There’s no doubt that the McLaren P1, Porsche 918 Spyder and Ferrari LaFerrari are about as extreme as modern-day road cars get. But, if you cast your mind back to the mid-1990s, both Porsche and Mercedes-Benz offered super-exclusive race cars that took the extreme road car dial to new extremes.
The Porsche 911 GT1 and Mercedes-Benz CLK GTR were both offered as road cars to allow their racing counterparts to compete in the FIA GT Championship. Porsche’s road variant, dubbed the GT1 Strassenversion, was limited to just 25 examples and is absolutely phenomenal. However, the GT1 featured below is even more special.
As the racing livery suggests, this GT1 isn’t a Strassenversion and was actually once a fully-fledged racing car that has been converted for street use. Among the changes include the fitment of catalytic converters, road-legal tires and softer springs and dampers.
In its racing days, this GT1 came second in its category at the 1998 Daytona 24 Hours and continues to be powered by a 3.2-liter flat-six engine delivering 600 hp. That grunt only needs to push around 1,000 kg (2,200 lbs), making this car monumentally fast.
You can keep your hybrid hypercars, we’d take this without a second thought.