Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR Uhlenhaut Coupé, Swedish Grand Prix 1955 #15

Kristianstad, 7 August 1955: the Swedish Grand Prix for sports cars on the Råbelövsbanan road circuit, held a few weeks after the Le Mans disaster, with Juan Manuel Fangio leading Stirling Moss home in a Mercedes one-two. The works team brought a practice car, and it was this one: the first 300 SLR coupé, chassis 0007/55, registered W22 6962. Rudolf Uhlenhaut drove it to Sweden himself and in practice covered 122 miles of the circuit at racing speed. It was the coupé's first public appearance. He had conceived it that spring, after the Mille Miglia, as a closed 300 SLR for the long endurance races of 1956: the same fuel-injected straight-eight and tubular spaceframe, wrapped in a gullwing body. Mercedes withdrew at the end of 1955, and the coupé never raced.

This CMC edition carries a red 15 on the right-hand rear wing only, the same side as the exhaust, with W22-6962 plates at either end. Inside it is all blue: blue leather, blue tartan seat facings and a wood-rimmed wheel ahead of the gauges. The gullwings lift on their stays, the bonnet opens over the inclined engine, and the boot reveals a spare wire wheel. The wire wheels pair stainless spokes with knock-off hub nuts. A limited edition of 1,000 pieces; CMC builds it at 1:18.