VIN: the Sultan of Brunei McLaren F1 GTR chassis 09R
History of chassis 09R
McLaren built nine examples of the first generation F1 GTR from 1995, all of which were raced bar one: chassis 09R.
Although demand for the GTR from racing teams was strong, McLaren supplied this last example to its most important customer at the time: the Brunei Royal Family.
It was during the late 1980s that the Sultan of Brunei, Hassanal Bolkiah, and his brother, Prince Jefri, began to acquire high end automobiles in really large numbers. Funded by Brunei’s vast natural gas and oil reserves, thousands of cars were bought, most of which were executive models. However, a large number of high performance exotics were also purchased, often in multiples and frequently with special features.
In addition to 09R, the Brunei royals went on to purchase nine other examples of the F1. Five of these were F1 road cars (chassis 002, 004, 005, 008 and 014), three were F1 LM special editions (chassis LM1, LM4 and LM5) and the other was an F1 GT (chassis 054).
As for 09R, it was completed in the weeks that followed McLaren’s victorious debut outing at the 1995 Le Mans 24 Hours where the F1s came home first, third, fourth, fifth and 13th. The Brunei royals commissioned 09R as a replica of chassis 01R, the quasi-works GTR that appeared under a Kokusai Kaihatsu Racing banner and which Yannick Dalmas, Masanori Sekiya and JJ Lehto famously drove to victory.
Upon delivery to Brunei, chassis 09R became a central part of the royal supercar collection where it has resided ever since.
Text copyright: Supercar Nostalgia
Photo copyright: unattributed