This is the car superheroes would have killed for! A never-used 1999 Mercedes-Benz CLK GTR Roadster is going under hammer and it might just deserve every cent. The car only has 4 miles (6 km) on the clock.
Only six of these roofless roadsters were made, from which five were LHD and one with RHD. The fully functional car that will be auctioned next month belongs, so far, to a Dutch collector and Mercedes enthusiast. He bought it in 1999, when it was just coming out of the plant lines, brought it home by a tow truck, but never drove it.
The CLK GTR looking like some old Batmobile is set to go on auction on June 26, at a Bonhams event that will take place during this year’s edition of Goodwood Festival of Speed. The superhero car is expected to fetch between £1.4 million to £1.8 million ($2.17 million to $2.79 million or €1.95 million to €2.51 million). Quite an investment, we’d say, as the owner only paid almost $1.6 million when he purchased it, sixteen years ago.
On October 28, 2009, the unique RHD versions of the coupe and the roadster, owned by Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah of Brunei, were sold for $ 824,609 (coupe) and $ 973,834 USD (roadster).
This model is somewhat a fail story. First-ever mid-engined race car from Mercedes, the carbon fiber-bodied coupe was meant to compete against major rivals like Porsche and Ferrari in the FIA GT Championship series. Eventually, it only spawned a street-legal version, due to the FIA regulations of that time, which dictated that manufacturers had to sell at least 25 units of each car model, in order to be permitted to run in the category. Unhappilly, the class was discontinued in 1999, but Mercedes respected the rules and their partner AMG built 26 units (20 coupes and 6 roadsters).
Never driven, but surely speedy. Beneath its superhero vehicle car skin, this Mercedes GTR hides an almighty 6.9-liter V12 engine, pomping 612 HP and 775 Nm of torque tuned by Ilmor Engineering who increase the displacement from 6.0 litre to 6.9 litre. These figures help the Mercedes-Benz CLK GTR Roadster hit the 100 km/h milestone from a standstill in just 3.8 seconds. Its maximum speed can reach 200 mph (320 km/h).
The roadster version is slightly different from the coupe version. The engine cover was redesigned and, behind the seats, there are two integrated roll-bars, that have a double role for safety and for increasing the rigidity of the body. The front grille is different from the coupe, having the Mercedes star in it instead of the placing above the bonnet.
According to Guiness Book, in 1999, the CLK GTR coupe version was the most expensive production car ever made with a list price of $1,547,620.
