There is no doubt that the McLaren MP4-12C is one of the top performing cars on the road. But many have criticized the styling as a bit too boring to be on a supercar.
Some of McLaren Chicago's customers agreed it wasn't exciting enough, so the dealer has partnered with McLaren Special Operations to make six unique MP4-12Cs.
Dubbed 'Project Alpha,' the cars look pretty badass.
We received the brochure for the cars from a reader and got in touch with McLaren to find out what exactly had been done. As we suspected, McLaren told us they're some cosmetic mods:
These are cars commissioned by our Chicago dealer in response to customer demand using options from the existing McLaren Special Operations catalogue. There are no performance modifications.
The body mods include fender louvers, gloss black accents on the splitter, roof, and rear deck, carbon fiber accents, and an Alcantara interior. The images show the cars will come in McLaren's trademark orange, white, and grey.
We were told that the cars are 2012 models, so they ONLY have 592 horsepower, not the 610+ of the 2013 cars. So the picky customers might still have a reason to complain over beers, brats, and cheese.
These 'Project Alpha' cars are from the same branch of the company that built the bonkers X-1 that we saw in Monterey the other week. These customers are picky, but they aren't as picky as the guy that wanted a spaceship landspeeder opera car with wheel spats.
Now, with Project Alpha, the 12C Spider, the X-1, and the Can-Am, people can no longer claim McLaren makes boring cars.
UPDATE: McLaren Chicago just let us know that the cars are 2012s, but will have the performance updates of the 2013 cars. Two cars of each color will be built.
(Big Hat Tip to Nick!)