When a 1954 Mercedes-Benz W196 R ‘Stromlinienwagen’ race car, campaigned by both Stirling Moss and Juan Manuel Fangio, sold for £42.75 million at an RM Sotheby’s auction in February, it became the most valuable Grand Prix car ever sold.
An extraordinary event in its own right, you might think. And you’d be right. But just two days later, another notable hammer price was achieved by another remarkable car. The 1965 Le Mans-winning Ferrari 250 LM, which had been held in a collection at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum, was sold for £29 million. Not bad either.
The drive or display dilemma
At this point, car collectors began to get excited – and not just because they sensed an opportunity to turn a profit. No, the headline-grabbing sales also ignited an age-old debate among enthusiasts: display it, or drive it?
‘There isn’t a correct answer,’ car collector and Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason explained to Spear’s in an exclusive interview. ‘Probably 1 per cent of interesting cars are in museums; thousands of amateur curators are totally against cars being there just to please enthusiasts.’
Meanwhile, Peter Wallman, UK & EMEA chairman of RM Sotheby’s, answers the question of whether to display or drive with another query of his own: ‘Have you ever heard the W196 R in action? Have you ever heard what it sounds like? Anyone that hasn’t ought to, because that’s a huge part of its appeal, and the appeal of any motor car, racing or not, is the wonderful sounds they make.’
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Marc Priestley, a broadcaster, classic car restorer and former McLaren F1 mechanic, can’t disguise his out-and-out racer genes: ‘I’ll always be an advocate for seeing cars like these back where they belong – on a racetrack – but if I’d spent £42.75 million on one myself, I might see it differently…’
Powered by a 257bhp in-line eight-cylinder engine, with a top speed of 186mph, the W196 R ‘Stromlinien-wagen’, or ‘Streamliner’, had its biggest win at the 1955 Buenos Aires Grand Prix, driven by five-times F1 champion Fangio. Later that year, Moss set the fastest lap at the Italian Grand Prix at Monza on its final outing in 1955, averaging 134mph before being forced to retire.
The issue for historic race cars in 2025, Mason says, is that once owners start racing a car, they inevitably get caught up in attempting to make it go faster. In so doing, they can often remove a great deal of its originality. He adds that Lord March, the man behind the strictly period-only Goodwood Revival race meeting, seems to be addressing this. The event has become much more strict on the modifications that can be made to the cars.
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‘Otherwise it becomes a “silhouette” formula,’ says Mason, who explains that while the cars may look old on the outside, they can be highly modified on the inside – whether for safety or speed. Sometimes these souped-up old stagers can go several seconds per lap faster than they did in their heyday. ‘We definitely need to retain some [originality] – to chart the history and technical development of how things were done. There’s certainly a move at concours events – Pebble Beach in particular – to look for original cars: not restored, but preserved.’
In terms of racing, Mason reckons older race cars are fine for amateur enthusiasts to drive, but more modern ‘historics’, such as F1 cars, which can be tremendously fast, should really only be driven by professionals. The Floyd drummer’s own collection – most of which he has raced – includes a 1929 Bugatti Type 3 and a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO. The latter is now worth around £40 million and has twice made it on to the podium at Goodwood. (It has also been used for touring and even a family wedding.)
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‘But I was getting to the point at which I was worrying about the value,’ says Mason of his decision to retire the car from racing, where near-misses and ‘shunts’ can easily occur, especially if you are unlucky enough to find yourself sharing the track with a ‘madman’. Some ‘battle scars’ can add value to a historic car – but only if the dings in question were incurred while a great like Fangio was at the wheel. What’s more, replacing old parts with new can yield undesirable results. ‘There are some hopelessly over-restored cars,’ notes Mason.
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For RM Sotheby’s chief Peter Wallman, there is no doubt. ‘The whole point of motor cars is they’re not really showing what they’re capable of if they’re static in a museum,’ he says. Historic cars ‘are one of the few collectible asset classes – you might like to call them “passion assets” – that have that dynamic quality. They should be seen, they should be enjoyed, they should be shared.’ However, he doesn’t advise throwing caution to the wind: ‘I think due care should always be taken and the circumstances under which [historic race cars] are driven have to be carefully managed.’
‘People do have accidents,’ says Mason. ‘I’d advise if you want to go racing, then maybe not in a £42 million vehicle; join the Historic Grand Prix Cars Association, where you’ll be surrounded by like-minded people who all know each other, learn how other competitors drive – and know who the madmen are.’
This article first appeared in Spear’s Magazine Issue 95. Click here to subscribe
