After presiding over last year’s record-breaking auction of the Ferrari F2003-GA, RM Sotheby’s is offering another one of the Maranello marque’s legendary F1 cars piloted by Michael Schumacher – as part of its ongoing ’50 Years New in Asia’ festivities.
Driven to victory during Schumacher’s first championship-winning season with Ferrari, this F1-2000 (chassis no. 198) was initially meant to be a spare car for the revered world champ.
Instead, according to Sotheby’s catalogue essay, it “proved vital to the success of Schumacher’s Championship-winning 2000 season”: most famously, giving him the competitive edge over erstwhile rival Mika Häkkinen at that year’s Brazilian Grand Prix.
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Over the next 11 GPs, Schumacher would go on to pilot this F1-2000 to pole position on 8 different occasions; with the car’s groundbreaking engineering also helping to clinch Ferrari its first Formula One Drivers’ World Championship in over two decades.
Estimated to fetch somewhere in the realm of US$9.5 million – a relatively conservative assessment, considering chassis 198’s historicity – autophiles on the ground in Hong Kong are actually able to get up close and personal with this piece of racing history. The car is currently on display at the HKCEC (until 5 April).
