What is the best version of a car to have? Based purely on auction value, the market seems to have determined that oftentimes the last version of a car to roll out of the factory is the most valuable. Would you believe that someone bought the last of almost all the company’s best models and just, I guess, completely forgot to drive them?
That’s the only way I can explain the fact that a collection of McLarens, almost all the final chassis of 20 different models (did you know that McLaren even made 20 different models?), only have delivery miles on them. They are, as described by auction house Tom Hartley Jnr, “unused, factory-fresh.”
What’s going on here? Did the original owner, who got the cars painted in his own personal color, get so excited about the next car that he just forgot to drive the car he already purchased? The vehicles are incredible, and there’s even an F1. The Last McLaren F1! Based on recent sales, that has to be a $30 million car at least, right?
And not just any car. The car many consider to the the best-handling, best-driving car ever built.
There are way more than that. Just in the photo, you can see a clean Speedtail, a Sabre, a P1, a P1 GTR, a freakin’ Senna (in Senna colors, not orange). A 650S Le Mans, a 2022 720S Le Mans, and a 600 LT Spider.
There’s even a super rare Elva, though that was reportedly delivered after the owner died, so that maybe can’t be blamed on the owner.
So who was it that had all these cars and didn’t drive them?
Mansour Ojjeh.
If you don’t know who Mansour Ojjeh is, then you might not be familiar with McLaren’s full history. The hugely successful businessman is the TAG behind TAG Heuer, among about a million other investments via TAG. He was also a passionate racing fan who was as much a part of the company’s racing success as any driver or engineer.
“Mansour was a founding father of McLaren as we know it today. A massively passionate racer and automotive enthusiast and no bigger fan of McLaren,” said McLaren Racing’s Zak Brown.
That orange color on all these cars? That’s Mansour Orange, as the auction house describes:
Mansour Ojjeh was a pivotal figure in the world of motorsport, celebrated for his visionary role in transforming McLaren into one of Formula 1’s most iconic and successful teams. His journey in Formula 1 began in 1979, when TAG sponsored the Williams team. However, it was his decision in 1984 to take an ownership stake in McLaren that truly shaped his legacy. TAG famously financed the development of the TAG-Porsche turbo engines, which powered McLaren to two Constructors’ Championships and three Drivers’ Championships, a partnership that marked the beginning of one of the sport’s most enduring alliances.
When McLaren Automotive began producing road cars in earnest, Mansour made a pivotal decision. He sold his previous collection and turned his attention to building something new: the ultimate McLaren road car collection.
That collection was built around a central theme, with the McLaren F1 as its ‘jewel in the crown’. This particular F1 is a one-of-one example, finished in a unique colour named Yquem, after the esteemed and rare dessert wine. It was also the last McLaren F1 ever produced.
To reflect the significance of this vehicle, McLaren subsequently renamed the colour Mansour Orange, a custom hue used exclusively on his cars. This shade could not be specified by any other customer. Furthermore, Mansour requested the final chassis number for each model, ensuring his cars incorporated all the technical updates made during the production cycle.
Ok, I sort of get that. That is kind of cool. While most of the cars are super-low mileage, the F1 did get driven a bit, and the P1 GTR did see track use. Given Ojjeh’s enormous wealth, he might have had driving versions of many of these cars if he wanted to go for a drive.
According to his widow, Ojjeh took great joy in spending hours designing “each car to his specifications” and that he had “an unusual talent for detail that stuns and impresses.” I gotta admit, the details are pretty good. The man had taste, if not ample driving time.
The collection has since passed to a new owner, who bought all of the cars for an undisclosed sum. That’s a lot of McLarens. It’s also the best possible McLaren collection in existence.
Perhaps the new owner can put a few more miles on if they’re not as, you know, busy.
Top Photo: Tom Hartley Jnr
Yawn.
I don’t get it. I have two cars, and I feel I don’t drive THOSE enough.
This is like… collecting action figures? Or Hot Wheels? Just crazy expensive ones.
I imagine being handed the keys of YOUR McLaren for the first time has got to be a euphoric experience. The car stays yours, but the emotion is fleeting.
So you try to recreate it by buying another one. Still euphoric, but a bit less than the first time. So you keep chasing after that feeling, until you run out of money or years of life.
I’ve been saying for years that acquiring this level of wealth is a mental disorder and that these people need to be hospitalized and studied, not celebrated.
I think it’s more like hoarding behavior. Everything is somehow precious, but not because you want to use it.
I think it’s more tax evasion behavior…
I have one car and feel that way. Between working from home and hating road trips, I’ve managed 10k miles on my boxster…in three years.
I only put 16K on a 981 Boxster Spyder in about 9.25 years.
718 Spyder RS? Might hit 3K this year, but 1.8K was engine run-in.
The reason I can afford them is because I work like nuts. So I can understand how the guy in article ends up in that situation. Though I have a rule where I won’t buy anything I don’t have time to use.
That’s because you’re a reasonable, normal human being
Its just an investment when you have a selling point like unique color and the last of each and every model. I don’t doubt that his widow got way more than what he paid for these even if he has a crew maintaining them.
I can see that on some of them, but not the “normal” modern ones.
Been in that business, I know what the MSO McLaren market looks like. Those have a very long road to recover from depreciation and inflation.
Though yes, for those who don’t look at that aspect of car collecting, a benefit of a (normal-ish) car as a “investment vehicle” is the tax is paid upon acquisition. For true collector cars, you do pay capital gains tax, but at the lower rate. For cars that don’t meet that bar, there’s none.
If you do a percentage of wealth calculation, then financially, this is exactly like collecting action figure or hot wheels.
Also from the story, it sounds like this guy was McLaren’s primary financial backer. So it’s like running a sandwich shop, and letting the guy who gave you the loan to start your shop eat for free once in a while, but on a scale normal people can’t fathom.
The one and only time I’ve been up close and personal with a McLaren F1 was at a cars and coffee in Atlanta back in the early 2010’s. The owner had spec’d it in “Kandy Orange”.. with a K. His words, not mine. It was absolutely spectacular and I vowed that if I were ever fortunate enough to own a F1, that would be the color I would use.
The fact this collection never saw road time is sad, but the orange F1 here definitely made me smile, thinking about my brief moment with a similar spec.
I remember when Herb Chambers would DAILY DRIVE HIS McLaren F1. He’d drive it down Massachusetts Ave in Boston like it was a Camry.
I have no doubt he had a full time staff constantly changing out fluids and belts and what not on these but…don’t they need to be driven at least a little to be maintained properly?
I wonder if, performance-wise, a version with a few thousand miles would be in better shape than these museum pieces.
RIP bozo. Sorry you can’t take all of your glutinous vanity pieces into the void with you. I hope the funds were used to pay back all the myriad people that I’m sure this guy fucked over to get where he was but color me doubtful. Hopefully whatever middle eastern oil baron/prince bought the collection actually drives all of them but I’m not holding my breath.
Bless you, Nsane. Doing the Lord’s commenting!
It would be some interesting math to figure out how many schools/affordable housing units/hospital beds/etc could have been built in lieu of this collection.
Yeah, you can do whatever you want with your money, but I think it’s ok for the rest of us to to point out you could have ended child hunger in all of the UK but decided to buy a bunch of cars you will never drive. Sweet color aside, it’s harder to be impressed by this collection when you think of it that way.
I encountered a fun number from an AP article related to the upcoming G20 summit today that I’ve been sharing everywhere I can-since 2015 the 1% have increased their wealth by 33.9 trillion dollars. It’s estimated that that’s enough to eliminate annual global poverty 22 times.
Basically poverty as we know it could be ended with less than 5% of the wealth that these repulsive mutants have acquired in the last decade alone. Let that sink in.
I love the color. Much better than Conservative Rich Guy Grey Poupon.
At least these McLarens are not primer gray, so they have that going for them
Why they didn’t call that color Orange Jjuice I’ll never understand.
His name is Ojjeh for crying out loud. Which probably only makes sense if you mispronounce his name.
And TIL that TAG wasn’t just a stand-in for “Day” in the name, or roughly translated “Day/Year”
Maybe both, whatever. I wasn’t in a fraternity so I’ve never owned one 🙂
This made me look up TAG’s origins.
Arms dealer to the middle east was a bit of an unexpected origin story for me.