The last time I sat in a McLaren was in July 1995. It was the Gordon Murray designed F1. This particular example belonged to Ray Bellm who, along with Mark Blundell and Maurizio Sandro Sala, had brought the duck egg blue and orange Gulf Oil liveried machine home to fourth place at the legendary Le Mans 24 Hours a couple of weeks earlier. Two other McLarens had come come first and third. Not a bad debut. As ever in those days, I was there.

For an item on the BBC, Bellm was about to hurl this mid engined 6.1 litre V12 super light racer and me around the circuitous race track at Castle Donington, Leicestershire, whilst I recorded a running commentary and interview with my cold eyed tormentor. Well, that was the plan. What my producer, who had rigged up the car and my helmet with recording gizmos, was presented with was 20 minutes of hysterical gibbering and squawked expletives, from which he had to harvest something broadcastable. I think, with deft editing, we managed six minutes in the end. Listening back, there was no hiding the raw fear in the staccato studded noise emanating from my larynx. I was reminded - again - why I wasn’t a racing driver. Those that can etc…

When I was hauled out of the car I felt that my vital organs had been ripped from their sinuous anchors and were all floating about within me. For a day I stumbled about like a drunken giddy goat. The tinnitus-like ringing in my ears took longer to clear. Some events in life remain seared forever on the cerebellum. This is one of ’em.

Only 106 F1s were ever built between 1992 and 1998, including all racing variants. Bellm’s car was one of only 28 GTR racers. This extraordinary feat of iron fist in a delicate velvet glove of engineering was then the world’s fastest road car and is still regarded by many as the finest supercar of them all. Even given its era and what in the subsequent 25 years it is now up against, it’s hard to disagree. Gordon Murray and McLaren built this thing without compromise. They now change hands for northwards of £12Million.

Seamlessly scrolling forward to a week in late October 2016, a full 21 years on, and I find myself driving three new McLarens. After an 18 year hiatus, McLaren is back building road cars under the aegis of McLaren Automotive, a separate arm of the former World Championship winning Formula 1 GP team, but working from the same futuristic site in Woking, Surrey.

I shall, in the near future, tell you all I can about the staggeringly fast 650S and the slightly softened and marginally more practical 570GT, but today it’s about my favourite of the triumvirate - not to mention my favourite car of 2016 - the 570S. McLaren Automotive’s first offering in 2011 was called the MP4-12C. Clumsily monikered but reportedly well screwed together yet, when I first saw one it didn’t make me tingle. Somehow the styling, now so pant-wettingly gorgeous,was off cue, especially around the front end. The 650S showed how this young company reacted to punters and pundits. No surprise that it was in profit after just two years. That’s probably a first.

The all new, um, ’entry level’ 570S (562bhp) shares the same basic twin turbo 3.litre V8 which, with various levels of output, propels all current McLaren cars.

From every angle the detailing is exquisite and dramatic. The sense of theatre is galvanised by dihedral doors (scissors to thee and me). And while we’re on drama, let’s get the schoolboy factoids out of the way. 0 - 60 is dispatched in 3.2 seconds, while the ton comes up in just 6.3, which is mightily impressive to experience first hand. Top whack is a sufficient 204mph.

Like its cousins from the stable, the chassis tub is constructed of carbon fibre, stronger than steel and a fraction of the weight. As standard the huge brake discs are carbon ceramic - natch. As tested the car comes in at £148,150, over £52K less than the 650S Coupe. This in part is achieved by not fitting active aerodynamics that flap up and down at speed or under heavy deceleration. The 570’s suspenders are also less complex…not that I noticed.

Our friends in Woking will tell you that tyne 570S is a daily driver, pitching it against the Audi R8 and Porsche 911 Turbo, reviewed here earlier in the year. Well it is, sort of. But first you must master graceful ingress and egress over the high and wide sill. Best practise this in the middle of nowhere, especially if wearing a frock. Be aware, when parking in town you absolutely will have a camera phone-toting audience recording your every move, so don’t be dragging your knuckles on the kerb. Probably wise to lay off the pork pies and all…and travel light. The aforementioned R8 and 911 have all-wheel-drive and more space for stuff which in our real world of UK winters does make ’em more practical but, when the rain has cleared and the road ahead opens up, it’s the McLaren driver who’ll be sporting the biggest and most expensive grin.

Seat adjustment is a fiddle, the side squab-mounted control buttons are virtually up against the transmission tunnel. The long and delicate fingers of a concert pianist help here. Mercifully I’m thus blessed.

The 7 speed twin clutch may not be quite as quick as that on the R8, but I’m not sure, to be honest. What I can proclaim with certainty, however, is that no car I have ever driven steers as sweetly and as directly as this, and that includes the old mechanical - not electric - system in 911s of yore. More wonderment can be heaped on the chassis, the superb traction and lateral grip. Sublime.

Supercars in this league look intimidating which, to a degree, is the point; scary and other worldly - not a car for mere mortals. But this mortal wore it like a glove, the car shrinking around me as confidence in it grew.