​GT1 & GT2 » ​1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12

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​1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12

​​​​One of two factory cars for the 1998 FIA GT Championship, driven by Bernd Schneider and Mark Webber. Winner of the Silverstone 500km and 3rd at Oschersleben. The final V12 CLK GTR race car built.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12 1998 Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12

  • Overview

    One of two factory V12 cars that helped Mercedes win the FIA GT Championship for the second consecutive year in 1998

    The genuine No.1 car, driven by Bernd Schneider and Mark Webber

    Winner of Silverstone 500km, the final win for the V12 before the V8 took over

    Bare tub restoration recently completed

    Substantial history file and equipment to run

    The final V12 CLK GTR race car built 

  • Mercedes CLK GTR 011 V12

    In December of 1996 Mercedes decided to build a car from scratch to contest the fast growing FIA GT1 World Championship in 1997, at the time being won by the most part by the McLaren F1 GTR. 

    Just 128 days was the period from the initial design study to completion of the first two cars, with a further car joining at Nürburgring for the 4th round.  The three cars for the 1997 season were chassis 4,5 & 6 and all ran as full works team cars.

    The CLK had some minor issues at the start of the season from such a short lead-time from design study to racecar. However soon the CLKs winning formula started to kick in and the cars took 6 race wins from 11 races in the 1997 season winning both driver and manufacturer championships.

    For the 1998 season, two of the 1997 cars were passed over and run by the privateer Persson team, whilst our car, carrying number 1, was built new for the factory squad. Mark Webber joined the team for 1998 and partnered '97 World Champion Bernd Schneider to share this car as the defending champions.

    This car made a successful debut at Oschersleben with a 3rd place finish amongst an all CLK GTR podium. The following race was Silverstone and this car topped two of Porsche’s groundbreaking GT1’s to take the overall win. This was the last time that this car would race as for the next round at Hockenheim the Works cars were replaced by the V8 engined CLK LMs which went on to win every remaining race of the season.

    The CLK won both the driver and manufacturer world championship in both 1997 and 1998. In 1999, after Mercedes had won every race in 1998, none of the other competitors entered for the new season, this meant the rules were changed and the cars were effectively outlawed.

In more recent times the car has been a part of two of the worlds most important racecar collections. It received a total bare tub rebuild by an expert ex front line F1 team crew, with a direct connection and help from AMG/HWA. We drove the car for the first time since the rebuild at Donington Park for the 2022 SCD Secret Meet and it ran faultlessly!

Although not raced competitively since the Silverstone win in 1998, this car is eligible for the Endurance Racing Legends series so could return to the track with the golden era of GT1 racers and go wheel to wheel with F1 GTRs, 911 GT1s and more.