1990 Sauber Mercedes C11 Group C - Brutal 5.0L Twin-Turbo V8 Sound at Spa Classic 2024

A Sauber-Mercedes partnership Group C car has been at the top of my list of cars I wished to see for many, many years and at the Spa Classic 2024, it finally happened. Group C cars are probably my favourite class to see and film and they always fill me with some weird feeling of nostalgia despite having been born just after the class' demise. When I first visited Spa during the Classic two years ago (and Hockenheim right after that), I was blown away seeing Group C cars in the flesh and have been left wanting to experience that again since. One very iconic type eluded me at the time and that was any of the Silver Arrows.

The C11 was built as a successor to the incredibly succesful and iconic C9 (which is probably why Mercedes-Benz finally decided to put their name on the car, rather than going with just Sauber) and was the last Group C car the partners built before the rule change to 3.5L naturally aspirated (F1) engines which arguably killed off the class entirely, a few years later. The reliable and incredibly capable engine was a 5.0L twin-turbo V8 which could pump out 730-850 horsepower, depending on the session and- or race length. Completely unrestricted it will even do up to about 950. That might almost be enough to rival Nissan's 1990 R90CK with the famous malfunctioning wastegate pumping out well in excess of 1000 horsepower. The C11 had no driver aids and was geared by a 5 speed manual. What a beautiful recipe for a race car coupled with the insane downforce of a Group C car. This 1990 example had even more downforce than previously as the Le Mans race was not on the official WSC calendar for that year so the low-drag capability was not needed. Unlike the C9, the C11 was also built out of carbon fibre instead of (mostly) aluminium meaning the car was much lighter. This allowed for ballast to be placed where desired to meet the minimum weight of 900kg.

Anyway enough rambling, I hope you enjoy the video despite some shots in pretty miserable conditions. Thank you for watching!

#groupc #mercedes #c11 #spa #v8

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01:30 Racing