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Gary Anderson

The theme of commitment by Mercedes-Benz to the highest standards and continuity in the effort threads its way through our May-June issue.

An old joke says that the way to get to Carnegie Hall is to practice, practice, practice. The same thing might be said of Mercedes-Benz. How does an automobile company become the best in the world? Excel, excel, excel. The theme of commitment to the highest standards and continuity in the effort threads its way through our May-June issue.


One highlight is the fourth and last in the series of articles about Daimler trucks and buses written by creative director Stephan McKeown and technical adviser Richard Simonds. For nearly as long as it has been making cars, Daimler has also manufactured trucks and buses, providing efficient mobility to millions of people and transporting goods on every continent in the world.


The company has also  excelled in motorsports for more than 100 years, exemplified in the 1914 Grand Prix car that was presented with the MBCA’s Most Significant Mercedes-Benz award at Amelia Island this year, depicted in our StarStruck feature. Graham Robson talks about that heritage in his article about the drivers of the Silver Arrows of the 1930s.


In 1994, Mercedes-Benz returned to Formula 1 racing, building engines first for Sauber and then McLaren. The company would next become a key player in racing safety in 1996, providing the safety and medical cars used at every F1 event, as described by John Chuhran in his article on the GT S and C63 S Estate used today.


Chuhran also writes about the Mercedes AMG Petronas team, entering F1 in 2010 with a long-term goal of excellence. The team didn’t win its first race until 2012, but in 2013, won its first Constructors Championship with driver Lewis Hamilton winning the Drivers Championship, achievements the team repeated in the next two years.


Rounding out these stories of commitment and continuity, we have our latest dispatch from Fred and Elisabeth Smits, having just left Mexico heading south into Guatemala after completing 18 months and nearly 40,000 miles of their plan to drive around the world in their trusty 1957 220S Ponton. We also continue our review of the various chassis series, reviewing the heritage of the relatively young C-Class, which only began in 1982. Finally, we’re beginning a new series that will discuss how members find, buy and refresh “beautiful bargains” in classic cars, with Blakley Leonard’s story and pictures of his now-desirable 1971 W108 280SE.


Only with Mercedes-Benz and the 130 years of history the company celebrates in 2016 could such stories of commitment and continuity be developed into the magazine we send you six times a year.