Become a premium member for just $35/year and get ad-free access!
Improving a Car That’s Already Excellent The Porsche 911 RSR is a car that has won more than 20 FIA World Endurance Championship races. Porsche hasn’t decided to rest on its laurels, though. The company didn’t even want to make evolutionary changes to its winning racecar. Instead, it replaced 95 percent...
Boasting the largest starting grid of the weekend with 201 qualifiers, the ADAC 24h-Classic race was always going to be a busy event. Also, the wide spectrum of cars and the performance differential between the front and back of the grid, was huge. Despite this, the field was about as...
At the start of the 24 Hours of Le Mans
Endurance racing should be a test of sustained strength and stamina over a prolonged period of time. It is not a sprint, because that is a test of a race car’s high speed capability over a short distance, such as Formula 1. As a result, race cars in these two...
The more things change, the more they stay the same…someone famous once said. Perhaps the same can be said for the 2019 starting grid for the 24 Hours of Le Mans, which will kick off tomorrow, Saturday 15 June, at 15h00. With the titles decided in the LMP1 and GTE...
Before we arrived in Le Mans for the start of the 2019 week of activities, we knew that the weather was going to be very changeable. Unfortunately we got to our administrative registration too late in the day to still make Sunday’s scrutineering session, but we made it to the...
Le Mans 24 Hour, 13-14 June 2015: Lined up prior to the formation lap are (from L-R) – the #18 Porsche 919 Hybrid driven by Marc Lieb/Romain Dumas/Neel Jani (finished 5th); #17 Porsche 919 Hybrid driven by Timo Bernhard/Brendon Hartley/Mark Webber (finished 2nd); #19 Porsche 919 Hybrid driven by Earl...
Although the factory squad was crowned the World Manufacturers champions for the first 2018/2019 Super Season, their success in the forthcoming 24-hour race is by no means a foregone conclusion. With the Test Day just a few days away, Porsche will begin preparations to defend its Le Mans title. Porsche...
Spa woke to snow falling at 06h30 yesterday morning, and by the time I had made it to the circuit, the temperature was a steady zero. It looked more like a winter wonderland than a racing circuit, to be honest. There are all sorts of rules relating to whether it...
Our second trip to Spa in the 2018/2019 Super Season takes place at a time when the teams, across all four classes, have built up a considerable depth of experience and momentum in the championship. This time last year we had a dry race with brilliant sunshine from beginning to...
IMSA R3 WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, Long Beach, 13 April 2019: The #911 Porsche GT Team Porsche 911 RSR of Patrick Pilet and Nick Tandy leads the #912 of teammates Earl Bamber and Laurens Vanthoor away from the start The week’s preparations started well for the factory Porsche team, as the...
Le Mans 24 Hours, 31 May-1 June 1986: Start of the race – Porsches dominate the lead group In Part 1, Stories from Le Mans – with a Porsche flavour, our intrepid scribbler who hails from that beautiful part of South Africa, the Western Cape, shares with us some hilarious...
Porsche Sport 2018 – © Gruppe C Motorsport Verlag For those who follow Porsche motorsport closely, the 26th edition of the well-known annual, Porsche Sport 2018, is definitely a book you want on your bookshelf. I have sung the praises of these publications before today, and for good reason, but...
On 21 March, the Le Mans entry list for 2019 was revealed for the 24-hour race which is to be held on 15-16 June. Just as in 2018, no less than ten 911 RSRs will be in action, with the potential for that number swelling to twelve if the two...
On 21 March, the Le Mans entry list for 2019 was revealed for the 24-hour race which is to be held on 15-16 June. Just as in 2018, no less than ten 911 RSRs will be in action, with the potential for that number swelling to twelve if the two...
There was a double victory for Porsche at Sebring, as the #91 Porsche 911 RSR of Gianmaria Bruni/Richard Lietz won round six of the WEC in Florida on Friday. Not to be outdone, Nick Tandy/Patrick Pilet/Frédéric Makowiecki also grabbed a win in the #911 Porsche 911 RSR in round two...
The 2018 prize giving ceremony for the Porsche Carrera Cup France took place on Wednesday 30 January in Paris. Not only were all the main actors in this intensely competitive championship present for this occasion, but also the official Porsche works driver Patrick Pilet and other media, journalists and racing...
After a 45-year hiatus, the popular Ice Race GP at Zell am See near the picturesque Austrian town of the same name, was revived last month to great acclaim. Thanks to an abundance of snow in the region, the race track, which is laid out on the frozen runway of...
Falken Motorsports team 2017 Falken Tyre Europe GmbH is the European subsidiary of Japanese tyre manufacturer Sumitomo Rubber Industries Ltd. The Falken brand was born in 1983 and five years later the company’s European headquarters was established in Offenbach am Main, Germany. A similar operation followed in 1991 in the...
#911 Porsche 911 RSR driven by Patrick Pilet, Nick Tandy and Frederic Makowiecki Driving the #911 Porsche 911 RSR, Nick Tandy put together a brilliant lap in qualifying at the Daytona 24 on Thursday when he set a new qualifying record for the GTLM class at Daytona during the 15-minute...
Rolex 24 at Daytona, 26-27 January 2019: Porsche 911 RSR, Porsche GT Team (911): Patrick Pilet, Nick Tandy, Frederic Makowiecki, Porsche GT Team (912): Earl Bamber, Laurens Vanthoor, Mathieu Jaminet The 57th Rolex 24 at Daytona on the weekend of 26-27 January will kick off IMSA’s 50th anniversary season and...
Porsche scores fourth place at Macau in the 2018 FIA GT World Cup in Macau. In a fiercely contested race on the Guia Circuit, works driver Earl Bamber narrowly missed out on claiming a podium spot. Mathieu Jaminet concluded his maiden outing in the Macau race in seventh position, while...
There will be four Porsche 911 GT3 R on the starting line of the world’s toughest street race, the FIA GT World Cup in Macau (China) from 15 to 18 November. The Manthey-Racing team will be fielding two of the vehicles to be driven by Earl Bamber and Laurens Vanthoor....
The 2018 Supercup finale in Mexico will quite literally go down to the wire! Fans in Mexico can look forward to a suspense-filled season finale of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez. The three competitors in the frame will fight for the championship title at rounds...
At the halfway point in the 2018/2019 WEC Super Season, Porsche leads the field in the GT Manufacturers title by a healthy margin. This position was undoubtedly helped by the huge points haul following the momentous 1-2 result in the Le Mans 24 Hour race back in June. But the...
Laguna Seca, IMSA, 9 September 2018: A view over the track shows the morning fog receding as Laguna Seca awakes The IMSA series came once again to WeatherTech Laguna Seca Raceway in California for the penultimate round in the 2018 WeatherTech Championship. The weather was typical California coastal September weather,...
During the closing stages of FP2, I was photographing at Club Corner, just as the cars entered the start/finish straight. The #91 Porsche came past me a few times and as it accelerated up the straight, the engine sounded like it was misfiring. On Saturday evening after Qualifying, in the...
The summer break is over, and it is back to business for the Silverstone Round 3 of the World Endurance Championship. With six 911 RSRs in the field, there is plenty for the Porsche enthusiast to see. The works Porsche team is well ahead on points in the tables thanks...
After the summer break, the WEC heads to Silverstone this coming weekend for WEC Round 3 of the 2018/2019 Super Season. Having moved from its traditional slot as the WEC season opener in April, it will be the first time the Silverstone round of the WEC has been held this...
IMSA Road America, 5 August 2018: A victorious Wright Motorsports after the race The IMSA race this last weekend, round 8 of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, produced rather mixed results for the Porsches. While honours deservedly went to the #58 Wright Motorsport team of Patrick Long/Christina Nielsen in the...
24 Hours of Spa, 28-29 July 2018: Pre-race starting grid Porsche took up the battle in the 2018 Spa 24 Hours with four 911 GT3 R race cars. The Spa 24 Hours is regarded as one of Europe’s major long-distance classics alongside the 24-hour races of Le Mans and the...
Exciting starting grid at the Le Mans Legends 2007 This coming weekend sees the running of the ninth Le Mans Classic on the famous Circuit de la Sarthe. The event, created by the Automobile Club de l’Ouest and Peter Auto almost two decades ago, has become the jewel in the...
A little more than twenty four hours ago, sixty cars lined up against the pit lane wall, and without exception, every driver on the grid had his/her mind set on winning the race or at the very least, their class. Now, just twenty six hours later, we know which of...
The Porsche #LeMans24 Class of 2018, on 12/06/2018
Qualifying 1 (Q1) for the Le Mans 24 Hour went off on Wednesday night without too much fanfare or drama. Before that Free Practice 1 (FP1) in the afternoon offered the teams the opportunity to put their cars and drivers through the paces at will and so not too much...
Well it’s official, pigs can fly! The #92 Porsche 911 RSR of Michael Christensen/Kevin Estre/Laurens Vanthoor/Dirk Werner may not have topped the lap charts on Sunday at the Le Mans Test day, but they were just 1.3 seconds off their team mates in the #93 Porsche who did indeed post...
This weekend sees the official Le Mans Test day on Sunday 3 June for those teams participating in the 86th running of the famous 24-hour race. The GTE field is one of the largest in several years, thanks to Porsche and Ford both running four cars each in the Pro...
The evening before the opening round of the WEC season at Spa, Porsche Road & Race had the opportunity of chatting to Pascal Zurlinden, Director GT Factory Motorsports, about the 2018 Porsche 911 RSR and the competition in the GTE Pro class. Uppermost in the minds of some journalists was the...
WEC Spa-Francorchamps 6 Hours, 5 May 2018: Porsche works driver, Gianmaria Bruni, talks candidly to the author during the ‘Meet the Team’ session at the Spa 6 Hour race Born in Rome (you don’t get much more Italian than that!) on 30 May 1981, Gianmaria ‘Gimmi’ Bruni began his racing...
Porsche will be represented by a large fleet of vehicles at the 24-hour race on the Nürburgring: 43 Porsche 911 and Porsche Cayman race cars will tackle Germany’s biggest automobile race on the 24.38-kilometre combination of the Grand Prix circuit and the Nürburgring-Nordschleife on 12-13 May. Just like last year,...
(from L-R): 1982 Porsche 956 C and 2017 Porsche 919 Hybrid Evo Just before the Nürburgring 24-hour race will be green flagged on May 12, Porsche will present a dream team at the Nürburgring Nordschleife for the benefit of the expected 200,000 spectators. There, Timo Bernhard and Hans-Joachim Stuck will...
The first race of the 2018 WEC season certainly didn’t disappoint. From the starter’s green lights, right up until the chequered flag, the excitement hit a high point and didn’t once wane. This was truly a WEC battle in the Ardennes. The start Under bright sunshine, the race got underway...
The first race of the season, the 2018 6 Hours of Spa, is almost upon us. Thursday saw Free Practice 1 and 2 (FP1 and FP2) and while these sessions traditionally don’t tell you anything, it was nevertheless interesting to see the cars out for the first time in the season....
Porsche starts the new world championship season at Spa in the six-hour race at the famous circuit in the Ardennes region of Belgium on 5 May 2018. This is the first race on the 15-month long Super Season of the FIA Sports Car World Endurance Championship WEC. The 7-kilometre circuit...
Long Beach, IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, 14 April 2018: #912 Porsche 911 RSR of Laurens Vanthoor and Earl Bamber bounces over the kerbs during the race The efforts of the factory Porsches over the weekend came to naught, as the two 911 RSRs finished well down the order in the...
Activities have concluded for Porsche at the 2018 WEC Prologue, and by all accounts, it went very smoothly. Run over two days in the south of France at the Paul Ricard High Tech Test Track (Paul Ricard HTTT), this event gave the teams an ideal opportunity to test their cars...
12 Hours of Sebring, 17 March 2018: The #912 Porsche 911 RSR of Earl Bamber, Laurens Vanthoor and Gianmaria Bruni during the race Changes to the Sebring 2019 schedule were announced during the week which will benefit all endurance racing fans. Following a recent meeting between the FIA World Endurance...
The front door of Autobau, which is built inside a turn of the 20th century alcohol storage facility There is a collection of cars that every racing and car enthusiast should see. It is at the Autobau, located in Romanshorn, Switzerland. On the southern shore of Lake Constance, the Autobau...
Project 1 may be a new team on the block in WEC, but this year, the team celebrates its 25th anniversary in motorsport. This season is certainly its biggest commitment to date as 2018 will see the team from Lohne, Germany, participating in the Carrera Cup Deutschland, the Mobil 1...
As the main racing championships are about to begin the 2018 season, the Porsche Carrera Cup France has seen its first collective Testing Day on the circuit of Nevers Magny Cours, on the 20 March. Despite poor weather all over France, the Porsche Carrera Cup France 2018 test day was held...
Goodwood 76th Members’ Meeting, 17/18 March 2018: #58 Porsche 935 K3 (1980) driven by Urs Beck in the Group 5 ‘Special Production’ event over the weekend I know that motor racing circuits around the UK are renowned for being cold places, and that’s because many of them were built around...