Carroll Shelby—whose many automotive achievements include a 24 Hours of Le Mans as a driver, creating the Shelby Cobra, and designing the Ford GT that swept Le Mans multiple times—once said: “You do something that you want to do or feel you have to do, because you like it and love it. And if it turns out to be history, well, so what?” Well, more than 60 years after his Cobra Daytona Coupe became the only U.S.-made car to win an FIA World Championship, it’s poised to make history again as the most expensive American automobile ever sold at an upcoming Gooding Christie’s auction.
The Cobra—an unlikely Frankenstein of the lightweight AC Ace British roadster chassis that Shelby fitted an American small-block V8—proved its formidable potential upon its 1962 competition debut in the 1962 USAC Road Racing Championship against the clearly weaker Corvette Stingray. The roofless brute had the power and acceleration to take on the Ferrari 250 GTO in the FIA World Championship, but lacked the aerodynamic efficiency of the Italian coupe.
Shelby tapped Peter Brock—the Los Angeles Art Center-schooled designer behind the second-gen Stingray—to create a topped, aerodynamically sound body that would allow the Cobra to reach its full potential on the world’s fastest tracks. The resulting Daytona Coupe, which Shelby said was built to “kick Corvette’s ass and Ferrari’s ass,” featured a long roofline, fastback profile, and a Kamm tail. Its debut season in 1964 saw it win a class victory at 12 Hours of Sebring, but it wouldn’t accomplish its mission until 1965, where it engaged in a dramatic multi-round battle in a class most closely contested with Ferrari but also including Austin-Healey, Jaguar, Chevrolet, and Sunbeam. Toward the end of the season, Shelby took the International Championship for GT Manufacturers at the 1965 12 Hours of Reims—on July 4, no less.
This car, chassis No. CSX2300, is one of only six Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupes built by Shelby American and played a pivotal role in its historic championship-winning season, with four straight class podium finishes at Daytona, Sebring, the Nürburgring 1000 Kilometers, and Reims 12 Hours. However, CSX2300’s championship-winning career ended almost as soon as it began. FIA rule changes made the Daytona Coupes ineligible for competition shortly after the 1965 title, and Shelby American shifted its focus to the Ford GT40 program.
Its post-championship life was vast and varied. The car returned to Shelby American and was sold in 1966 through the company’s “Garage Sale” to Oscar Koveleski, a Pennsylvania racer, collector. and founder of the mail-order company Auto World. It then migrated to Japan under the ownership of Don Nichols, who would go on to found the Shadow Can-Am and Formula One racing team. Under owner Tadashi Sakai, a driver and cinematographer, CSX2300 became the only Daytona Coupe to race seriously after the Shelby American program ended. It competed at the 1966 Japan Grand Prix at Fuji Speedway, retiring near the front with mechanical trouble, then won outright at the All Japan Suzuka and Diamond Trophy Fuji events later that year. A subsequent owner, Kazuo Myouchin, raced the car in endurance events including the 1968 Japan Grand Prix.
With a damaged engine and its history not yet widely recognized, the car was purchased by Shin Yoshikawa, a young Japanese Cobra enthusiast who registered it legally and converted it into a street car, replacing its racing engine with a standard Ford V-8 while retaining its racing headers and side exhaust.
Cobra historian Michael L. Shoen, author of The Cobra-Ferrari Wars 1963-1965 and owner of sister car CSX2299, learned from designer Peter Brock that the car still existed in Japan and tracked it down by the early 1970s. In 1975, Shoen brokered its sale to Shelby himself, making CSX2300 the only Daytona Coupe Shelby personally owned. Shelby had the car restored to 1965 specification, including its original 289-cubic-inch engine and gearbox, by Cobra specialist Mike McCluskey of Torrance, California.
In the late 1990s, a series of financial transactions moved the car out of Shelby’s ownership. After passing through several dealers and a period with collector Jim Spiro, it was purchased by Larry Bowman in 2000. Bowman had the car restored with an emphasis on historical accuracy, preserving evidence of its racing history, including damage from a 1965 crash at Sebring and registration markings from its years in Japan. The restoration was completed in 2003, and the car appeared at the Monterey Historics and the Goodwood Revival, where it raced against another Daytona Coupe in the TT Celebration race.
The car’s current owner has held it for more than two decades since acquiring it from Bowman. It continues to compete in historic motoring events, including the Tour Auto, Modena Cento Ore, the Goodwood Revival, and the Goodwood Festival of Speed. When it crosses the Gooding Christie’s Pebble Beach Auctions block in mid-August at Monterey Car Week, it’s expected to sell for over $25 million to become the most valuable American car ever sold. The current record is held by a Duesenberg SSJ that sold for $22 million at the same auction in 2018.