Can Lego's Life-Size, Drivable McLaren F1 Actually Lap A Track

Believe it or not, LEGO is the biggest tire manufacturer in the world, producing over 300,000,000 rubber tires every year. That means they make more rubber tires than major brands like Goodyear, Michelin, and Cooper. Now, a majority of those tires go on small LEGO vehicles that barely have any power from their tiny battery-powered motors, if they're powered at all. However, the toy brand has made an attempt at a true roadworthy vehicle by partnering with the McLaren F1 team.

McLaren driver Lando Norris, who is currently the number two driver in the F1 points championship, was given a LEGO replica of the McLaren F1 car and actually drove it around the Silverstone Circuit. F1 vehicles are some of the most powerful and athletic vehicles in the world, completing 70+ lap races at speeds most drivers only dream of. Composed of 342,817 pieces of LEGO, the car is a 1 to 1 replica of the McLaren F1 vehicle seen at the world's most respected tracks.

Norris took the LEGO out on the Silverstone Circuit and was able to complete an entire lap in the plastic vehicle. But this 2024 experiment wouldn't be the only time that Norris would get behind the seat of a LEGO F1 car, as the entire F1 driver lineup would jokingly race LEGO F1 vehicles around the track at the Miami Grand Prix, although the Miami F1 LEGO cars didn't fare as well when compared to the LEGO McLaren.

Over 17 days, 82 LEGO technicians spent a combined 8,344 hours expertly building the replica McLaren. The McLaren replica was the third full-sized vehicle that LEGO has made, though neither of the other two previous vehicles could turn through corners at speed. LEGO used 393 different types of the brand's Technic pieces, which is the line of LEGO pieces designed for more complicated builds, often featuring moving parts and utilizing more advanced physics. According to LEGO, the Technic line of pieces is "more versatile and durable than traditional LEGO bricks."

"We have two types of bricks," Lukáš Horák, Senior Project Manager in Model Production, LEGO Group, told McLaren. "So, there is the LEGO Technic core, which is the construction out of the LEGO Technic elements, and then we have the LEGO Technic skin, which is essentially the body of the model."

The 340,000+ pieces that make up the LEGO McLaren F1 replica vehicle weigh just over 1,200 kilograms, and the vehicle itself was capable of reaching speeds of 50 kph. The battery that powers the LEGO McLaren is a combination of LEGO Technic Function batteries and a car battery.

As mentioned earlier, this is far from the first vehicle that the toy company has built. In 2004, the LEGOLAND theme park in California featured a life-sized version of a Volvo XC90, which was one of the first full-sized LEGO vehicles. It was a decent representation, although the newer LEGO replicas offer more lifelike designs.

Seven years later, in 2011, the Florida location of LEGOLAND featured life-sized LEGO vehicles — three of them. LEGOLAND Florida featured a Ford Explorer, a Ford F-150 Lightning, and a 1964 Ford Mustang. It wasn't until 2016, though, that LEGO began using its Technic line of pieces for the replicas.

The first LEGO Technic vehicle replica was an orange Porsche 911 GT3 RS. Although the GT3 RS replica isn't nearly as precise as the McLaren F1 replica Lando Norris drove, it still represented the car well. The replica was last displayed in public at the LEGOLAND hotel in Denmark.

From there, the LEGO brand built a replica of the Bugatti Chiron, which was capable of reaching a top speed of 20 kph. The second vehicle LEGO built that could actually be driven is a replica of the Ferrari Daytona SP3.