With the birth of the FIA’s GT Championship in 1997, Mercedes-Benz instructed AMG to create something very special. AMG were tasked to create a racing car which could also be converted to road use in the design vein of the CLK. The difficult brief resulted in a car which utterly dominated the GT Championship; the Mercedes-AMG CLK GTR. As with the regulations of the GT Championship, 25 road cars were required to race, a rule which led to an equally astonishing road car by the same name. Sold only to Mercedes’ best customers (including the Sultan of Brunei who purchased the only right hand drive CLK GTR), Mercedes aimed to produce a racing car for the road, a goal they succeeded in, only toning down the road GTR’s with air conditioning, leather upholstery and slight aerodynamic tweaks.
Being as close to the race car as possible, the road CLK GTR’s featured a paddle shift gearbox, one of the earliest in a road car and Merc’s own 6.9-litre V12 producing 612hp; enough to push the GTR to 214mph. To top it all off, Mercedes built 6 special edition roadster CLK GTR’s. Being such an incredible car, it’s no wonder it was the most expensive available back in 1998, on the market in 1998 for $1.5 million USD.
Main image credit:
en.wheelsage.org/amg/mercedes_benz_clk_gtr/
