Mercedes streamliner sells for €51m, becoming most expensive F1 car ever auctioned

F1

A Mercedes W196 R streamliner F1 car raced by Juan Manuel Fangio and Stirling Moss has become the most expensive Grand Prix car ever sold at auction

1954-Mercedes-Benz-W-196-R-Stromlinienwagen_1293472x

Mercedes W196 R could become most expensive F1 car of all time – if it sells

Mercedes

This Mercedes W196 R, as raced to victory by Juan Manuel Fangio, has become the most valuable grand prix car ever to sell at auction.

The 1960s single-seater, cloaked in sleek slipstreamer bodywork, sold for €51.155m (£42.75m) after an intense bidding war at an RM Sotheby’s sale in Stuttgart where it was the only lot.

Even Janis Joplin would have underestimated the amount of divine intervention needed to become the new owner: the hammer price is more than double the previous auction record for a Formula 1 car of £19m, set by a non-streamliner W196 in 2013. It’s also the second-highest sum ever paid for any car at auction, behind another Mercedes – the 300 SLR ‘Uhlenhaut’ Coupe that sold for €135m in 2022.

“What a thrilling auction that was!” said Marcus Breitschwerdt, CEO of Mercedes-Benz Heritage, after watching the bidding war between several buyers both in person and on phones.

“I congratulate the lucky buyer. Very few Mercedes-Benz Silver Arrows are privately owned.”

As well as winning at the hands of Fangio in the 1955 non-championship Buenos Aires Grand Prix, the streamliner was used by Stirling Moss to set the fastest lap at Monza.

Mercedes donated the car to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum in 1965, which put the car up for sale at the February 2025 auction.

Juan Manuel Fangio Buenos Aires GP 1955 Mercedes

Fangio at the wheel of 00009/54 in Buenos Aires

Mercedes

More cars from Indianapolis will be sold later this year as the circuit clears out its non-IndyCar vehicles in a series of sales that could raise almost £100m, as it makes its collection more US-focused and secures the financial future of its museum.

“It’s hard to describe the significance of this sale,” said Gord Duff, global head of auctions for RM Sotheby’s. “This car is simply one of the most important racing cars in history and it’s an honour for RM Sotheby’s to sell it so successfully to benefit the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum.”

The W196 was developed by Mercedes to enter the 1954 world championship, the first time the Silver Arrows had entered grand prix racing since WWII.

The car proved a revelation, as the team claimed a 1-2 on its debut at the 1954 French GP at Reims, Fangio heading home Karl Kling.

2 1954-Mercedes-Benz-W-196-R-Stromlinienwagen_1293472x

Last record F1 sale was also a Mercedes F1 streamliner

Mercedes

The Argentinian would use the car to claim the ’54 and ’55 titles, the Merc winning nine of the 12 world championship GPs it entered.

Fangio drove W196 chassis number 00009/54, the one being auctioned this weekend, minus the streamlined-bodywork during victory at a home non-championship race in Buenos Aires at the start of the ’55 season.

From the archive

Having claimed a famous Argentine GP win two weeks earlier, the Formula Libre Buenos Aires event was used by Mercedes to do further in-race testing.

Held over two 30-lap heats, Fangio would finish 10.5sec behind Giuseppe Farina in the opening round, before coming home second again in the next.

However, once the times were combined a margin of 11.9sec over young team-mate Moss and more than half a minute on the Ferrari of Farina was enough to secure the win on aggregate.

But after the introduction of new short wheel-base W196 thereafter, the streamliner became a rare sight. While it had been mighty at Reims, a circuit with only three real corners, it proved ineffective at tracks with mid-speed and fast turns, having a tendency to understeer.

It appeared at two further races in 1954: the British and Italian GPs, then made a return at Monza in 1955 when the longer-wheelbase chassis 54 was fitted with streamliner bodywork and brought back for Moss, the car running second and setting the fastest lap before the Brit had to retire with reliability issues.

4 1954-Mercedes-Benz-W-196-R-Stromlinienwagen_1293472x

Moss at the wheel of car in its streamliner bodywork in Monza

Mercedes

This would be the final world championship appearance for chassis 54. Mercedes withdrew from motor sport activities at the end of the year after the Le Mans ’55 disaster in its driver Pierre Levegh crashed into the crowd, killing himself and 83 spectators.

Chassis 54 remained in Stuttgart until it was donated – still in its stromlinienwagen bodywork – by Mercedes in 1965 to the then-new IMS Museum, where it has remained ever since.

The Mercedes is the first of an 11-car collection being sold which also includes the 1965 Le Mans-winning Ferrari 250 LM and Craig Breedlove’s Spirit of America Land Speed Record contender.

3 1954-Mercedes-Benz-W-196-R-Stromlinienwagen_1293472x

Car is being sold to fund IMS museum restoration

RM Sotheby’s

IMS hopes to raise £95m from the combined sale, with the restoration of its museum set for completion in April 2025.

“The Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum has been honoured to care for and share the W 196 R within our museum, but the sum it has achieved today is a transformative contribution to increase our endowment and long-term sustainability as well as the restoration and expansion of our collection, “said museum president Joe Hale.

Comments

Loading Comments