Has the McLaren P1 done a 7m 04s lap of the Nurburgring?

There’s a strong rumour from the Nurburgring that the McLaren P1 – McLaren’s new supercar – has narrowly failed to beat a 7 minute lap.

Has the McLaren P1 (pictured) done a 7m 04s lap of the Nurburgring?

Last month we reported that McLaren had a new P1 at the Nurburgring which had the ‘XP2R’ moniker painted on its nose.

The interwebs were full of speculation that this was the first sighting of a new, more powerful, McLaren P1, but it was clear it was in fact just a re-built prototype.

But we did speculate at the time that perhaps McLaren were busy trying to fulfil their promise that the McLaren P1 could get round the Nurburgring in under 7 minutes – something, arguably, that has never been done by a production, road legal car.

That speculation may have been close to the mark, with Bridge to Gantry reporting the strong rumour that the P1 has set a time round the ‘Ring, but that the best McLaren could manage was a 7 minute 4 second time.

That in itself is a stunning achievement, but with Ron Dennis setting the bar so high with claims of a sub-7 minute lap for the P1 at the Nurburgring, it almost seems a disappointment and failure.

Assuming the rumours are right, will McLaren declare the time and swallow the criticism, or will they go away, play some more with their laptops, and tweak the P1 further to yield that crucial 5 seconds difference?

We know what we’d do.