Press Release

21.5-liter record-breaker

1909 was a special year in the history of Benz & Cie, crowned by the achievements of a record-breaking car which has sealed its place in automotive folklore as one of the most inspirational models ever made. Powered by a quite awe-inspiring 21.5-liter 200-horsepower engine, the “Blitzen-Benz” reduced the then mythical 200 km/h landmark to a footnote in history. No other road-going vehicle could compete, whilst the world’s fastest trains and even the aircraft of the time were left gasping in its wake. A land-speed record which remained intact for eight years represents a suitable legacy for this era-defining vehicle. Of the six Blitzen-Benz ever made, two survive – Mercedes-Benz owns one, the other is the muse of a US collector. However, now another American enthusiast has found a way to gain entry into this exclusive club, working closely with Mercedes-Benz Classic to create a reproduction of the Blitzen-Benz containing a number of genuine parts.

Faster than any plane, train or automobile

The Benz name is synonymous with the development of the automobile, and with good reason. It was, after all, Karl Benz who on January 29, 1886 was granted the patent which now serves as the birth certificate of the motor car. Just a few weeks later, Gottlieb Daimler’s motorized carriage turned its first wheels. As the 1800s gave way to the final century of the millennium, Benz towered over the world’s auto makers, the cars produced at the Mannheim factory earning an enviable reputation for practicality and reliability.

These were relatively rare qualities among the cars populating the roads at the time. A slew of new auto brands had emerged from nowhere, forcing Benz to recognize that a resonant name was not in itself enough to guarantee success in a marketplace with little structure or pattern. The company’s rivals, not least Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft, had latched onto the potential of motor sport success as an advertising tool. Despite competing in a series of events, Benz had resisted the temptation to follow suit, preferring to accentuate the virtues of its affordable cars in everyday use.

However, after investigating ways of increasing competitiveness, Julius Ganss – a member of the company’s board of management – came to the conclusion that even Benz could not afford to ignore the intricacies of modern market mechanisms. With a thorough appreciation of the qualities inherent in the company’s models, he knew that Benz was perfectly equipped to build a sports car which could outstrip any other form of transport at the time – trains and aircraft included.

In early 1909 the board gave the green light to construction of a car which would glide effortlessly through the magic 200 km/h barrier. Providing the thrust to match the rhetoric was the 150-hp engine from the grand-prix racer, yet even this output fell short of what was required to fulfill such an ambitious brief. In the hour of need, the engineers fell back on a trusted method and bumped displacement up to 21.5 liters – setting a standard no other racing or record-chasing car produced by Benz & Cie., Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft or Daimler Benz AG would ever reach again. The engine developed 184 hp at 1500 rpm in its original incarnation, before some technical trickery saw this figure rise to 200 hp at 1600 rpm. Weighing in at 407 kg, it was almost as imposing in its sheer physical size as in the power it produced.

Although the engine with serial number 5100 first saw action in the chassis and under the body of the Benz grand-prix car, it was known within the company as the 200-hp Benz, in line with the usual naming method. On August 22, 1909 Fritz Erle – a designer at Benz and later head of the testing and motor sport departments – stormed to victory in the one-kilometer race in Frankfurt/Main in double-quick time. Erle covered the kilometer with flying start in 22.6 seconds, equivalent to an average speed of 159.3 km/h and enough to earn him the Grand Duchess of Hesse prize.

Mission accomplished: A record-breaking car is born

The car had retained the body of the grand-prix model and entered events under this designation. Victor Héméry drove the 200-hp machine for the first time on October 17, totally outclassing the competition in a sprint race in Brussels. And the tarmac had barely had time to dry on the newly opened Brooklands circuit in England when the Benz works driver arrived on November 8, 1909 to set a new land-speed record. Héméry covered the one-kilometer distance from a flying start at an average speed of 202.7 km/h, breaking the all-important 200 km/h mark for the first time in Europe and proving that the car was capable of fulfilling its raison d’être. This was, after all, a machine built to break records, and other new milestones were soon to follow. The kilometer from a standing start was completed in 31.326 seconds and the mile recorded in 41.268 seconds, equaling the mark set by Darracq.

Whilst the car was competing in these early races against rivals and clock, the engineers back in Mannheim were working feverishly to develop a new and aerodynamic body variant. The work was completed in late 1909 and the Benz finally took on a stylistic character very much of its own. Erle and Héméry made the car as narrow as possible in order to reduce wind resistance to a minimum, which explains why the gearshift and handbrake levers and the exhaust system were located outside the car body, with only bulges in the hood giving the exhaust rocker arms the space they required. The high-standing, narrow radiator core was accommodated behind a brass grille, whose upper end formed an expansion tank pointing out sharply from the front of the car. This “bird’s beak” helped to give the record-breaking machine its striking and somewhat aggressive appearance, whilst at the rear of the car the body tapered off into a pointed tail. When it came to the seat positions, the driver and co-driver – whose job it was to operate the hand-operated gasoline pump – were literally shoulder-to-shoulder.

Pushing back the boundaries

The first record-breaking outings of the 200-hp Benz provided early indications that this was a model destined to push back the boundaries. Indeed, the speeds which this bull of a car was aiming for meant that it quickly outgrew the confines of European race circuits. Benz & Cie. knew that this would not be a problem in the USA and the decision was quickly taken to cross the Atlantic. Achieving further success with the record-breaking car in the States – an important overseas market – would not be bad for business, at any rate.

And so, after completing a series of trial runs around Mannheim, the car was shipped off to America in January 1910, new body and all. The plan was for George Robertson to go head-to-head with the car against Ralph de Palma, who held records on a host of American circuits. However, not everything went according to plan.

After discovering that Jesse Froehlich had taken delivery of the car, event manager Ernie Moross proposed a deal with the New York-based Benz importer: his 150-hp grand-prix Benz plus 6,000 dollars in exchange for the record-breaking racer. The wily businessman even had a catchy name in mind – this was a lightning-fast car, so why not call it the “Lightning Benz”. The name was painted onto his new purchase.

Moross’ driver Barney Oldfield duly lined up at Daytona Beach in Florida on March 17, 1910 without any kind of specific preparation for his first record attempt – and duly posted a new world best of 211.97 km/h. However, the A.I.A.C.R. (Association Internationale des Automobile Clubs Reconnus), the highest authority in car racing and the precursor to the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA) which governs motor sport today, refused to recognize the record because the Benz had not covered the distance in the opposite direction as well – as specified in the competition guidelines – with the average from the two runs determining the valid speed.

Undeterred, Moross organized a series of show events for the “Lightning Benz”. However, the car’s name was soon to lose its sheen in the eyes of its restless owner, who replaced it with the German translation “Blitzen-Benz” – presumably with the aim of further accentuating the car’s roots – and had a small German Imperial Eagle painted onto the right-hand side of the hood.