by John Glynn | Jul 19, 2011 | Classic Porsche Blog, Road Trips
Last weekend’s Classics at the Castle Porsche show enjoyed rain in abundance. Every show seems like its own splinter group these days, so between that and the weather, I gave the event a miss, met some mates for the first IB anti-splinter Breakfast Club in the morning and then did some work in the afternoon. Rain galore, but it was still a top day.
Porsche 356 Road Trip Brescia-Campiglio
No such grotty weather at the recent Porsche 356 Road Trip Brescia-Campiglio gathering, where Maria Franchi organised a Porsche-driving tour de force. The event proved yet again that road trips are where it’s at for my kind of Porsche people.
“The rally went well,” Maria told me. “Between my teams there were also two teams from Germany, but I hope that the next two editions have many more German participants.”
Looking at pictures from friends, there was some beautiful machinery at Hedingham Castle but, pushed to pick between parking and driving, I’d be en route to Campiglio.
I’m making an exception to this for Rennsport Reunion IV and the Porsche Race Car Classic. Can’t imagine there’ll be much rain at either of those. Arrivederci!
by John Glynn | Jun 28, 2011 | Classic Porsche Blog, Race and Rally
I was out at the Nurburgring 24-Hour race last weekend (best racing livery below), so had a chance to catch up with some friends at Porsche and ask about upcoming event plans. First on the list is this weekend’s Goodwood Festival of Speed.
This year’s Goodwood theme is Racing Revolutions: Quantum Leaps that Shaped Motorsport. No manufacturer has more to say on the subject than Stuttgart, so the Porsche Museum is sending some epic cars to take part in various parts of the Festival.
First is Semper Vivus: the replica of Ferdinand Porsche’s ground breaking 1900 hybrid petrol/electric creation.
Next is the 718 F2 car (above), mentioned a number of times on the Classic Porsche Blog and driven to victory in the 1960 championship by Graham Hill, Jo Bonnier and Sir Stirling Moss. There’s talk that Sir Stirling may once again take the wheel – we’ll see how that pans out.
Then there’s the 1973 917/30 Spyder. This was Porsche’s first turbocharged car, and it changed the face of racing. The 917/30’s 5.3-litre flat-12 makes 1200 horsepower but weighs less than a modern Boxster Spyder. Average lap speed around Talladega: 220 mph+. In 1973!
Finally there’s the ill-fated 961 (above). Developed from the 959, the car finished seventh at Le Mans but was involved in a fire some time later. It has since been restored and will sit well at Goodwood with the other cigarette-sponsored has-beens. I say has-beens in a highly complimentary way!
Given that Semper Vivus and the 961 will be on site, it’s a shame the 4wd 911 R Hybrid won’t be there, as it’s the best current Porsche for this year’s theme, and is absolutely beautiful. Watching it lap the Nürburgring last weekend was literally electric. They’ve got two of them – surely one must be free?!
The BBC 5-day weather forecast for Goodwood looks nice at the minute: 18 degrees for both Friday and Saturday is a comfortable temperature to walk around in. I’m currently trying to get a ticket. If I manage it, I’ll see you at the Porsche tent.
If you’ve not got tickets, then Porsche have a competition for you. Follow Porsche Origin on Twitter and tweet the hashtag #porschegoodwood by midday on Wednesday June 29th for your chance to win a pair of VIP tickets for Saturday, and a ride up the hill in a GT3 RS 4.0.
Ferdinand blogs my freelance adventure with Porsche at the centre. To support the blog or engage with me in other ways, you can:
by John Glynn | Feb 27, 2011 | Classic Porsche Blog, Road Trips
Following my recent trip to the Porche Museum, I read an interesting item on the PetaPixel blog in which Neil Burgess, 25 years a photojournalist, head of London-based photo agency NB Pictures, former head of Network Photographers and Magnum Photos, and twice Chairman of World Press Photo claimed photojournalism was dead.
“I believe we owe it to our children to tell them that the profession of ‘photojournalist’ no longer exists,” says Burgess. “There are thousands of the poor bastards, creating massive debt for themselves hoping to graduate and get a job which no-one is prepared to pay for anymore. Even when photographers create brilliant stories and the magazine editors really want to publish them, they cannot pay a realistic price for the work.”
As someone who packed in working 9-5 to concentrate on being one of the “poor bastards…hoping to get a job which no one is prepared to pay for anymore”, this is disappointing news, assuming it is accurate.
I recently took a trip to the Porsche Museum, where I shot a few hundred frames on my Leica D-Lux compact camera. Some are seen here. I had intended the pics for blog and library use but, as I was pleased with the quality, I decided to pitch them to the editor at Total 911 magazine.
“What about people who take once-in-a-lifetime trips to the Porsche Museum, Schlumpf Collection, Spa Francorchamps Museum and so on?” I asked. “Why don’t we run a feature with the pics taken on a compact camera, like most folks will use on these trips? Let’s get Leica involved. I’ll go to London and talk to Brett, the Leica M photographer, get some critique on my pics, and ideas for myself and those coming after me to take with them to the museum.”
The editor liked the idea. I went to the Leica Akademie in Bruton Place, London to meet with Brett, and the piece is in this month’s magazine. It’s not the perfect manifestation of the concept, but I’m sure it’s not the last piece of this nature we three will do together, and reaction so far has been positive.
My first words-and-pics feature was the R Gruppe Bergmeister Tour in 911 and Porsche World magazine: it made the cover. I’ve since done a few more and they are steadily improving in my eyes, as is the copy that accompanies the pictures. What matters to me is exactly what mattered to every photojournalist that has gone before: that the vision is actualised and presented to a wider audience.
I started photography to support storytelling, and still see my pictures as helping to tell a story in three dimensions. Will my photography ever be as good as a full-blown professional’s work? In most applications, it doesn’t need to be; one way that photojournalism is evolving.
I feel the incredible buzz that surrounds these pieces, so I say photojournalism is far from dead: it is just assuming new forms in new media. After years of neglect, the art is waking up to endless potential, thanks to the rise of blogging, personal publishing, the iPad and all like it. To anyone who thinks they can make a living at it, I say you can.
Burgess’ career points call to mind a friend of mine who can make people laugh at a party feeling like she’s a natural born stand up, or another friend who once bluffed his way past customs, believing that he was a great actor in the making. Both are beautifully talented and both chased their dreams, only to discover that the commitment needed to transform that talent into a career is enormous; well beyond what either had imagined. The same is true of photojournalism in modern media.
Believe me, taking a salary from your vision is hugely challenging, but doable if you commit to it absolutely. Get ready to fall over a lot, and to be off the pace of many of your peers. If you don’t think you can turn that into something worthwhile that an audience will pay for, stay with the 9-5. But be sure the choice is yours: no one else’s.
by John Glynn | Sep 26, 2010 | Classic Porsche Blog, Porsche News
November 2010 is 911 & Porsche World magazine’s 200th edition, so Editor Bennett has pulled out as many stops as possible to make it entertaining. The centrepiece is a conglomerative effort from all editorial contributors, in a feature called ‘Ultimate Porsche’. The idea was we had to pick our ultimate factory Porsche, and bring it to Bruntingthorpe to run them all back to back.
My ultimate Porsche is a 917: nothing touches that car for drama and all-round Porsche cleverness. Entered via loophole and raced hard by our favourite heros, the 917 demanded king-size balls to drive quickly. Just looking at it makes me feel a bit funny, so what it must feel like to drive one at 250 mph down the Mulsanne Straight, with the lightweight body flexing and pinning your foot to the throttle pedal, I have no idea.
I tried everywhere I could think of to get a 917, but to no avail. Once I was used to the idea of not being able to bring my Ultimate Porsche, the next best thing was probably an easier solution than most people would believe.
My take was that the Ultimate Porsche beyond the 917 should be something you can get into right now and take to the Bergmeister Monte Carlo route: surely the most incredible driving ever done in a car. So it had to be something within easy reach.
Looking in my garage, I had two 911s to choose from: my Carrera 3.0 and the 964RS I was advertising for sale on behalf of a friend. Both are quick, in nice condition, both sound and smell like a proper Porsche and both are wonderful to drive. So which one to take?
964RS v 3.2 Club Sport v 2.7 RS
Picking your own car for one of these things is dodgy ground. Much as I love my C3, there is barely an as-factory part on it. I also make no secret of the fact that it could one day go to a new home, so by definition it is not the last word in Porsche for me. If I had the asking price for a decent 964RS sitting in my bank account I would buy one, no question and with absolutely no hesitation. So, red one it is then.
This choice may seem tough to reconcile with my well-known love of the early and impact-bumper style cars, but it’s not that tricky really. The 964 Carrera RS looks like them, sounds like them, smells like them but goes faster than any of them in factory guise. The one in my garage was set up by Water Röhrl and rides beautifully. It’s built like the brick proverbial. Every time I get in it, I soon find myself driving like an eighteen year-old.
3.0 RSR v 997 Turbo v 964 RS v rest
It’s a time machine, plain and simple. If you want to make yourself twenty years younger buy a 964 RS. It comes from a time when Porsche built sports cars: the world’s best sports cars. And they all looked like classics, straight out of the box.
My Top Ten from the Ultimate Porsche line-up:
- 964RS. Uncompromising in every positive sense of the word. A Stuttgart V-sign to all Porsche-hating motoring journos, it says: “Don’t like me? F**k you, get me a proper driver.”
- 2.7 RS. Think of it like Scarlett Johansson lying on a bed, summoning you with her finger. There is no saying no.
- 997 Turbo. Faster than a shooting star strapped to a 4wd comet. There comes a point where outright ability matters: this car is past that point.
- 3.0 RSR. Won’t run under 4k rpm and is too noisy to take anywhere but I’d live in it.
- 911 2.4S. Every inch a classic.
- 356 Cabriolet. The original. The one that started it all.
- Cayenne Turbo. A Porsche for every day. As Fraser says: if you could only have one Porsche for the rest of your life, then….
- 996 GT3. I’m never going to get past those headlamps. Sorry GT3 boys.
- Carrera Club Sport. Gas-filled exhaust valves do not an RS make. If they’d gone further it’d be the Ultimate, but they sold us short.
- Panamera Turbo. Big executive saloon. Nuff said.
by John Glynn | Aug 28, 2010 | Classic Porsche Blog, Modified Porsche Hot Rods
911 & Porsche World magazine have put the R Gruppe Grand Tour on the front cover of this month’s issue. This is the news stand version and not the subscriber copies.
To say I’m pleased would be an understatement: the Grand Tour was one of the best events yet, so to document it in my first words-and-pictures feature, and then have it make the cover is a dream come true.
The feature is spread across eight pages and looks good. For me, there were other pictures that better relate to the in-betweens of the piece – most of the shots in the feature came from the two on-the-move shoots we managed to grab. So, knowing what went on behind the scenes, I think it looks me look a little repetitive on style, but I don’t envy the guy who has to choose the pics! It has come out well and a number of people have complimented me on it, which I really appreciate.
All in all then, I’m over the moon: a Porsche World cover on your first attempt is a killer endorsement of a great story. I have to pay tribute to my editor: Steve Bennett hails from the heyday of Cars and Car Conversions and is the easiest guy in the world to work for. He just lets me gt on with it and runs the pieces as they leave my Mac. Apart from one bit, when I was looking for a way to describe how fast the temperature fell when we left the 40-degree Autoroute and headed up into the Swiss Alps on day one. I said it fell ‘like a log off a waterfall’ which I then changed to ‘dog off a waterfall’, but ran in the magazine as ‘quite suddenly’! LOL – gotta love stuff like that.
My next words and pics is a supercharged Porsche 968 coming through Porsche World next month. Looking forward to seeing how that turns out.
