On the weekend that sees Formula 1 return to Sin City, RM Sotheby’s are offering Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes-AMG W04 at their Las Vegas auction. Be warned, though… It won’t come cheap!
This particular car, chassis number F1W04-04, was driven by Hamilton in 14 out of the 19 races in his first season at Mercedes after his shock move from McLaren to replace the retiring Michael Schumacher. In it, he picked up four podiums including his maiden win for the team at the 2013 Hungarian GP where he started on pole and went on to win the race by an impressive 10.9 seconds.
As we all know, this win turned out to be the first of many for Sir Lewis and the Silver Arrows. He went on to finish fourth in the championship before winning his first title with the team the following season.
If that doesn’t make this car desirable enough for you, it’s also worth noting that this was the last season of V8-powered F1 cars before the V6-hybrid era began in 2014.
The Mercedes-AMG W04 was propelled by a 2.4-litre naturally aspirated V8 which revved to 18,000rpm and produced, along with some phenomenal noise, 750bhp with an additional 80bhp coming from the kinetic energy recovery system (KERS). It was the first Mercedes-AMG car to front-rear inter-connected suspension giving it new levels of mechanical grip. It was also the last Mercedes to feature that high nose and, at the time, it represented the biggest leap the team had ever made in the performance of its car.
So who is this car for? Well, it saddens me to admit that it’s certainly not for me. The predicted value of $10-15 million has made sure of that. However, there will definitely be some multi-millionaires in town for the race who might want to take home their own slice of Formula 1 history. What an incredible item it’d be to have in their collection.
Photos: RM Sotheby’s
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