The Story of the G-class Named “Otto”
One man, one G, one life’s work. That sums up the essence of an unprecedented global adventure. In 1988, when Gunther Holtorf and his wife Christine set out in their Mercedes-Benz 300 GD to visit as many of the countries around the world as possible, the G-Class was just ten years old. 26 years after, just under 900,000 kilometres, and 215 visited countries later; Gunther Holtorf drove his cherished G – christened ‘Otto’ – back home to Swabia. The marathon vehicle took pride of place in the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart-Untertürkheim, where it goes on show to visitors in the Classic Cars section. As a world-record holder, ‘Otto’ will also be immortalized in the Guinness World Records. When the vehicle was officially handed over to the Mercedes-Benz Museum, the driver and the vehicle equally impressed Dr. Dieter Zetsche, Chairman of the Board of Management of DaimlerAG and Head of Mercedes-Benz Cars and he stated, “I promise that there will still be a G-Class in the future. Will there be more characters of Mr Holtorf’s ilk in the future? I hope so,” For 79-year-old Gunther Holtorf, he believed his Mercedes-Benz 300 GD, affectionately christened as ‘Otto’ by his wife Christene, is quite simply the expedition vehicle par excellence for this kind of (torturous) tour. He stated, “In 1988, when I bought the car I was a bit more sceptical about the promise made by Mercedes-Benz, namely “Where there’s a G, there’s a way”. After all, I’d already seen something of the world beforehand and had a rough idea of what the vehicle would have to endure on this kind of world tour!” This initial scepticism gave way though to an unreserved trust in Otto’s capabilities as the years went by. Even in the most precarious situations, the symbiosis between the Holtorfs and the G-Class grew.