(Motorsport-Total.com/Motor1) – At the Gooding-Christie’s auction in Pebble Beach, the hammer fell, and the 1964 Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupé CSX2300 made auction history at first go. Including the premium, the carefully restored blue coupé fetched 42,905,000 US dollars (about 37 million euros) – the highest price ever paid at an auction for an American car. This is the top result of the Monterey Car Week 2026.
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This single lot, however, did not stand alone. The auctions in Monterey totaled around a staggering 748 million US dollars in sales, significantly exceeding the approximately 470 to 500 million US dollars forecast by analysts before the week. At the forefront of this high demand for top-tier racing history was the Shelby.
Why the Shelby Daytona brought the record
The CSX2300 went under the hammer at Gooding Christie’s after weeks of intense anticipation and exceeded even the already extremely high estimates. Before the auction, “more than 25 million US dollars” was mentioned; instead, the bid rose to around 39 million US dollars hammer price and ended at the mentioned 42.9 million US dollars including premium. This clearly surpassed the previous auction record for an American vehicle of 22 million US dollars for a 1935 Duesenberg SSJ at Pebble Beach 2018.
The Daytona is the third of only six built examples, the only vehicle that once personally belonged to Carroll Shelby, and was specially developed by Peter Brock to beat the Ferrari 250 GTO on Europe’s fast racetracks.
This special Daytona Cobra also has the appropriate racing history behind its legendary reputation. This chassis competed in 1965 at major events, including the Daytona Continental, Sebring, at the Nürburgring, the Tour de France, and Reims, where it finished ninth overall, contributing to Shelby American’s successful FIA-GT championship program. Other Cobra Daytonas were involved in the notorious Le Mans disqualification for pushing in 1964 as well as Bob Bondurant’s victory at Reims on July 4, 1965, which secured the title.
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What this means for American blue-chip classics
The last Cobra Daytona to go under the hammer was sold in 2009. At that time, a sister vehicle fetched 7,685,000 US dollars. The jump from this value to 42.9 million US dollars shows how much top-class American racing cars have increased in value in less than two decades.
The CSX2300 was not the only US star in the spotlight. A rare factory-built 1963 Chevrolet Corvette Grand Sport was auctioned in Monterey as another American racing legend that had not been offered at auction since 2009, ultimately fetching nearly 19 million US dollars at RM Sotheby’s, although 13 million was expected.
That is more than double the previous auction record for a Chevrolet. Earlier this year, a Ferrari 250 GTO set the European benchmark. Buyers apparently view top-tier racing cars from the 1960s as a global asset class and not just as nostalgic collectibles.
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More million-dollar vehicles from Pebble Beach:
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