One of the Porsche F1 driver rumours previously reported on Ferdinand was confirmed this morning, when Porsche announced that Nico Hülkenberg would drive for its LMP1 squad at Le Mans 2015. While there is no further news on Jenson Button, it proves that the third LMP1 car is not set aside for works GT drivers.
“The Hulk” currently drives for Force India on Formula 1 (based just down the road from us in Silverstone) and enjoyed a solid start to the 2014 F1 season. Recently confirmed with Force India for 2015, the Porsche drive will give him something else to do next summer.
“Porsche and Le Mans: this combination probably attracts every race driver,” said Nico. “I’ve been a Porsche fan for a long time and have been watching their return to the LMP1 class closely. The desire grew to drive that car at Le Mans. I am very pleased the 2015 Formula One calendar allows for it and I’m grateful for Sahara Force India’s generosity in letting me go for it. Now it’s up to me to work hard to satisfy both commitments.”
Nico Hülkenberg Porsche Drive Le Mans 2015
When Nico takes the start of the 2015 Le Mans on June 13, he will be the first active F1 driver to race at Le Mans since 2009. While The Hulk is no stranger to Porsche (he previously tested the 997 Hybrid at the Nürburgring), Porsche is bedding him into racing the 919 at the 6 Hours of Spa on May 2.
Quotes from the Porsche race personnel read like every other press release – “this proves our 919 Hybrid is a worthy race seat etc” – but there is no doubt that Porsche has pulled in another exceptionally quick race driver who has dominated most of the championships he has raced in. After some really impressive F1 race drives in less than stellar machinery, Hülkenberg missed out on a works Ferrari seat by the barest of margins and has always qualified well: his pace should put down a challenging benchmark.
Also important is Hülkenberg’s long-term Dekra sponsorship and experience with F1’s new drivetrain technology. Very few people have raced the latest generation of F1 cars and ,while there is little outward similarity between the two series, driving quickly with hybrid power demands a specific approach. Nico’s intelligence and understanding of high-level hybrid racing could give his car a distinct advantage: who knows until we go racing.
While this deal is just for a driver, it may also be that Porsche could somehow explore connections to Force India’s technical know-how and commercial activities. Vijay Mallya knows how to make a buck or two and India has a proper F1 circuit doing nothing. Perhaps there’s an opportunity to bring WEC to that part of the world. I’m just throwing it out there.
Double World Sportscar Masters champion and rare Porsche parts reproduction specialist, EB Motorsport, rounded off its 2014 historic racing race season with a top twenty finish and two class wins at the legendary Spa 6 Hours.
Fielding all three EB Motorsport racing 911s over the course of the weekend, brothers James and Mark Bates claimed class wins in both the Pre-‘66 GT and FIA World Sportscar Masters races, before starting the headline event.
As torrential rain soaked the Francorchamps circuit during the classic Spa 6 Hours endurance race, the pair used their considerable experience to bring EB’s 1965 911 race car home inside the top twenty. Only one other 911 from the extensive start group claimed a top twenty finish: the short wheelbase car of Le Mans winner, Raymond Narac.
Spa 6 Hours for EB Motorsport Porsche
“We set a much-reduced race calendar for 2014, and Spa was our target event,” said Mark Bates, who finished the race under red flag conditions in P19 overall. “I made my 6 Hours debut last year sharing a short wheelbase 911, so was excited to race with James in our own car this year. Achieving a top twenty finish in atrocious conditions within reach of a winning Le Mans Porsche driver is a very special feeling.”
“It’s been a landmark year for me,” smiled James at the end. “A hectic workload and the impending arrival of my first born shrunk our race schedule, but the EB Motorsport cars are very competitive. Mark put some amazing laps together in horrific conditions and showed established Spa regulars a clean set of heels. It’s a cracking finish to the 1965 911 race car’s debut season.”
EB Motorsport sponsored by Millers Oils
EB Motorsport’s Porsche 911s are sponsored by Millers Oils, after dyno tests proved that Millers lubrication freed more horsepower from EB’s 3.0 RSR race car. The trio will be joined by a fourth in 2015: a 911R recreation, currently in build at EB’s Yorkshire HQ. “This one features the full range of EB’s 911R parts, including our featherweight doors at just 4.5 kilos a side: with the hinges,” says Mark. “Target weight is 860 kilos: we’ll see how close we can get.”
Alongside the 911R build, an exciting recreation of the 1974 Porsche 911 2.1 RSR Turbo casts an intimidating shadow, but that’s a story for another day!
See the full range of EB Motorsport rare and lightweight reproduction Porsche parts at www.eb-motorsport.com.
“I don’t want this to read like some PR whitewash over an error on our part,” Richard Tuthill insists. “We had a fully engineered, production-based solution to take the Porsche 911 RGT into WRC on the FIA’s table in May. We’ve tested the car over 120 kilometres on gravel, absolutely flat out. This car is fantastic on gravel and should be racing in Wales. But it won’t be, and we all know why.”
I understand Richard’s frustration. Less than a week before Tuthill’s R-GT Porsche was due to take the start of Wales Rally GB, the FIA decided to reject the car’s gravel specification for the Oxfordshire team’s home event, despite all of the planned modifications being fully described in plans submitted to Switzerland almost six months ago. Having sucked up a truckload of R-GT red tape already this year, this was one step too far.
Earlier this week, the R-GT was taken to Walters Arena in Wales, home of many gravel test sessions and identical terrain to the Rally GB gravel stages. In-car footage from testing shows the R-GT Porsche’s incredible speed: the 911 pulls two gears higher than Tuthill historic cars on the same stages and easily hits the limiter in sixth on the longest stretches of gravel.
‘The car was born to be driven on gravel,” says Richard. “It is well balanced, amazingly easy to drive and with the wonderful 3.8-litre engine and sequential six-speed gearbox, it is very, very fast. We experimented with the setup up throughout the day and will continue to develop certain areas, but I could not have imagined it could be so good from the very first KM. It’s more than ready to hit the stages, be they gravel or snow.
“Combined with the car’s performance on asphalt, this confirms that it is an all-rounder and can be used across the world in all regional championships, where the regulations follow FIA guidance.”
Tuthill Porsche FIA Rally GB
Lengthy discussions at FIA headquarters in Geneva could not move its technical department to approve the car for use on this weekend’s Rally GB. It’s a blow to Team Tuthill, the rally organisers who have headlined so much promotion with the R-GT Porsche but mainly to the fans; hundreds of whom were looking forward to witnessing the return of a Porsche 911 to WRC gravel stages.
Richard explains the impasse. “Within existing R-GT regulations, there is scope to allow modification to the suspension uprights that are fitted to the chosen base model. However, this only allows the fitment of gravel brakes. In the case of the 997 RGT, the upright is too big to fit within a 15 inch gravel wheel, regardless of the size of caliper and disc fitted. Understandably the FIA needs to review how this issue can be resolved and, not surprisingly, it is unwilling to allow complete freedom for modification on safety grounds.
“We found a solution from Porsche factory parts, which we tested to great effect. That solution, developed by our chief engineer who is one of the most experienced motorsport engineers in the world with thirty years of Le Mans, WRC and Dakar behind him, was still not enough to convince the FIA. While we fully accept that any new category will raise technical challenges that need open discussion and thinking to get around, I cannot hide my frustration at the way this decision has been made, given we started this enquiry in May.”
FIA Leadership through F1 Motorsport Crisis
Lately it seems that the FIA has given up on the ‘sport’ side of motorsport in the vested financial interests of its commercial manufacturer partners. With F1 in crisis and the governing body standing by motionless, will the FIA ever draw back those curtains of red tape and start listening to fans who only care about racing? Or does the inactivity reflect a lack of leadership as the FIA president works his connections to land a plum job at the UN: a theory I read on one of the leading F1 blogs last week? So much for a bright future.
“It’s not a revolutionary idea; taking an old car and adding some new stuff polishing it up a bit and… ‘tah-dah’. It’s not revolutionary: lots of people have done it, especially in this country with Mustangs and ‘resto mods’ as they’re called over here. I don’t think any company has been crazy enough to do what we’ve attempted to do in such a cross-the-board, spectacularly over-the-top way.”
Whatever about polishing Porsche parts, the likeable Rob Dickinson has certainly polished the rhetoric regarding his Singer 911s since our first meeting, when Jamie Lipman and I were the first guys Rob invited to see his creation, and shoot Singer number 1 on the road in California. Back then, the Singer idea was still forming: what base car, what market, what price?
Rob Dickinson Singer Porsche
Unveiled in 2003, Rob’s Bahama Yellow RGruppe ’69 E hot rod was an inspiration for me, and for many others who followed their hearts to the air-cooled 911. This latest video on Singer eschews the same old Singer shots and lets the organ grinder talk on how his dream has developed. In fairness, the approach could have led to Rob digging a rather large hole for himself, but I think he makes heartfelt sense of his concept and product. Kudos, mon ami.
“Freeman Thomas started this club (RGruppe, with co-founder Cris Huergas) for hot rodded sports purpose early 911s in 2001, so I immediately joined the club when I built my car in 2003, and my car became quite well known in the RGruppe. As I enjoyed being part of this ‘clique’ if you like – this team of guys who had similar tastes – I started to see these expensively executed hot rods.
“My little car was done on the cheap, but a lot of people started to show up to the yearly meetings of the RGruppe in very expensively restored early 911s which had big engines shoehorned into them, and spectacular brakes, and some of these cars were better than others. I happened to drive a particularly well executed version of this car, and was just blown away at how refined and sophisticated an early 911 could actually be.
Steve McQueen references are so important
“That was part of the germination of this idea that these cars don’t have to be rough-and-ready hot rods with limited appeal. The 911 is so evocative – Steve McQueen references are so important for the vibe of this car (and everything that surrounds this car is important) – if someone was to restore a 911 so that it had a wider attractiveness for a wider audience, you could probably appeal to that audience and make a business out of it.
“I started to see that, and the combination of how my car was reacted to in the taste-making world of Los Angeles with the aesthetics, and then I’d got in this car where the engineering had been well sweated, and I thought: put these two together and there’s some fun to be had and maybe some business to be done.
“We generally try and improve every aspect of the car, while honouring everything that is Porsche. We hate custom cars here at this shop. Maybe ‘hate’ is a strong word, but the idea that our car might be seen as a custom car makes me feel nauseous. Our car needs to be seen as a Porsche through and through. We only put Singer badges on our car for the sake of clarity: this is a Porsche 911 that’s been touched by us.
“Hopefully, it’s a line in the sand as to how good an air-cooled 911 can be that isn’t a race car. It’s very easy to build a thinly-disguised race car for the road, but that’s not something we’re too interested in doing. We want to do a properly rounded car which is properly usable, that can be driven to the office on a Monday and driven to the track at the weekend: it has that wonderful duality but just fine-tunes the focus a little bit.”
I have a feeling that the high-end hot rod Rob tips as inspiration is SHTang: the 3.6-litre early 911 built by WEVO for Steven Harris, but I might be wrong. I’ve done many miles in SHTang, but not driven a Singer yet, so can’t tell you how the two compare. That is the obvious next step.
I’ve been swapping emails with friends at McLaren regarding Jenson Button’s future (not that they know anything) but another man at the Woking F1 team has a different connection to Ferdinand. Richard owns this Porsche 911 SC hot rod, which recently went back on the road after a long laid-up period.
I’ve been following the project for a while, after meeting Rich via EB Motorsport. The Porsche fan bought some of Mark’s Porsche 911 SC RS bumpers for narrow-body 911 models including the SC, and added a ducktail for fun.
“I was very happy with the EB Motorsport parts,” says Rich. “The ducktail engine lid fitted straight on with no issues, and the bumpers were good as well. I modified the smile at the front to make a centre bracket, which looks good and supports the front edge over the whole width.”
Gulf Porsche 911 SC
The 911 has just come out of paint and Richard has shared some new pics of the project. Normally, the Gulf tribute schemes involve light blue all over with orange stripes running from under the bumpers across the cars: it’s a look I’m normally not that sure about. Richard’s decision to go orange with the bumpers and carry a modified stripe theme is a good one: the car looks very cool.
“I’ve owned this Porsche 911 SC for more than 18 years. This is rebuild number three! It’s a pretty standard 3-litre SC engine, that has carried us more than 100,000 miles so far. Interior is RS-like, with 993 GT2 seats.
“Last painted eleven years ago, it came off the road for a few years when an oil leak required the engine out to repair. My wife was then ill with cancer and, after she passed away a year ago, my mates got me sorted with a barn with lift and it’s been keeping me occupied ever since.
“The engine was a filthy mess when I dropped it out, but we’ve done what it needed and tidied it up. It’s running very well: just needs lots of super unleaded!”
It’s always sad to hear stories of loss, but the aftermath of these traumatic events can be motivational, as we seek to cope with the loss and make sense of what comes next. My brother-in-law, David Bolger, was claimed by cancer over a decade ago: that was my wake-up call to share the Porsche love. What I do today is closely linked to his passing, and I think of him often.
Kudos to Rich for a car that looks good! It cheers all of us up to see long-owned air-cooled cars modified nicely, not just put back to standard and shoved on the market. A good way to move on: and well done to your mates for helping out too.
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