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Photography by Andrew Schneider
Porsches are meant to be driven. Period.
Every four years, Porsche fanatics from all over the world travel to Laguna Seca to experience a weekend like no other, Rennsport. One marque, one track, and dozens of legendary drivers at the wheels of Stuttgart’s finest. Typical highlights include: Seeing John Fitzpatrick sign his old racecar in front of its current owner, hearing the raw sounds of a 718 RS60 Spyder warming up, and—of course—a casual Jerry Seinfeld sighting.
What’s truly impressive though is that all of these cars are running at peak performance, barely showing their age. My hat goes off to the crews that work to keep legends like the 919 and 917s up and running, the exhaust notes alone must take a piano tuner’s precision to keep dialed in.
After a weekend of sound and fury I’m left with a true sense of comradery, something unique to the Porsche community.
Wow. What a great assembly of racing machinery. I saw so many of these familiar machines race in anger in their own time. One memory is of the 936, in that very same spot driven by Bell’s then team-mate, Ickx, at the Monterey Historics well over 30 something years ago when it was state-of-the-art. The track was different then. Faster and MUCH more dangerous. Being a child and hearing/seeing that thing whistle up the hill, under the bridge and fly around the long way up to the corkscrew was just amazing.
Fortunately, my boy can also appreciate the vintage machinery, but I know he would surely rather be seated in (and piloting) the 919. I can live with that. I felt the same way about the 956. Respect the past with an eye to the future.