Legendary Mercedes driven by five-time F1 champion sold for £42.7MILLION – more than double previous record – at auction

AN ICONIC Mercedes Formula One car has made past by doubling the grounds for the astir costly Grand Prix car ever sold.

The striking metallic Mercedes W196 R Stromlinienwage, chassis fig 00009/54, was sold for a staggering £42.7million (€52.92m) by an unnamed buyer.

One of lone 4 implicit versions ever built, it is lone 1 of the astir celebrated racing cars ever made having been driven by five-time F1 champion Juan Manuel Fangio and British icon Sir Stirling Moss.

Boasting a apical velocity of 186mph, the singular instrumentality that typifies the "Silver Arrows" nickname claimed triumph connected its debut successful 1955 astatine the Buenos Aires Grand Prix, but with a cigar shaped open-wheel design.

It won 5 much races that play to triumph some the driver's and constructors' championship.

The car was sold by RM Sotheby's connected behalf of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway (IMS) astatine the Mercedes-Benz Museum successful Stuttgart, Germany.

The erstwhile grounds for the astir costly expansive prix car sold besides belongs to a Fangio-driver Mercedes, the 1954 Mercedes W196 which sold astatine Goodwood, England for £19.6m ($29.6m) successful 2013.

However, it pales successful examination to the astir costly sports car ever sold.

That rubric belongs to 300SLR Uhlenhaut Coupe, which was sold successful May 2022 for £113m ($140m).

The W196 R was donated to the IMS by Mercedes successful 1965, and was held for astir 60 years earlier being auctioned disconnected to rise funds for the museum's restoration efforts.

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IMS curator, Jason Vansickle, said: "It's a beauteous car, it's a precise historical car, it's conscionable a small spot extracurricular our scope window.

"We've been fortunate to beryllium stewards of this conveyance for astir 60 years and it has been a large portion successful the depository but with this auction and the proceeds raised, it truly volition let us… to beryllium amended successful the future."

Mercedes withdrew from the motorsport successful 1955 pursuing a Le Mans 24 Hours catastrophe which tragically killed 84 people.

They yet returned successful 2010, wherever they person since won 8 constructors titles and 7 drivers titles - six with Lewis Hamilton and 1 with Nico Rosberg.