After an extravagant car launch that involved shutting a large chunk of downtown Valencia, the MP4-22 would provide McLaren with a very competitive car for what would become a very attention-grabbing season on and off the track.

Driven by two-time World Champion Fernando Alonso and rookie Lewis Hamilton, the MP4-22 was designed to bounce back from a winless 2006 season. When discussing the design philosophy of the new car, McLaren’s designers claimed the MP4-22 featured “some advanced engineering concepts” and “novel aerodynamic solutions”.

The MP4-22 proved to be a lot more competitive than its predecessor. It won in Malaysia, Monaco, Canada, the US, Germany, Hungary, Italy and Japan, and was the most reliable car on the grid, only suffering two retirements – neither of which was mechanical. There wasn’t a single race in which a MP4-22 didn’t make the podium. McLaren scored more points in the first half of the season than in the whole of the previous year. All of these points were in vain, however, after McLaren were expelled from the constructors’ championship for their role in a case involving confidential technical information, referred to as ‘Spygate’.

Whilst the team were excluded, the drivers were not and, going into the final race of the season in Brazil, Hamilton led Alonso by four points with Ferrari’s Kimi Räikkönen three more points behind. Alonso finished third and Hamilton seventh (after suffering rare gearbox issues), whilst Räikkönen won the race and consequently the drivers’ championship, finishing above Hamilton and Alonso in the standings by a single point.

Overall, the MP4-22 took victory on eight occasions, finishing on the podium a further 13 times. Hamilton won four races, gained eight more podiums and scored 109 championship points. He recorded nine consecutive podium finishes and six pole positions, more than any other rookie in Formula 1 history. Hamilton also equalled Jacques Villeneuve’s records of the most wins and the highest championship finishing position in a debut season.

This fine 1:8 scale model of the McLaren MP4-22 is as raced by Fernando Alonso at the 2007 European Grand Prix at the Nürburgring. It has been handcrafted and finished in our workshops using detailed colour and material specifications, and original CAD data supplied directly by McLaren Racing. Furthermore, it has undergone detailed scrutiny by both engineering and design teams to ensure complete accuracy of representation.

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