Porsche Steps Up Vintage Motorsports Activities

With the famed Monterey Motorsports Reunion as backdrop, Porsche Motorsport North America (PMNA) announced Saturday it will expand from serving teams and owners of contemporary 911 race cars to providing a similar service to the large number of collectors of vintage Porsche race cars in the United States and Canada. PMNA has established a partnership with a new historic motorsports department that is now being established within Porsche AG's Motorsport Division in Weissach, Germany. The new department will provide expert restoration services to the Porsche Museum for many of the vintage competition cars the company owns well beyond the ones displayed in its riveting exhibition center. When ready, a number of these cars will be entered in the increasingly popular vintage racing circuit around the world.

“We want to keep the memory of Porsche's many racing successes alive by not just putting our legendary race cars on display but by letting them actively compete in events that celebrate historic motorsports,” said Achim Stejskal, Director of the Porsche Museum in Stuttgart, Germany. “Race cars have to race, not rust,” he added with a smile.

Working closely with the Weissach-based operation, PMNA will add heritage racecar restoration and servicing to its repertoire. So far, the company has been mainly involved in the selling and supporting 911 race cars to North American owners and teams as well as in the restoration of race engines for historic Porsche race cars like the 917 and 962.

PMNA will move its operations from Santa Ana, Calif. location to Carson, Calif., where Porsche Cars North America is building its West Coast Experience Center. The new facility is expected to be ready by fall of next year. Aside from housing PMNA's offices, parts storage and workshop facilities, the new complex will incorporate a business and conference center, a human performance laboratory and a number of facilities for customers and enthusiasts that will enable them to finalize selection of their next Porsche or hone their driving skills.

“Our new, much larger facility will enable us to reunite with race cars that PMNA worked on decades ago”, said Jens Walter, president and CEO of Porsche Motorsport North America. “Finally, we can respond to the demand for factory-backed restoration and maintenance services, expertise that no other manufacturer can provide,” he added.

A key component of Porsche's new Experience Center will be a more-than three-mile long test track that includes a range of different track and surface conditions, which will challenge the skills of drivers and the capacity of their cars.

As an industry first, PMNA will be able to offer race car owners the opportunity to store their cars in the new facility in a museum-like atmosphere, service them between races and get them race ready before each outing including the necessary shakedown / roll-out on the test track after repair and maintenance work.

By Roger Hart