F.A. ‘Butzi’ Porsche, the eldest son of Ferry and Dorothea Porsche, joined the family business in 1958 having shown great interest in the field of industrial design. Working under the direction of Erwin Komenda, F.A. Porsche set about learning the business from the inside, and was soon given the task of ‘working’ on the new shape of the 718 racer for the ’61 season. Showing an … [Read more...]
50 Years Porsche 914
Whether you love it or hate it, the 914 served as a very important family member in the Porsche model line-up of the day. To appreciate this fully, you need to understand the circumstances surrounding its conception, and to have an insight into the period in which this model was launched. In the late ‘60s, it was not uncommon for Ferry Porsche as the head of his company, … [Read more...]
Arno Bohn – The Porsche Outsider
Arno Bohn was managing director of Porsche from 1990-92. An outsider who came from the computer industry, he arrived at a company seared by falling sales and riven by internal division about future direction. He left a Porsche which though still weak, had a new 911, the 993, in the wings and had conceived the 986/996 platform, a strategy which would be the beginning of its … [Read more...]
Ferdinand Piëch: 17 April 1937 to 25 August 2019
Ferdinand Karl Piëch was born in Vienna, Austria, on 17 April 1937, to Louise (daughter to Ferdinand and sister of Ferry Porsche) and Anton Piëch, a lawyer. He was the grandson of Ferdinand Porsche, from whom he undoubtedly inherited his love for all things mechanical. Piëch graduated from the ETH Zurich (university for science and technology) in Switzerland in 1962, … [Read more...]
Porsche 917 turns 50 years in 2019
The world has become obsessed with anniversaries or facts that you can leverage, in order to bring your message across. And that is also true to some extent about this account of a legendary race car, but in 2019 the Porsche 917 turns 50 years, and that is a significant age in anyone’s book. Without any question, the crown of long distance racing in the world of … [Read more...]
Roland Kussmaul
For many years, the éminence grise of Porsche’s competition department, but now in retirement, Roland Kussmaul seems busier than ever. He left Porsche officially at the end of 2008, but our attempts to meet him were thwarted for several years by his amazingly busy schedule. More recently, we were luckier: despite a programme still just as full, he found time to meet us at his … [Read more...]
Tilman Brodbeck remembers
To be able to write on your résumé that you worked for one of Porsche’s CEOs would be quite an achievement. Tilman Brodbeck can however do a little better than that, for in a 40-year career, he was assistant to no fewer than five successive Porsche presidents. But, as he tells us, he held other posts too. When he started at Zuffenhausen, the company was still ruled by Ferry … [Read more...]
Mike de ‘Udy and the Carrera Six
The Carrera Six, as Porsche officially called the 906, was a radically different car from its predecessor, the 904 GTS. The 904 was a sleek glass fibre bodied racer penned by Butzi Porsche, and it took over as Porsche’s competition model following such illustrious forebears as the RS 718 and RS 61 which brought the Stuttgart manufacturer so many victories in the early sixties. … [Read more...]
Martini Porsche 917-042 – Le Mans record breaker
From 1964 through to 1969, Porsche lifted its game from being a class winner to setting international lap speed and endurance records that were beyond the reach of other manufacturers, by quite some margin. In May 2017, I was afforded the opportunity of photographing eight race cars in detail at the Porsche Museum in Stuttgart, and one of the cars on my list was the #21 Martini … [Read more...]
