McLaren M6gt 1968
McLaren's Early Plans for a Road Car Bearing His Name
A road car bearing the name "McLaren" was an ambition that became a five-year off and on project, that was to be achieved once the company was well under way. The first inkling that Bruce McLaren indeed had the more sporting motorist in mind appeared in the racing press in the mid-1968, when it was rumoured that consideration was being given to the homologation of a coupe version of the McLaren-Elva sports racing car to compete with the Lola T70 in Group 4. The M6A had proven eminently successful in the Can-Am Series, so what better test-bed by which to assess the merits of the venture than the production-line M6B? The Kiwi maestro had fond hopes of thrashing it out with Porsche, Ferrari, and Alfa, on the circuits of Europe, and, besides, what was wrong with importing the old American "win-on-Sunday-sell-on-Monday" philosophy? It was some time before his dream was to become a reality. Revised rules for the F1A Group 5 World Championship for Makes had been altered to require a minimum of 50 identical models before homologation. And they had to be complete cars, unlike McLaren’s plans for the M6BGT which left the engine option to the customer. The longed-for homologation papers were, therefore, never to materialise, and the project started to die a slow death.
Later Developments
Early in 1970, however, McLaren had a prototype prepared using one of 50 all-enveloping bodies (which had been delivered for homologation purposes) to surround a stock M6B chassis. It soon became his favourite project, and, amid speculation over an unusual vehicle making a hash of traffic in and around Walton-on-Thames, Trojan Cars released the news that they had in fact cobbled up a road-trimmed version "for evaluation purposes, as it is possible that Trojan may market a road-going version of the M6BGT".
In his book, McLaren! The Man, The Cars & The Team, Eion Young reveals McLaren’s thoughts at the time: "Building his own road car was a project that had interested Bruce as an ambition to be achieved when the company was well under way with the racing programme".
But such high hopes soon gave way to disaster when the personable New Zealander met his tragic and untimely end on June 2 while testing the new model M8D Can-Am car at Goodwood.