Nearly seventy years after the Mercedes W196 R, driven by the legendary Juan Manuel Fangio, won the world championship, this German race car is breaking records again. Historic Formula 1 cars are beloved collectibles, but this Silberpfeil now definitively takes the crown. The W196 R fetched a record-breaking sum of over fifty million euros at an auction this weekend.
The W196 R Stromlinienwagen, as the car is officially named, was auctioned off on Saturday in Stuttgart, the home base of Mercedes-Benz. Experts speculated that the vehicle would fetch a record price, but the anticipated price tag of fifty million euros was even surpassed. The new owner paid a whopping 51,155,000 euros for this piece of Formula 1 history. This makes this Mercedes officially the most expensive Formula 1 car ever. The record was long held by a ‘regular’ version of the W196; in 2013, it went under the hammer for twenty-two million euros. A bargain.
Fangio and Moss
The legendary Juan Manuel Fangio captured two titles with the Mercedes W196 between 1954 and 1955. In total, the car won eleven Grand Prix races. Besides the Argentine champion, Stirling Moss, ‘the best driver who never won a championship’, also sat behind the wheel of a W196. The car auctioned off this weekend was used during the 1955 Italian Grand Prix. It was offered from the collection of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum.
An interesting detail: the W196 R Stromlinienwagen is not the most expensive car ever auctioned, although that record is also held by a Mercedes. In 2022, the 300 SLR Uhlenhaut Coupé was sold from Mercedes’ private collection to a private collector. This model fetched a staggering 135 million euros at the time.
