Porsche 918 Spyder

Porsche stunned the motoring world in 2010 when it unveiled the 918 Spyder. The concept car it displayed at that year’s Geneva motor show was no publicity-grabbing special but the starting point for an innovatory breed of supercar: ultra-fast, made of advanced materials, but also in tune with the environmental demands of a new century.

That the 918 was claimed to be capable of near-on 200mph was no surprise. That it would be built of carbon-fibre was no more of a shock. But the way in which it would achieve the goals of its maker was revolutionary for the time: the 918 would be a hybrid, with a massively advanced four-wheel-drive electrical drivetrain supplementing the already potent V8 petrol engine.

This book is the inside story of an extraordinary engineering adventure. Written by a marque expert and with copious testimony from those most closely involved with the 918’s design and development, it reveals how the team at Porsche rose to the challenge of creating what was at the time surely the world’s most technologically-rich motor car.

Accompanying the authoritative text is an exhaustively detailed chassis listing that gives the fullest information possible on the specification of each and every 918 Spyder made. The first time such an initiative has been undertaken for a car only just out of production, this is a major publishing ‘first’ to which future generations of historians will be indebted.