[clearing throat] I am 130-mile Honda S2000 CR owner, and this… is my car. She weighs 1,295 kilograms and spins 2.2-liter four-cylinder at 8,000 revolutions per minute. It cost $30,000 to drive this Honda… for seven miles. [guffaws in Russian]
Yes, that’s 30 grand for seven miles in a 2009 Honda, averaging almost $4,300 per mile. Not for a Formula 1 car (as good as Honda‘s 2009 would’ve been), but a regular road car, an S2000 CR. Okay, maybe regular is a stretch, as it’s not like an S2000 CR is any run-of-the-mill Civic. Its rarity is part of what put the seller in a position to lose that money in the first place.
The S2000 CR, or Club Racer, was a rare edition introduced toward the end of the S2000’s production run. It was lighter, had track-tuned suspension, a stiffer chassis, functional aero, a removable hardtop, and more. Its 2.2-liter F22C1 four-cylinder didn’t rev as high as the earlier 2.0-liter did, but it still touched 8,000 rpm and made the same power with more torque. To be specific, 237 horsepower and 162 pound-feet, dispensed to the rear axle by a six-speed manual transmission and a helical limited-slip differential. Only 699 were sold in the United States, or just over one percent of total production.
So, a rare version of a renowned sports car, with fewer miles than months existing on this earth. That’s a formula for an expensive car, and when it last sold in 2022, it sure was. Then at 123 miles, the chaos of COVID-era pricing pushed it to $200,000 in an auction on Bring a Trailer. Between then and now, its owner drove it barely a quarter the distance of a marathon, or just enough to warm the engine up fully once or twice. It returned to Bring a Trailer this past week with 130 miles, fetching just $170,000 this time around.
Why the owner sold the car having hardly touched it, we can never know. But the seller isn’t bent about it, and congratulated its eager buyer—whom you know will cherish the car, with a name like “s2k4ever.” I’m not sure I’d be that calm if I watched $30,000 go up in smoke like that, but then again, my net worth is only a fraction of what this car sold for in the first place. Here’s hoping its new owner drives it, instead of letting it turn into an overpriced paperweight like a certain other rare yellow enthusiast car. Better change all those belts, son.
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