The hammer fell at RM Sotheby’s Monterey sale and a one-off McLaren F1 GTR in wild “Pop Art” colors brought $34,655,000, blowing past most expectations and freezing the room. Collectors just watched a track-born prototype, once owned by Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason, become the most expensive McLaren and most expensive British-built car ever sold at public auction.
The car crossing the Monterey block was chassis 10R, a 1996 McLaren F1 GTR built to the lighter, more focused race specification developed after McLaren’s Le Mans win in 1995. It is one of just nine cars in that 1996 batch and, even inside that tiny group, stands out as one of only two short-tail GTR prototypes known to enthusiasts and historians.
