The Old Warhorse

This is a story of the incredible career of Porsche 935 009 00030, one of the most amazing race cars ever, or as someone once said, the car of a thousand faces. Also known as the ‘Old Warhorse’, Porsche 935 009 00030 is one of the most storied cars ever to race. It has a long and distinguished history, racing in IMSA and World Championship events from 1979-1987. It has won some very big races both overall and class, and has an amazing finishing record in the races it was entered in. It probably has well over 125,000 racing and practice miles on it. It recently sold at auction in 2016, for over $4.4 million dollars!

1978

The story actually begins with this car’s older sibling, in 1978. At Le Mans in 1978, the Dick Barbour Racing team entered two 935 Porsches in the IMSA class. 930 890 0033 for Bob Akin, Bob Garretson and Steve Earle. Also entered was 930 890 0024 which was a brand-new car for Dick Barbour, Brian Redman and John Paul Sr. While Dick’s car went on to finish fifth overall and win the IMSA class, Bob Garretson had a massive crash in the night at the kink on the Mulsanne straight. The car left the circuit and went end over end, and landed on its wheels by the side of the road. Bob luckily walked away, but does not remember too much of what happened. All he remembers is that the door was jammed shut and he crawled out through the windshield (or where the windshield used to be). The car was a complete wreck. About all we could salvage from the wreckage were a few of the dashboard gauges, and some of the engine and gearbox parts.

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Towards the end of 1978, Dick Barbour ordered a replacement chassis from the factory to replace this crashed car. The team would build up a completely new car from parts to replace the wrecked one for the 1979 season, using whatever we could salvage from 930 890 0033 (plus an extensive list of new parts).

1979

Very early in 1979, Greg Elliff, Jerry Woods and I went up to the San Francisco airport with the team transporter to pick up a new chassis which had come over on Lufthansa from Germany. It was 935 chassis 009 00030. By early 1979, the factory was cutting back on building customer 935s, and just started selling chassis to the various teams. 009 00030 was one of those, an all-white 935 chassis, from the Porsche factory. The team proceeded to build up this car from the ground up, as a completely new car. It even had a decal on the rear wing that stated, Made in Mountain View California!

It would run its first race at the 1979 Le Mans 24 Hours driven by Dick Barbour, Paul Newman the actor, and Rolf Stommelen. It ran almost faultlessly (except for a stuck wheel nut), and finished second overall, and once again the team won the IMSA class. It ran again a few weeks later at the Watkins Glen 6 Hours, where again, Dick, Paul and Rolf drove. It gained some amount of notoriety in practice because Paul Newman was struggling to come to grips with the car on this circuit. He installed a milk crate on the floor on the passenger side, and while just hanging on to the roll cage, had Rolf Stommelen drive him around for some ‘driver training’. His lap times improved by several seconds, so it worked. There were of course many photos taken of this unorthodox method, which I am sure made the movie studios cringe when they saw them! This was the way of Paul at the races though, he was there to race, and did whatever he needed to, in order to improve himself.

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The car ran only one more race in 1979, The Road America 500, driven by Dick Barbour, Brian Redman and Skeeter McKitterick. IMSA had added extra weight (150 pounds or so) to twin turbo 935s at that race, so we struggled somewhat. Brian Redman said the car was affected quite a bit. Peter Gregg went back to single turbo so as not to have to add the weight. The car ran with the front group and battled for the win but after 98 (of 125) laps, the engine died with some kind of electrical malfunction, and the car lost a wheel.

1980

At the end of the season, the car was sold by Dick Barbour to Bob Garretson. That meant the car stayed ‘in house’ at Dick Barbour Racing, it just had a new owner. Dick had ordered a new Kremer car for the 1980 season. The 009 00030 car ran in the 24 hours of Daytona driven by Bob, Anny Verney and Skeeter McKitterick but at this point it was still running as a 935-79 with the stock factory setup. It still had the water system for intercooling air, and in fact we had trouble with this in the race as the water kept leaking out. Daytona is notorious for a lot of sand and such on the circuit and radiators over time got tiny holes in them from the sandblasting, which caused the water to leak out, which then caused the engine inlet air temperature to climb which would cause detonation in the engine. By the last six hours of the race we had to stop multiple times to re-fill the water tank, sending a mechanic into the ‘back seat area’ with a hose from the pit box. The car still finished ninth overall.

After Daytona, the car was back to the shop to be converted as a Kremer kit had been ordered, and this car was to be converted to K3 specification. The kit consisted of new front and rear fenders, new rear wing, new false rear window, new front air dam, and an air to air intercooler system. Some modifications to the rear bulkhead were needed to fit the new intercooler, as this now projected into the rear of the passenger compartment quite a bit more than the old water system. The gearbox was also turned upside down to lessen the angle of the driveshafts, which allowed us to lower the car, which in turn improved the handling.

For Sebring, and the rest of the 1980 season, this car would be sponsored by Apple Computer. This was back in the early days before Apple was the household name it is today. Steve Wozniak (Apple co-founder) and Mike Markula (angel investor at Apple) came by the shop several times to see the status of the build-up for Sebring, but as I recall we did not see Steve Jobs until the race itself. We kind of gathered that Steve Wozniak was the car guy of the two. At Sebring, the car would be driven by Bob Garretson, Bobby Rahal and the young Canadian, Kees Nierop. Bobby at the time, had done Formula Atlantic, the Can-Am, and a few Formula 1 races. I remember the crew was thinking, great, a ‘formula car guy’. Bob Garretson told us, don’t worry, “We will train him!” Bobby went on to be a great driver for us, he got along with all the crew, and is still good friends with most of us today.

The car ran well in the race except for two small issues. At one point, there was some issue with something inside the cockpit. Some work was done, and Rahal was sent back out. Rahal pitted again almost immediately, shouting, “Get the fxxxing tools out of here, they keep jamming the brake pedal.” A few wrenches had fallen under the seat and were rattling around in the pedal assembly, so John Johnson and I crawled in there and removed the errant tools.

Later in the race at the night time with a few hours to go, Bob Garretson did not come around. Back then we did not have radios, as the technology was not that good, and didn’t work most of the time. All we knew from the officials was that the car was stopped at the side of the road and the driver was working on the car. For all the endurance races, we installed an on-board tool kit in the cars, as the driver was the only one who could work on it once he left the pits. The kits would include things like, a few wrenches, screwdrivers, pliers, wire, and tie-wraps with maybe some tape. After some time, Bob returned to the pits, with the whole inside of the rear engine panels disassembled. He informed us that he had run over some debris, which turned out to be a piece of brake hose with wire in it. The wire had been thrown around the axle and shorted out the electrics across the starter motor. Bob, being a decent mechanic (for a driver) he managed to effect a partial repair with the on-board tool kit, once he saw what the problem was. A pretty good job was done by him, out there in the dark of the Sebring night. The crew put everything back together and sent him on his way. As a result of those delays, the car ended up seventh, while the team car of Dick Barbour and John Fitzpatrick won the race.

At Riverside, the car finished second to the team SACHS car. While the SACHS car was running the whole IMSA schedule, the Apple car was just doing the endurance races plus Sears Point. Le Mans resulted in a DNF for Bobby Rahal, Bob Garretson and Alan Moffat, as the engine lost a cylinder after about ten hours of running. At Watkins Glen, although Bobby Rahal had put the car on the pole, it again dropped out with engine issues. Jerry Woods had been unable to get new parts from the factory in time to rebuild the engine and had to use old rod bolts, one of which broke in the race. There was a world-wide titanium shortage in 1980, which seemed to impact Porsche’s supply of connecting rods and rod bolts.

The next race for the car was Sears Point. This was important for the team, as this was Apple’s home track, being the closest we would run to their Headquarters in Cupertino, and so a lot of their people came up for the race. It turned out to be one of the hottest weekends on record, with the air temperature around 108 at race time. There were no cool suits back then, and it was real hot inside the cars. Our two cars took off, and were soon running 1-2 with Rahal right on Fitzpatrick’s bumper. After about 20 laps, Rahal pitted and said, “Overheating, overheating, oil temperature is climbing.” Jerry Woods told him, don’t worry about it, it’s because you are following Fitz so closely, there is no cool airflow to the oil cooler (cool being a relative term when it was 108 outside). We threw a bucket of cold water on him, and sent him back out. The stop had dropped him to fifth. He did an excellent job over the remaining laps to end up second by 20 seconds behind Fitz. So, a good result for the team, and a good show for Apple.

At Mosport, our two cars started on the front row. Fitzpatrick just beat Rahal to the pole, as he had the use of the German qualifying tyres that Fitz had been bringing over as baggage on his flights from Europe. The tyres were used in the DTM in Germany as there was a big tyre war going on there. IMSA rules were kind of open, in that you just had to qualify and start on the same brand of tyre, which we did as they were all Goodyear tyres. Bob Garretson had a crash in the race so, Mosport was a DNF for the car. But, the car was repaired and ran a fine third at the Road America event a few weeks later. At the end of the season, Dick Barbour planned to stop racing, and the car stayed with Bob Garretson who was going to continue in 1981.

1981

1981 promised to be a big year for the Old Warhorse. A deal had been signed with Ralph Cooke and Roy Woods, and Garretson Enterprises would prepare and run Cooke-Woods cars in 1981. We would be running for the IMSA championship, as well as the Le Mans and Watkins Glen makes races. New Lola T600s were also ordered. During the beginning part of the season we would use the two 935s, 009 00030 and Ralph Cooke’s 935, as the Lola T600 would not be ready until May.

We only ran one car at Daytona, Bob’s car, 009 00030 and we won, so were off to a good start. The second race we got Ralph’s car prepared as well, and were hoping for good results. Early in the race, Bob Garretson had an incident at the hairpin, somehow the car rolled over and landed back on the wheels. We noticed on the stop watches that he was late, then we saw him heading for the pits about 25 seconds slow on the lap. The car was a mess, we had to hammer the roof back in place to get a windshield in the car. Jerry Woods had to fix a leaky oil line in the back which had broken. We repaired it as best we could and sent Rahal out in it. He came in right away, the windshield had folded up, broken and was sitting in his lap! He then informed us, the steering wheel was not straight. We basically told him, yeah, that is the least of our problems. We went through all three of our spare windshields, they all broke or fell out. Finally, John Johnson went to the Porsche truck and picked up a fourth one. This one, we drilled holes in and tie-wrapped it in. This final repair, with a metal post fashioned to hold it in place, held for the rest of the race. Rahal and Redman were not too happy about it, but continued anyway. In the end, we finished seventeenth overall and got points, so the two of them were still the championship leaders. This took some of the frustration away as basically, they had driven a wreck around for about nine hours and still finished.

There was a huge repair job on the Old Warhorse before Riverside. New roof, new roll cage, and get the chassis straightened at the frame shop. Somehow, we got it done, ran at Riverside and the car finished third. Rahal, got a fourth with it at Laguna Seca while Redman won the race in the brand-new Lola T600. The 935 was then prepped for Le Mans, as this was the year we entered both cars, a Lola T600 with a Porsche engine and the 009 00030. Bob Garretson, Anny Verney and Ralph Cooke would drive the 935. Problem was, we got the Lola very late (about two months late), and barely got it put together for the trip without even the chance to test it. It ran, but had no power, so failed to qualify (it turned out there was a leak in the intercooler piping, causing it to lose all the boost). The 935 ran fine and finished sixth overall, but after Le Mans, Cooke-Woods and Garretson parted ways. Ralph was erratic and hard to deal with for sure, so it was probably for the best. Bob decided to continue with 009 00030 and run for the World Endurance Championship, as he was well up in the points by then.

The second half of the season started with the Daytona Paul Revere race, which ran at midnight the night before the Firecracker 400 Nascar race in early July. It was very hot and humid, I think the temperature at the midnight start was 90 and humidity around 100%. Just coming from Le Mans, we really did not have any extra engines ready to go and Bob had bought a used engine from Peter Gregg’s Brumos team, which Jack Atkinson told us needed to be rebuilt. There just was not time for that, given there were only two weeks between this event and Le Mans. So we installed it with fingers crossed. Rahal was driving and running in the top four for a while, but near the end, there was an oil leak, and we finished 17^th. For Watkins Glen, Jerry Woods had a new engine ready to go. Porsche helped us by providing both Rick Mears and Johnnie Rutherford to assist with the driving. The result was a fine third overall behind two Lancias, and first in the Group 5 over 2-liter class. Bob entered Bobby in both the Sears Point and Portland IMSA sprint races, but at Sears Point the crankshaft broke, a rare problem which was traced to a manufacturing defect by Porsche. The Portland race resulted in a third place overall. At Mosport, Bob drove with Mauricio DeNarvaez to seventh place in Mauricio’s car. The last US race counting towards the World Endurance Championship was the Road America 500 where Bob got a fine fourth place, with the help of Tom Gloy. The championship was still very close between Bob and Harald Grohs and to win, we basically had to go to the Brands Hatch 1000km at the end of September and finish in front of Grohs. We did just that, finishing second overall and clinching the World Endurance championship for Bob. The Kremer Brothers joined us for some celebratory champagne in the garage right after the race, as a K3 had won the world championship. The Old Warhorse had not let us down all year and any issues we did have were due to parts defects, or the unavailability of new parts.

1982

For the 1982 season, the team was restructured as Garretson Developments, and a new March 82G (chassis 001) was purchased. The 935-009 00030 would continue as the second car. For Daytona, the car was driven by Bob Garretson, Jeff Wood and Mauricio DeNarvaez, with sponsorship from Penthouse Magazine and Michelob beer. The car ran very well and ended up third. After Daytona, I was pretty much put in charge of the Old Warhorse as crew chief, as all the other full-time mechanics wanted to work on the March, not the old technology 935. We had been approached by drivers who wanted to rent seats for the Sebring, Riverside and Charlotte IMSA races. Grady Clay would drive at Sebring, Riverside and Charlotte, while Ray Ratcliff would drive at Riverside, Charlotte and Le Mans. Once again, the car was well prepared and did not let us down, finishing seventh at Sebring, fifth at Riverside, fourth at Charlotte, and eleventh at Le Mans. At Le Mans, the car was driven to its 11^th place finish by Bob, Anny Verney and Ray Ratcliff. A fine result, given that the ACO fuel regulations caused us to lose a cylinder and drive half the race on five cylinders (running lean to save fuel caused the engine to run hot which damaged one cylinder).

1983

Around the end of October of 1982, we were contacted by Wayne Baker. Wayne had done some IMSA racing in the past in the GTU category in a Porsche 914/4 that he had built at his shops in San Diego. He had had some success with it and winning a few races with the car. His idea for 1983 was to run a Porsche 934 in the IMSA GTO (GT over 2.5-litres) category. He discussed the feasibility of this with Jerry Woods, and a plan started to come together. At this point, as per the IMSA rules, the GTO car was not an FIA Group 4 car at all, in other words, it was not a 1976 Porsche 934. The rules were much more relaxed, as IMSA wanted the car to be competitive with the Nissan ZX turbo of Don Devendorf, the tube frame Camaro of Billy Hagan (the NASCAR team owner of Terry Labonte), and the BMW M1 of Diego Montoya (Juan Pablo’s uncle). All of these cars were much quicker than a 1976 934, so the rules were relaxed a bit in 1983. Any 911 based chassis could be used, suspension was pretty much free, as long as it was Porsche, and the engine could only be a 3.2 single turbo engine (maximum size).

Wayne and Jerry’s idea was to buy Bob Garretson’s 935, the Old Warhorse, and convert it to IMSA GTO spec, and make as many modifications as allowed by the rules. With the plans in place, Wayne bought the car from Bob and over the winter, the conversion took place. Some major changes had to be implemented: (1) the engine had to be converted to a single turbo engine (from twin turbo); (2) the whole intercooler system had to be turned around, as there would no longer be air inlets for the air-to-air system in the front of the rear fenders when using 934 type bodywork; (3) the bodywork all had to be changed to 934-type silhouette with front headlights and no rear wing; (4) the tyres and wheels had to be changed to 16×10.5 W front and 16 x12.5 W rear, instead of 16×11 W front and 19×15 W rear (which were 935 spec wheels).

The chassis was sent down to Don Araki in San Diego, who was a very good fabricator. He had worked for Carroll Shelby for many years, and had a lot of experience. We used to call him the ‘Prince of Darkness’, as he would show up to work at around 3pm, then work till sometimes 6am. Don and Greg did all the chassis and bodywork in San Diego, and they stiffened up the chassis, by cutting away the rear tub and building a tube structure. They also re-routed the oil lines away from the door sills, down the centre of the car through the cockpit. The rules had changed as braided lines for oil were now allowed inside the cockpit which was a much better setup for maintenance, as the lines were readily accessible. Max Crawford was involved with the design and build of the new bodywork, which was all in carbon fibre. The rest of us in Mountain View, worked on everything else while the car was down south, rebuilding suspension, brakes, wheels and equipment, engines and gearbox.

Jerry Woods built a 3.2-litre ‘935’ engine using a KKK K36 turbo, with a few other improvements. He developed a twin wastegate system to ease the drivability of the engine. He also built a set of 6-to-1 equal length headers that helped improve mid-range torque. These headers ran all year with no problem, whereas the Porsche ones would tend to crack after a while, and need replacement. For Daytona, Jerry moved the boost sensor line above the throttle butterflies to enrich the fuel mixture when off-throttle, which would make the engine run cooler. This worked well, but had an interesting side effect, which was a huge flame out the back during off-throttle situations. It was quite spectacular, especially at night. However, this was not an easy car to drive, as there was not enough tyre for the horsepower, especially in the rear tyre, and it tended to use up rear tyres quickly. Handling was also tricky, as it had no rear wing to speak of, nor any large front air dam and fenders for any downforce, it was mighty quick in a straight line though. It had very little drag, due to the 934-type bodywork, and as much horsepower as any 935 ever did. At Riverside, Al Holbert (who was running a March Porsche GTP car), came into our garage during practice and asked us what the hell type of engine we were running. He remarked on the long Riverside back straight, the 934 would just pull away from him and he would have to wait until the corners, and under braking, to pass.

The car did well in 1983. A crash in a monsoon rain storm in Miami was its only real DNF. In one of the most amazing races ever, it won the Sebring 12 Hour outright, and had GTO class wins in Riverside, Atlanta and Charlotte. That along with other high finishes gave Wayne Baker the IMSA 1983 GTO championship. His co-driver Jim Mullen, was second in the championship. The Old Warhorse even survived a large fire in practice at Sears Point on the Thursday of race week while testing. Jim Mullen spun off in some oil and caught some dry grass on fire which started the car on fire. The crew worked around the clock until Saturday afternoon to repair the car, returned to the circuit, qualified and finished second in the race on Sunday. It was a championship season on a shoe-string budget, but well executed by the team and drivers.

At the end of the 1983 season, the Old Warhorse was converted back to its 935-configuration, but continued to run with 16” rear wheels, as Firestone (Wayne Baker’s tyre supplier) did not have any 19” tyres for the car. (NOTE: This is a problem today for vintage racing, as no-one makes current day tyres of the size the 935 used to run.)

1984

For 1984, Wayne ran the car for Daytona, Sebring and Riverside. Jim Mullen and the Americas cup captain, Tom Blackaller, would drive at Daytona and Sebring. At Daytona, the car was running strongly but by early Sunday morning, had an issue with the clutch. Since the 935 has a synchronized transmission, driving with no clutch is not really possible. So, we had a 32-minute stop to remove the engine, change the clutch and continue, eventually finishing fifth. Sebring was another good run with the same three drivers and resulted in a fourth place. At Miami the car ran well but was only 14^th. The level of competition for a 935 at this time in an IMSA sprint race was just too much. The car really was no longer competitive except at the longer distances. Riverside resulted in 16^th, with a new driver, Jack Newsum, who struggled with the power and drivability of the Old Warhorse, as he had very little experience. At Laguna Seca, Blackaller again drove solo and could only get eleventh place, not a bad result for this car, considering that he was up against Lola T600s, March GTP cars and 962 Porsches. That was the Old Warhorse’s last race in 1984.

1985

The Old Warhorse ran once more at Daytona in 1985, driven by Wayne Baker, Jack Newsum and Chip Mead. They finished ninth, but the car just sat in Wayne’s shop until later that year as he continued racing with a March GTP car.

Chet Vincentz had bought 930 890 0014 (a 935) from Moretti in 1981 and converted it to a GTO car, to also run in IMSA. This car was in fact the 1980 Daytona 24 Hour winner in the colours of Rheinhold Joest, and he ran this car with some success until 1985. At the Riverside IMSA event that year, this car caught fire in practice and was badly burned up. He needed another car, so he bought 009 00030 from Wayne Baker and converted it back into a 934 once again and continued running it in IMSA until 1987. Chassis 930 890 0014 was eventually repaired and restored.

Old Warhorse twilight years

I sort of lost track of the Old Warhorse (009 00030) after 1987, until some point in the 1990’s when I got a call from Carlos DeQuesada in Miami. He had bought the car and had called IMSA to see if there was anyone around who knew anything about this car. IMSA forwarded him to myself and Jerry Woods.

We had an enjoyable conversation one day on the history of the car and he asked, if I was to restore it, what livery I would use. My view was that I would make it as it won Daytona in 1981, the blue Style Auto livery. Jerry Woods thought he would make it as it won Sebring in 1983, as the 934-GTO. Carlos was leaning towards the 1979 original Le Mans livery, as Paul Newman had driven it (little did he know then, that he was prescient to select this one). I mentioned that it would be a challenging task, as the car had been changed so much from its original construction. All the modifications over the years would make it difficult to return everything back to the 1979 specification.

He did proceed with the 1979 restoration, and Paul Willison did a credible job, given what he had to work with. The Old Warhorse appeared at the Porsche Rennsport in 2007 at Daytona, after apparently winning a best in class award at the Amelia Island Concours that year. Eventually it was sold to Carlos Monteverde in the UK, and it has appeared at various vintage events such as the Goodwood Festival of Speed, and was on display at the Porsche factory museum for some time.

There were rumours floating around that Apple Computer wanted to buy the Old Warhorse and restore it back as the Apple 935 K3, as it had run in 1980, but nothing ever happened along those lines.

In August of 2016 it was put up for auction at Pebble Beach, Monterey by Gooding and Co. Jerry Woods and I sat at the auction and watched it go for $4.4 million, PLUS commission. Amazing! Who could have known? Someone said it was, “A $1-million dollar car with $3.4-million of history!”

Adam Carolla, a Hollywood film maker, producer and radio personality has bought it, and is restoring it back to 1979 specification. He plans on running it at Monterey and other Historic events. We look forward to seeing ‘Old Warhorse’ on the circuits once again!

Drivers 935 009 00030: 1979-1987

Owners 935 009 00030: 1979-2017

Race history 935 009 00030: 1979-1987

(Car sold by Dick Barbour to Bob Garretson)

1990?  Car sold by Chet Vincentz to Carlos DeQuesada
2007? Car sold by Carlos DeQuesada to Carlos Monteverde
2016 Car sold at Pebble Beach auction by Carlos Monteverde to Adam Carolla

Written by: Martin Raffauf
Images by: Porsche, Virtual Motorpix/Glen Smale, Martin Raffauf, Cooke-Woods Racing, Electrodyne, Kurt Oblinger, Quinn Williams, Wayne Baker Racing, Jerry Woods, Don Hodgdon, John Johnson, Garretson developments, Michelob