The Porsche 911 GT3 RS has been described as a street legal race car and a Porsche for purists. Ex-DTM driver Roland Asch describes it as the ‘best sports car in the world’, an uncompromising automobile fully suited to racing. To prove the point, a 911 GT3 RS entered for the Nürburgring 24-Hours was driven to and from the track with street registration plates (S-GO 2400).
The Nürburgring was built as a public works project in the 1920s to bring employment to the economically depressed Eifel region in western Germany. The original Nordschliefe loop of the circuit twisted, climbed, plunged and wound through 14.17 miles (22.8km) of mountainous terrain. Hundreds of thousands of spectators would travel to the area to watch the racing. When the circuit wasn’t being used for racing or testing by manufactures, the public could purchase a ticket and complete a lap. In the course of a lap it wouldn’t be unusual to overtake a tourist bus while being passed by a motorcyclist with a Porsche coming up with headlights flashing.
In 1972 Dr. Ferry Porsche decided that all members of the extended Porsche family would no longer take an active role in the management of the Porsche company. Dr. Porsche assumed the position of Honorary Chairman of the Supervisory Board, his son, Ferry “Buzzi” Porsche, resigned as head of the design department and his nephew, Ferdinand Piëch, left as head of research and development. Dr. Ernst Fuhrman returned as the president and Helmut Bott took over the research and development department.
Ferry Porsche and Fuhrman were concerned with the expensive prototype and Can-Am racing programs and wanted to cut the cost and complexity of the racing programs. Fuhrman’s wanted a project to highlight the abilities of the 911 as a marketing tool. According to Fuhrman, “Racing is good advertising for every car” so Porsche would concentrate on developing the 911 for racing.
The 1974 German Grand Prix was the third formula one race I attended at the Nürburgring. Each time, I explored the track for sections where the cars went airborne. On Saturday, August 3rd I spent the morning between Brunchen and Pflanzgarten. In the Pflanzgarten section a drop in elevation caused the cars to fly.
Approaching the Pflanzgarten section
My lifelong passion for motor racing started in North Branford, Connecticut when I was ten. It was the early sixties, when auto racing meant hot rods, drag racing, and the Indianapolis 500. Our neighbour’s teenage son, Freddie, was converting a 1934 Ford Pickup Truck into a hot rod, complete with chopped and channeled body and flat head V8 engine. I spent countless hours in the car while Freddie worked, reading his collection of Hot Rod Magazines, inadvertently expanding my rural Connecticut world.
Early in the sixties, Ford Motor Company became involved in motor racing at multiple levels. Ford partnered with Lotus and invaded the Indianapolis Speedway. The company’s activities were well covered in Hot Rod magazine, and I spent Memorial Day listening to the Indy 500 on the radio. As Ford’s activities expanded into sports prototype racing, my world expanded too, and I soon became aware of places like Sebring, Nurbürgring, and Le Mans.
