Saab's party faithful was abuzz recently when Saab of North America promised to give a brand new 9-5 sedan to anyone who was the original owner of a Saab that's traveled more than 1,000,000 miles.

But this bit of public relations goodwill is not new. In fact, Mercedes-Benz (or DaimlerChrysler) can take the credit for coming up with the idea first (or at least before the Swedes).

The owner of the Benz with the most miles is - to date - a Greek taxi driver hailed by the name Gregorios Sachinidis who bought a 1976 240D with 220,000 km on the odometer and proceeded to rack up 4.6 million km (2.8 million miles) since. In 2004, DaimlerChrysler awarded Mr. Sachinidis with a brand new C220 CDI for making the marque look so good and providing further evidence to the saying that you can't kill a Benz diesel.

I wonder how many new Sebrings Chrysler has awarded longstanding '76 Cordoba owners...