The alloy fascia with analogue instruments has the feel of old-fashioned, burnished quality. You can choose your colour or combination of colours for the interior for the basic price of £810,345 (if you want safety belts to match it’s an extra £24,000). Compare that with the F1, which is more like an overgrown go-kart with no comforts, just a big carbon-fibre baby seat for the driver, a three-point harness and a smell of petrol.

Thomas Bscher, the suave former banker who is now Bugatti’s president, used to own an F1. He drove it to work every day for two years from his home in Cologne to his office in Frankfurt before selling it in 2003 to an American collector Miles Collier. He doesn’t like comparing the two cars but says the Veyron is better in every respect bar one: the McLaren was lighter (“. . . although it didn’t feel it. It felt much heavier than it was”).

Bscher won’t reveal who his customers are but confirms 60 Veyrons have been ordered by discreetly wealthy buyers — “old money” car enthusiasts as opposed to internet entrepreneurs or gangsta rappers. One of the first cars, an all-black model, has been bought by Ralph Lauren, a man who already owns an F1 and, according to some accounts, two of them.

You can understand why every billionaire wants a Veyron; only 300 will be made and there will probably never be anything like it again. When it was conceived by Ferdinand Piëch, former boss of VW, it was nicknamed Piëch’s folly. The rumour goes that as a youngster Piëch was never satisfied with his hand in Top Trumps and wanted a car that could beat all rivals.

The Veyron is that car. VW’s chances of recouping Piëch’s huge investment are the same as seeing Jeremy Clarkson in a tutu. Already the car’s days are numbered. Within five years Bugatti will have tamed the mighty engine and gearbox and put them in a more practical and slower four-seater car. The Veyron will remain unsurpassed.

We eventually borrowed an F1 from Nick Mason, the drummer from Pink Floyd and author of Into the Red, a book about the world’s best cars. Mason is rich enough not to care whether his McLaren F1 isn’t the fastest road car any more. Indeed, he’s so rich he wants a Veyron.

Nicholas Rufford

VITAL STATISTICS

Model Bugatti Veyron
Engine 7993cc, 16 cylinders
Power 1001bhp @ 6000rpm
Torque 922 lb ft @ 2200rpm
Transmission Seven-speed DSG, manual and auto
Performance 0-62mph: 2.5sec
Top speed: 253mph
Price £810,345
Verdict Masterpiece that gives everything a good spanking
Rating Five stars

Page two: Andrew Frankel on the McLaren F1()Continued from page one

McLAREN F1

The first two days of May 1994 are unlikely to slip my mind. On May 1 Ayrton Senna, the only hero I’ve ever had, was killed, and on May 2 I became the first journalist to test the McLaren F1, a car created by Gordon Murray, who had also designed Senna’s Formula One cars.