Bugatti's Wimille Veyron sets a CHF 4.5 million auction record
A three-of-three Veyron has beaten the one-off Sang Bleu by more than $2 million
A Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport Vitesse 'Jean-Pierre Wimille' sold for CHF 4,505,000, about $5.44 million, at RM Sotheby's Zurich Auction on 26 September. That is the highest price any Veyron has made at public auction. The car is one of three built to honour Bugatti's double Le Mans winner, and it has covered only 3,766 km since it was delivered in 2014.
RM Sotheby's sold the Wimille Veyron 61 percent above its top estimate
RM Sotheby's had estimated the Wimille Veyron at CHF 2.4 million to CHF 2.8 million, so the result landed 61 percent above the top of that range. It was the highest price of a Zurich sale in which 17 of 23 lots found buyers. This example was delivered new to Dubai on 21 May 2014, showed 655 km at its 2016 service and 2,553 km a year later, then passed through German and Swiss owners.
The one-off Veyron Grand Sport Sang Bleu held the old record at $3,085,000
The Veyron Grand Sport Sang Bleu held the previous public high, $3,085,000 at RM Sotheby's Miami in March 2024, and it was the first Veyron past $3 million. It is a one-off in polished aluminium and blue carbon, built for Bugatti's centenary, so it is rarer on paper than the Wimille car. The best price for a standard Veyron coupé is $2,205,000, set at Broad Arrow in Las Vegas. Bugatti itself marked the model's 20th anniversary by restoring one in-house.
Jean-Pierre Wimille won Le Mans for Bugatti in 1937 and 1939
Jean-Pierre Wimille gave Bugatti its first Le Mans win in 1937, sharing a Type 57G Tank with Robert Benoist and averaging 136.99 km/h over 3,288 km. He won again in 1939 in a Type 57C Tank, and in 1947 he took Bugatti's last race victory at the Bois de Boulogne. During the war Benoist recruited him as an agent for Britain's Special Operations Executive. Wimille died in practice for the 1949 Buenos Aires Grand Prix.
Pierre Veyron, the hypercar's namesake, was Wimille's 1939 co-driver
Pierre Veyron, the Bugatti works driver the hypercar is named after, shared that 1939 Le Mans win with Wimille. Two years earlier he had driven the sister 57G Tank with Roger Labric. The record car therefore carries both halves of one winning crew: Veyron's name on the model, and Wimille's portrait on the door sills and his signature stitched into the headrests.
Bugatti's six Legends editions produced just 18 Grand Sport Vitesses
The Wimille car opened Les Légendes de Bugatti at Pebble Beach in August 2013: six editions of three cars each, all based on the Grand Sport Vitesse with its 1,200 hp, 1,500 Nm quad-turbo W16. Bleu Wimille paint copies the 1937 Tank, the Le Mans circuit sits under the rear wing and the steering wheel carries tricolour stitching. At least one first owner ordered all six editions, which is how Fernando Alonso's aluminium Veyron came to exist.
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Rarity did not set this record. The Sang Bleu is the only car of its kind and stopped at $3,085,000; the Wimille is one of three and went $2.35 million further. What the Zurich bidders paid for is the story: a Resistance agent, two Le Mans wins, and a co-driver whose name became the car's. In 2013 the Legends series looked like paint and embroidery on a Vitesse. Thirteen years later it has produced the most valuable Veyron ever sold in public, and Bugatti deserves the credit for choosing its heroes well.
The other five Legends editions now have a benchmark. The next one offered at a major auction will carry a pre-sale estimate above CHF 3 million rather than the CHF 2.4 million this car started from, and the Jean Bugatti edition, named after the engineer behind the 57G Tank, is the likeliest to beat CHF 4,505,000.
