Production of the 2016 McLaren P1 GTR has just kicked off at the company's plant in Woking, were 45 examples of the track-only supercar->ke177 will be built by the end of the year. The British car maker originally intended to start producing the P1 GTR after the production run of the road-going 2014 McLaren P1 finished, but high demand for the track version prompted McLaren->ke284 to commence production earlier.

That's the word from Dutch outlet De Telegraaf, which adds that 42 of the 45 units McLaren plans to build are already spoken for. This means that only three P1 GTRs are still available as of this writing. However, you shouldn't break the piggy bank unless you own a road-going P1,->ke4608 as the track-restricted supercar is only available to P1 owners.

McLaren CEO Mike Flewitt confirmed only 45 P1 GTRs will be built, but he did admit that the brand could produce up to 375 units to match the production figures of the standard P1. That's not very likely to happen though, as the P1 GTR was conceived as a very limited supercar and increasing production to more than 100 units would defeat its purpose and hurt McLaren's image.

Even though both the P1 and the P1 GTR will be built on the same line, it's expected that all GTRs will be completed by the end of the summer, in time for the first customer event in October.

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Why it matters

With production of the P1 GTR already underway, it won't be long until we will see these hybrid->ke147 race cars->ke148 being pushed to the limit on the track. If that's not good news, I don't know what is.

On the other hand, it's important to note that McLaren commenced production of the track-only supercar earlier than expected. With the road-going P1 still in production, it could mean that McLaren is either looking to meet high demand (yes, 42 units of a $3 million, track-only vehicles means high demand) or it just realized that the cars might not be ready in time for the first customer event this autumn.

Either way, it looks as if both the P1 and the P1 GTR will go out of production by the end of 2015, leaving room for new products and maybe even a new hypercar.

2016 McLaren P1 GTR

Find out more about the McLaren P1 GTR in our review here.