190E 2.5-16 Evolution I

STORY

Homologation specials rarely come wilder than this. To keep its 190 competitive in Germany's ferocious DTM touring car championship, Mercedes built exactly 502 examples of the 2.5-16 Evolution II in the summer of 1990. Every one was road-legal, left-hand drive, and utterly unmistakable.

The party piece is the enormous adjustable rear wing, so large that a strip of trim had to be added to the rear window to satisfy a rule about the driver's rearward view. Together with flared arches and a deep front splitter, the aero actually lowered drag while adding downforce. The Cosworth-based 2.5-litre four was reworked to 232 hp and paired with a dogleg five-speed and a limited-slip differential.

On track it worked: in 1992 Klaus Ludwig's AMG Evo II took five wins and the DTM title. Today it is one of the most collectible Mercedes of its era.