W154 for Donington

One of the most famous of all pre-war racing cars will return to Donington Park this spring to take pride of place at a silver edition of the Vintage Sports Car Club’s annual ‘See Red’ race meeting.

One of the mighty Mercedes-Benz W154s will travel from the Mercedes Heritage Centre in Germany to be demonstrated over the weekend of May 31/June 1. Tony Dron will be entrusted with demonstrating the car, which last ran at Donington in May 1999. The 1938 3-litre supercharged machine delivered around 450bhp.

A quartet of W154s arrived at Donington in October 1938, ranged against four Auto Unions for the Donington Grand Prix. The Mercedes driver line-up included Englishman Richard Seaman, who finished third, and the race meeting this spring will again celebrate Seaman, the first British driver to compete for a foreign works team.

“We have convinced Mercedes to bring a W154 back to Donington to celebrate the 70th anniversary of that great event and to support the Seaman Trophy races, which are an essential element of this meeting,” said Mike Stripe of the VSCC. The club was the last organiser to hold a race meeting at Donington, on August 12, 1939, before the outbreak of WWII.

The Vintage Seaman and Historic Seaman Trophies will be for pre-1931 and pre-1941 cars respectively, while the Williams Monaco Trophy is for pre-1934 two-seat Grand Prix cars.

Other races will include the White House Memorial Team Relay race, a Motor Racing Legends Pre-War Sports Car Race and an Edwardian race for 1908-1919 cars.