74 whichcar.com.au/wheels
T’S EASY to get overwhelmed at the Porsche
Museum. The public have left the building and
we’re led from the foyer through a labyrinthine
series of elevators and corridors, all finished in
unadorned white, to a set of double doors. Our guide
swipes her fob on the wall and there’s a momentary
pause. The doors swing open and there right before
us is a plain black Beetle. Behind it is a 1939 Type 64
body, and peeking through a far set of stairs are racing
911 RSRs and 936s. A Paris Dakar 911 and a race 944
to the left, the second 356 ever built to the right. For
a moment, I’m a bit overloaded and just gawp, head
swivelling in disbelief.
Photographer Jahn’s a regular here and he’s straight
into it, but I need a moment. Our guide asks if we’re
okay and then leaves. They genuinely have left us
alone in here with these priceless cars. Kid, meet
candy store. There’s a certain flow to the 80 cars
on show, starting with the earliest and spiralling
up three levels to the most recent, represented by
the current production car range, the 918 Spyder
hypercar and the 919 Le Mans winner.
My footsteps ring out on the white marble floor
tiles as I walk to the front of the museum and look
out. Daylight is fading at the picture windows andlights blink on in the apartment blocks of this eastern
suburb of Stuttgart. Commuters head home on the
dual carriageway. I’m watching them while sitting on
the rear tyre of Alain Prost’s McLaren MP4/2C F1 car,
powered by Porsche. I look into the cockpit, keen to see
what The Professor would see out of the car. Just one
gauge, marked to 12,000rpm, a Personal steering wheel
and a burnished gear lever at his right hand. It smells
slightly funky, some biological top notes among the oil
and rubber.
Start walking clockwise and you’ll tick back in time
through Porsche’s competition cars. The 919 looks
like some giant carbon sarcophagus, pure function,
awesome in its purposeful ugliness. The RS Spyder is
its antithesis, all primary colours and open cockpit. The
brake dust from the 911 GT1 is still baked hard onto
the louvres on its front wheel arches. It’s been there
for 20 years since this car raced at Le Mans, deposited
there by Bob Wollek on the big braking zones at
Arnage and Mulsanne.
Underscoring Porsche’s competition success is a
vast forest of trophies suspended on wires. There’s the
dainty little opal headscarf for the Paris Dakar, the
big bowl of the Mille Miglia and there in the centre
is the trophy awarded to Le Mans 24 Hour winners.WORDS ANDY ENRIGHT PHOTOS STEFFEN JAHN
Underscoring Porsche’s competition
success is a vast forest of trophies
suspended on wires