001+02+12R = Supernatural: 3 McLaren F1’s, One Car Show.

Seeing one McLaren F1 is considered a pretty serious happening. However, on some days, an insane sequence of events occurs that can only be described as supernatural. Something so rare, it can’t be calculated, so shocking and unforeseen that it can only be considered a miracle. That’s what happens when three McLaren F1’s, all different trim levels appear to a car show/toy drive in a Chicago suburb. Let’s rewind to the start of the day to understand how this all occured.

We knew this Mclaren P1 would be in attendance. Fun fact: formerly owned by EDM musician Deadmau5.

Early To Rise.

Chicago car shows are historically awesome. The scene there is the best in the country outside of California (the car scene mega state, can’t be beat) and South Florida, weird how that works. The problem with Chicago is that I don’t necessarily live close. My drive to a car show in that general area is anywhere from two to three hours. Not really convenient, which means there are some shows where I am up very early to get on the road. In this case, I was up at 5:15 to get on the road at 6 to meet up with some friends for breakfast at their local diner which has chocolate chip pancakes I had been looking forward to eat since the plan was hatched to come down for one final show. So, at 6am, I was on the road, racing the sunrise to Chicago. The drive was uneventful, which is good, because I was not going to miss out on pancakes and a car show. We got to the restaurant, and were seated at the very back table in the corner of the restaurant. We enjoyed an amazing breakfast and theorized about the cars we hoped to see later that morning.

My Holy Grail Cars.

I have three holy grail cars that are what I consider a step above the rest, The Porsche Carrera GT, I am thankful to say I have seen a few different ones in my travels, the Pagani Zonda Tricolore, 3 ever made, one in the US, that’s gonna be a tough one to find. But the final car is my money no object, absolute dream car, no questions asked. What is it? The McLaren F1 LM. 5 were built and there are only two in the United States, Ralph Lauren owns one and there’s one in a certain midwestern city… Chicago to be specific. I have had pictures of the prototype F1 LM from Autoevolution.com for years, growing up with that car as my end all be all car so I thought in the back of my head on the way down to the show, what if? The collection that has it posted they were attending, and they’ve brought out cars in the past, but never the LM or their newly acquired, road legalized F1 GTR, chassis 12R (you can learn about 12R from Supercarnostalgia here). It could happen, but I was trying not to get my hopes up.

A Fayence Yellow Porsche Carrera GT. Photographed at CheckedItOut 2022, you can read my blog on that event here.

Timing Is Everything.

We ended up finishing our breakfast early, and with nothing else to do, we headed over to the show before it technically started. This was a great idea. We arrived, parked just across the railroad tracks that run right in front of the show, and could see a variety of Porsche’s and Ferrari’s from our parking spot. There were cop cars blocking the road outside the building where the show was held, and the cops were cool. We were able to walk right in, no issues so we could get shooting the cars that were already there before the rush of the actual show. This also meant we were first on the scene for any cars that showed up as the event was setting up and arranging cars. This started with the shock of a Koeningsegg Regera, owned by the same guy who owns the blue P1, rolling in. Then followed by a Porsche 918 formerly owned by Salomondrin, and a Pagani Huayra Roadster, both part of the same collection. Seeing these hypercars moving was already an amazing thing, but we didn’t know it was about to get better.

The McLaren P1 (center), Porsche 918 Spider (left middle), and Koeningsegg Regera (far left).

The Royalty Arrives

As the cars get parked, and the event time draws near, in the distance I could hear a bizarre noise. A noise fit for a race car. I wasn’t wrong. A small group of people run to the road. I, of course, follow them to see what the racket is.

The previously described “racket”. A McLaren F1 GTR, F1 LM, and F1.

At first, I only saw the race car as I was frantically filming with my phone and shooting with my camera at the same time. I then looked up from my camera and realized that I was not in the presence of just one McLaren F1, I was in the presence of three. Including my dream machine, an F1 LM. The roadblock was cleared for the F1 GTR and the other two took off down the street to loop around the block and park up.

12R getting parked up after being let in by the local constabulary.

F1 LM 002 and F1 01 taking off down the street.

The shock that went through my body from seeing these three cars and knowing they’d be at the show gave me such sensory overload there are periods of time that I cannot recall. Almost like I blacked out. It was unreal. Once all three cars parked up, myself and the other photographers that were already at the event scrambled to get photos before the internet got set on fire, causing all kinds of folk to come see the cars. It felt like a scene out of a Need For Speed game, people calling their friends telling them to drop what they’re doing and get to the event ASAP. People on facetime with their friends or family to show the cars, there was a lady on the phone walking through the commotion who said “there’s these cars here, and tons of people that have… cameras?”. She clearly is not familiar with the number of photographers at car events and how it has boomed since the popularity of social media.

But the F1’s were not all that appeared from the team at Mouse Motors/McLaren Chicago. This P1 LM also joined the ensemble of amazing cars.

Making A Plan

So… faced with my dream car, and not knowing when I’d see it again, I had an idea. What if I followed the cars when they left to get rolling shots. That would be a truly once in a lifetime opportunity. So I pulled my friends aside early in the event and pitched the idea. Once the boys agreed to ride along, we shot the cars at the event, caught up with old friends we haven’t seen in awhile and got ready to follow them.

The Hamilton Collection also showed up to the event with their Pagani Huayra pictured here as well as their Porsche 918, Ferrari Laferrari, and Mclaren 765LT spider.

Go Time

With the McLaren F1 being a 90’s supercar and it being December, the cars had a hard time starting after sitting for a few hours and needed some time to warm up. This gave my friends and I time to get my car positioned to follow them. Based on how they entered, that’s how I guessed they would leave. So, it was time to wait. We waited across the street from where they came in, hoping to be able to turn out behind them after they would get in front of us. We heard the cars revving and slowly, a herd of people began to run our direction. It was time. First, was 12R, then 001, then the LM. The herd of people were all over the street, so I was worried they’d block me in so I couldn’t get out quickly. Thankfully, that didn’t happen and with a sizeable gap between the F1 LM and the P1 LM due to the P1 slowly crossing the railroad tracks, I slid in behind the F1 LM. Now I just had to keep up.

Behind the F1 LM at a stop sign, not necessarily regular traffic.

(Almost) One Expensive Insurance Payout…

A few blocks from the event, there were a mix of stop signs that were all way and two way stops. After two all way stops, the F1’s arrive to a two way stop, stopping their direction, but not the perpendicular road. The GTR and silver F1 made it through no problem. The LM was not so observant. The LM rolls to a near stop, keeping momentum since launching a car with a triple-carbon disk clutch on a hill isn’t a walk in the park. The car creeps out of the stop. An Audi Q7 heading down the perpendicular road doesn’t have a stop sign so they don’t yield to the F1 who left the stop sign at a poor time. The Q7 lays on the horn and slows down, the F1 stops in it’s tracks, avoiding a near t-bone and historically expensive auto accident insurance payout. The best part, I got it all on video. My friend Patrick who rode with me to capture footage of the cars, uploaded his video to Tiktok, you can view it here, which has over a quarter million views (let me know in the comments who you think was at fault for the near accident, I vote F1). We were officially paparazzi for these cars. The cars then turned onto Ogden, which lead them to I-294. It was about to go down.

My POV following the F1 trio down Ogden Avenue. I watched a guy get arrested at that Shell once, but that’s for another blog.

Channeling My Inner Senna

Keeping up with a McLaren F1 in any car is a challenge, but add the fact that we were on a Chicago highway and there were three other people in my car, I had to work for it. This meant I unfortunately didn’t shoot very many photos of them rolling but I remember the experience vividly. The straight cut gear whine of the F1 LM’s gearbox and the growl of the race exhaust on 12R will forever be engrained in my memory. We got maybe 5-10 minutes in and then traffic got intense, we slowly got pushed back from the pack of F1’s, coupled with the fact that I almost got sideswiped by another car following them who made an incorrect lane change and then tried to correct it not knowing of my existence, I was out of the zone and didn’t want to risk anything, especially because I had a return drive to Madison I had to make. One of my passengers didn’t appreciate my hesitation, but it isn’t his car… sorry, not sorry.

This Buick was also following the cars. I salute the drivers abilities after my encounter with a certain Camry.

Absolutely insane seeing 12R on the move.

So that was one hell of an event, and to think it happened in December is shocking to say the least. What a great day, even if I couldn’t get some rollers of my own after the photo above, it was still an insane, once in a lifetime experience. I hope the team at Mclaren Chicago will decide to bring these cars out again sometime in 2023. Which F1 was your favorite? Let me know in the comments below and enjoy these additional photos.