It took a top speed run of 211mph to earn the original RUF CTR a place among the all-time great supercars and thrust its maker into the global spotlight back in 1987. At the time, the Yellowbird, as the model was nicknamed, was officially the fastest production car in the world. With its twin-turbocharged 3.4-litre flat six producing 476hp, not even the Porsche 959 or Ferrari F40 could keep up.
Pretty impressive going for a car that, as legend has it, was initially developed by RUF boss Alois Ruf (the son of company founder Alois Ruf senior) in a garage beside his childhood home in Pfaffenhausen, Germany. It also set the bar very, very high for the CTR’s successor, which came eight years later, when the world expected great things from the now famous German car maker…
Ruf junior therefore knew that the CTR2 would not only have to improve on its predecessor, it would have to blow everything else out of the water. In 1995 the poster boys of supercardom included the Ferrari F50, a 202mph naturally aspirated V12 supercar, the Jaguar XJ220, a six-cylinder monster that could reach 213mph, and the Nissan's R390 GT1, the 220mph road version of the firm’s Le Mans racer. RUF, a still comparably small firm, needed to beat them all.
The good news was that Porsche had just launched a new 911 for RUF to base its challenger on. The 993 chassis made its debut in 1994 and by 1995, the Turbo version was on sale. The structure therefore represented the very latest in development from Porsche and was already highly regarded. RUF’s car only used the 993’s body in white, however, with all other features and parts developed in house. Like the rest of the RUF range, the CTR2’s chassis was therefore given a unique number.
Power for the new supercar came from an air-cooled, twin-turbocharged 3.6-litre flat six engine, based on the motor that had powered the Porsche 962 Le Mans Group C racing car which had first competed in the late 1980s. Like the CTR2’s predecessor, this link to Group C racing provided the car with its name, which stands for Group C Turbo RUF 2.
RUF never left its engines untouched so the firm’s engineers extracted a substantial 580hp and 506lb ft of torque from the motor, which when joined by optional all-wheel drive (rear-drive was standard), had the CTR2 hitting 60mph in 3.6sec. It placed the car right at the sharp end of supercardom; the F50 took 3.7sec, the XJ220 took 3.6sec and the R390 GT1 took 3.9sec.
But off-the-line performance was not what secured the CTR2 global respect. What did, of course, was its top speed of “more than 220mph”. While this number is frustratingly ambiguous, it at least meant that the CTR2 officially picked up the baton from its predecessor and retook the lead in the top speed race. (Its lead was short lived, admittedly, because the McLaren F1 went for a top speed run in 1998 and…well, you know the story.)
The Woking car, however, cost £540,000 when new, which was more than twice the price of the CTR2. The latter was priced at just under £200,000, which, comparatively speaking, made it a bit of a bargain. Just 16 examples of the RUF were built (there were 106 F1s), so you were also buying into a much more exclusive club – if you managed to get in, that is.
That’s why when we came across a CTR2 in the classifieds, priced at £625,000 – that’s about three times the price of a Ferrari 488 GTB – we weren’t shocked one bit. RUF values have undoubtedly been affected by surging prices for products of Stuttgart, but the CTR2 has also earned itself icon status in its own right. People will pay accordingly.
This car, a left-hooker, all-wheel drive model with 30,000 miles on the clock, is finished in understated Arctic Silver Metallic with an all-green leather interior, including well-bolstered Koenig seats. It remains as it was when it left the factory in 1997, sat on five-spoke 19in wheels and equipped with an integrated roll cage. It looks to be in immaculate condition – but what else would you expect from a car being sold by an official RUF dealer? For a very wealthy buyer, this will be one heck of a way to relive one of the most exciting periods of supercar history.
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