WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE ASCARI KZ1?

It seemed to have it all: carbonfibre construction, 500bhp BMW M-sport V8, 200mph top speed and a dusting of Lotus handling magic. So what became of the KZ1?

- PETER TOMALIN

HORACIO PAGANI HAD H shown that it could be done: the outlandish Zonda was proof that an unknown really could break into the supercar club previously the Lamborghini, Porsche and a small handful of others. Pagani proved that you didn't need decades of preserve of only Ferrari, heritage; you didn't need to go racing; you didn't even need to build your own engine. After the launch of the Zonda in 1999, the received wisdom no longer applied.

Enter, in the early 2000s, another successful, car-mad entrepreneur with a dream: Dutchman Klaas Zwart. Just like Pagani, Zwart's dream was to build his own mid-engined supercar. His too would be a purist driver's car, fully carbonfibre in construction and powered by a bought-in German engine: where the Zonda had its AMG V12, the KZ1 would have a BMW Motorsport V8, tuned to a nice round 500bhp. In a car with a claimed kerb weight of 1300kg, that was enough for Ascari to cite 0-60mph in sub-4.0sec and a 200mph top speed. Pagani territory...

Klaas Zwart certainly wasn't lacking in ambition or belief. There was a pristine new production facility and top engineering talent; a sales target was initially set at 100 cars a year, and there were plans to go GT racing. Acres of press coverage followed; there were memorable appearances on Top Gear. And then...

The sales simply never materialised. Ascari took the KZ1 racing, with some success, but road car sales never amounted to more than a trickle and after a few years the adventure was over, the production facility closed and sold. So what went wrong? We tracked down some of the key players to get their take. What we uncovered was a classic tale of what might have been.