Every year, the Goodwood Festival of Speed serves as a stage for world premieres, historic race cars, and rare one-off models. McLaren is using this year’s event to bring one of the most important vehicles in its corporate history back into the spotlight. With an M6GT fully restored by McLaren Special Operations, the brand is paying tribute to the sports car with which Bruce McLaren sought to make the transition from a racing team to a sports car manufacturer in the late 1960s.

When people think of McLaren today, they usually think of the F1, the P1, or, more recently, the W1. In fact, the history of McLaren’s road-going sports cars began much earlier. The M6GT was developed based on the successful M6A Can-Am race car and was the first McLaren intended for public roads. Bruce McLaren used the prototype himself as his everyday car and drove it to meetings and racing events. After his fatal accident in 1970, the project disappeared into the archives. However, the idea behind it lived on and found its most famous continuation 25 years later in the McLaren F1.

McLaren Special Operations undertook the restoration. The goal was not to create a modern interpretation of the M6GT, but to rebuild the vehicle as faithfully as possible to the original. To achieve this, the team relied on original body molds that were rediscovered in the United Kingdom, as well as historical photographs and extensive archival material. Even today, the molds tell their own story. During their examination, the specialists discovered traces of early modifications that had been made during the development of the original vehicle and were intentionally preserved.

Even beneath the bodywork, everything closely follows the historic model. The chassis comes from a contemporary M6A race car and was verified against historic reference vehicles. Under the rear hood is a small-block V8 with the characteristic “Camel Hump” cylinder heads built to original specifications, paired with a contemporary transmission. The attention to detail is just as impressive. The original suspension was carefully restored and rebuilt. For numerous bearings, components had to be sourced according to imperial dimensions, which are hardly available today. Even the closed aluminum dome rivets correspond to the historical models and were fabricated by specialists from the aerospace industry.

This attention to detail continues in the interior. The gearshift lever is made of hand-turned walnut, and the seats are upholstered in custom-made green vinyl with hot-stamped seams faithfully reproduced from the original. Even the windshield is not off-the-shelf. Its distinctive shape was reproduced using digital scans of the historic original.

The M6GT is painted in Colnbrook White. This specially developed cream shade is reminiscent of the workshop in Colnbrook, near what was then London Airport, where Bruce McLaren developed his ideas for a road-going sports car. The green interior also echoes the color scheme of the McLaren M2B from the 1966 Formula 1 season, thus linking two early chapters in the company’s history.

“For our team, the M6GT was a project that required a great deal of craftsmanship and attention to detail…”

Jon Simms, Director, McLaren Special Operations.

The restored M6GT takes center stage at McLaren House during the Goodwood Festival of Speed. Alongside it, the brand is showcasing, among other vehicles, the M8A Can-Am race car, the Austin 7 Ulster, a McLaren F1, and the current models: the Artura, Artura Spider, and 750S. For the first time, the Artura features a two-tone paint scheme in Colnbrook White and Atlantic Blue, inspired directly by the M6GT.

The new W1 will also be on display in action at the famous hillclimb. In addition, there will be the public debut of the MCL HY for the FIA World Endurance Championship and the 2027 24 Hours of Le Mans, as well as the race-ready customer version, the MCL HY GTR. McLaren has also announced the unveiling of another new supercar on July 9, which will be presented to the public for the first time at Goodwood the following day.

Amid all the premieres and current models, a concept car that’s nearly 60 years old is likely to attract a lot of attention. The M6GT shows that the history of McLaren road sports cars didn’t begin with the F1, but long before that.

Photos: McLaren