There are few ways to wake up at 9am. You can hear birds. You can hear your alarm. You can hear your neighbor mowing the lawn.
Or, if you are Gareth Edwards of Pembroke, Wales, you can receive a notification informing you that a woman with an Asda shopping bag has chosen your McLaren 570S as her personal stress ball. Security footage showed the woman walking onto the driveway and planting kicks into the yellow supercar listed for sale at £72,995 (approx., $97,000).
It was neither a theft nor a carjacking. Just, apparently, an unsolicited performance review that’s certainly not the best way to wake up at 9am.
The 33-year-old owner watched in disbelief as a total stranger booted the McLaren before contacting Dyfed-Powys Police. By the end of the episode, the damage amounted to two hairline scratches and one internet discussion that achieved escape velocity.
Britain’s Most Expensive Therapy Session
The comments section beneath the Daily Mail report on this story split into camps with the efficiency of a civil war. One group questioned why anyone would leave a £73,000 McLaren outside without a garage.
Another questioned whether a McLaren 570S can even be bought for £73,000. A third group settled into the oldest pastime known to humanity, which is accusing strangers of jealousy. Then there was the elephant in the driveway.
Many readers wondered whether the woman needed help rather than ridicule. None of us knows her circumstances. No motive has emerged. Police have not identified her publicly, and no charges have been announced.
The footage is funny (the McLaren’s owner isn’t amused, obviously) because it is absurd. It is also the sort of thing that prompts an uncomfortable thought. A person carrying groceries does not usually detour into combat with an exotic supercar.
Mental health conversations tend to happen after celebrities publish memoirs or athletes speak out. They rarely begin with a woman delivering roundhouse kicks to a McLaren before lunch. Yet here we are.
The McLaren 570S Is Not Exactly a Corolla
The other running joke concerns the value of the car itself. Commenters scoffed at the £72,995 asking price, as if Gareth had listed a Fabergé egg beside the recycling bins. Others pointed out that the McLaren 570S has entered the phase of supercar ownership where people discover that depreciation exists.
The 570S launched as an entry point into McLaren ownership. It packed a twin turbocharged V8 with more than 560 horsepower and enough acceleration to rearrange internal organs. Today, examples trade for sums that provoke identity crises.
It is too expensive to treat like a hatchback. It is too attainable to impress people who measure wealth by yacht length. The sharp-witted Tyrion Lannister would say; a wise man said a used McLaren is the only car capable of making someone say, “Only £73,000?” with a straight face.
If This Happened in America…
Britain’s version of events involved CCTV footage, a police report, and public appeals for identification. The American version writes itself.
A Ring camera notification goes off. The homeowner bursts outside in pajama pants and flip-flops. Three neighbors appear from nowhere carrying coffee mugs and unsolicited legal advice. Someone livestreams the confrontation.
Within hours, cable news panels debate property rights. Lawyers launch podcasts. State statutes become dinner conversation. And yours truly dutifully publishes the story on Yahoo and everywhere else you get your news.
Depending on geography, the ending ranges from awkward trespass charges to a far darker outcome. Think five to hundred gunshots to the abdomen. It is never one gunshot in America. Instead, Pembroke received a peculiarly British climax.
Two scratches. Ninety-one comments. An Asda bag. And a McLaren owner who probably never imagined his greatest threat would not be potholes, insurance premiums, or depreciation. It would be a stranger who woke up one morning and decided to settle an argument nobody else knew they were having.