Luckily for the meek-mannered motorist, only 100 of these brutes were built to tear up the tarmac - and autotrader.co.uk has three for sale.

Stuart Milne looks at why the CLK DTM is one of the best racetrack refugees money can buy.

Some cars can go 200mph. Some cars look like they can go 200mph. Unfortunately, not many do both.

Cars should wear their intentions on their sleeves.

Take the Bentley Continental GT. It can knock on the door of the fabled double ton, but is as unassuming as a baby dormouse.

On the other hand there's the outrageous MG SV supercar. Sprouting vents, wings and breathing fire from its twin exhaust pipes, it looks like it could take you straight to hell. Its top speed is a bit of an anti-climax at 'only' 175mph.

And then there's the hardcore, 200mph Mercedes CLK DTM.

One day, Mercedes' tuning team, AMG took an ordinary cooking CLK and locked it in a damp shed, feeding it a diet of chilli peppers and broken glass. Occasionally, they rubbed raw onions in its eyes.

During a stormy night, Dr Von-AMG wired it up and gave it a bit of electric shock treatment and it burst free of its shackles. All 582, supercharged break horsepower of it.

The CLK DTM was born.

Where there were gentle curves on the lesser CLKs, you'll find pure, unmitigated aggression. Spoilers, vents and bulges take the coupe to new levels.

Looking every inch the bride of Frankenstein, the DTM is a pure racer for the road.

Under the bonnet sits a uniquely revised version of AMG's 5.5-litre supercharged V8, which will launch the big Merc to 62mph in just 3.9 seconds and on to 200mph. That's an electronically-limited 200mph - God knows what it would do if you unleashed the full thrust.

The template for the DTM's development was the racing version that won the 2003 German Touring Car Championship (or as the Germans call it, the Deutschen Tourenwagen Masters - DTM, hence the Merc's name) at the hands of Bernd Schneider.

Everywhere you look there are cues from the racer; 19 and 20-inch alloys, cooling ducts, wings and massive brakes.

Inside it's no different. A roll cage, carbon-fibre-backed bucket seats, an alcantara trimmed steering wheel and race-style rocker switches all vie for the driver's attention.

Even the suspension is height adjustable.

Unfortunately for those of us that fantasise about racing in the championship that is more F1 that M1 (like our domestic Touring Car Championship), Merc only made 100 of these babies, so you'll have to fork out upwards of £180,000 to feel the rush.

But the CLK DTM is worth every penny.