Bernd Schneider

Five-time DTM champion who first-tested the Mercedes-Benz CLK GTR for AMG and won the 1997 FIA GT title in that car. Mercedes later stated that twenty-five street-legal CLK GTR Straßenversion cars were built as the homologation series.

He was born in St. Ingbert, Saarland, on 20 July 1964. He sat in a kart at five, became German karting champion in 1980 and won the Junior World Kart Championship the same year. After Formula Ford in 1984 he entered German Formula 3 in 1986 with Kees van de Grint's Team Sonax in a Reynard-Volkswagen, then won the 1987 title with Schübel Rennsport in a Dallara-Volkswagen. Alongside that he drove a Ford Sierra in selected DTM rounds from 1986 to 1989.

In 1988 and 1989 he raced Formula One for Zakspeed. Mercedes-Benz records that he qualified for eight of thirty-two Grands Prix and finished two. In 1990 he started the United States Grand Prix at Phoenix for Arrows and finished twelfth. He then raced Porsche 962s for Kremer and Joest in the Sports Car World Championship and Interserie. From the Nürburgring meeting of 8 September 1991 he took Michael Schumacher's Zakspeed Mercedes DTM seat for four late-season weekends. In 1992 he joined AMG-Mercedes full time.

He finished third in the 1992 and 1993 DTM driving an AMG-Mercedes 190 E 2.5-16 Evolution II, then tenth in 1994. In 1995 he won the DTM with five victories in the V6 AMG-Mercedes C-Class and also took the parallel International Touring Car Championship with six wins. In the final ITC season of 1996 he finished second. When the DTM stopped, Mercedes moved him into the FIA GT Championship.

AMG was tasked with the CLK GTR on 5 December 1996. The first car was completed on 26 March 1997; two days later he conducted the first tests at Circuito del Jarama. He won six of eleven 1997 FIA GT rounds, mostly sharing with Alexander Wurz or Klaus Ludwig, and took the drivers' title at Laguna Seca on 26 October. Mercedes later stated that twenty-five street-legal CLK GTR Straßenversion cars were built to meet the production-race-car rule.