,” on which dozens of historic McLaren Formula One cars are parked, nose out, in chronological order. The collection represents a veritable chronology of Formula One innovations that illustrate how McLaren has advanced the art of racing through history, particularly in the area of aerodynamics. The cars on the boulevard are all runners, McLaren says, and are occasionally shown off at vintage car events and/or media programs. Most sit atop a what looks like a cookie sheet on the floor—carbon fiber, of course—to collect any fluids that might find their way out. All were spotless, of course. (We checked.) On the other side of the glass wall is a reflecting pool full of water used to cool the wind tunnel.

(Yahoo.com)