When the BMW made the first E30 M3 in the 80s, Mercedes-Benz answered with this: the 190 2.5-16 Evolution II. It was the car used by the big three-pointed star brand to fight on the German touring car championship (DTM). It wasn’t quite a Mercedes-Benz 100%. The engine, for instance, was built by Cosworth in the U.K. The gearbox was supplied by the Getrag manufacturer and it was, in fact, the same gearbox used for the E30 M3.

But the Evo II was a different thing. It was built in 502 units, of which 500 were blue/black metallic (blauschwartz) and the other two were silver. The flamboyant look of the body-kit was designed by a professor from the University of Stuttgart and it reduced the drag coefficient to 0.29, which was a very good number for a four-door saloon.

The suspension was fully adjustable at the flick of a switch on the dashboard, raising or lowering the car. But the most important improvement was on the Cosworth engine, which now featured 232 hp instead of 202 hp of the regular 2.5-16 engine. The limited-slip differential helped the car to achieve a 0 to 100 kph (0-62 mph) sprint in 7.1 seconds, which was a very good time for the era. It is not a bad time even 30 years after the car left the assembly line.