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Porsche 911 50 Years
![Journalists reported that the additional front-drive hardware imparted more feeling to 991 C4 steering. This addressed a sense some writers expressed that the new electronic steering lacked some of the feedback present in the previous hydraulic system. Porsche Archiv—Photo by Dieter Landenberger](https://volksbibliothek.com/porsche-911-50-years/9780760344019_188.jpg)
![C4 models were made for this, or for weather or surface conditions that were worse. Experience gained improving off-road capabilities of the Cayenne, as well as those managing the power and performance capabilities of the most potent Turbo models, improved all-wheel-drive hardware and software on the new 991 all-wheel-drive models. Porsche Archiv—Photo by Dieter Landenberger](https://volksbibliothek.com/porsche-911-50-years/9780760344019_189.jpg)
![Driver Jo Schlesser and navigator Robert Buchet won the final stage of the 1966 Monte Carlo Rally. They finished second in GT class behind another Porsche 911. Porsche Archiv](https://volksbibliothek.com/porsche-911-50-years/9780760344019_190.jpg)
![The 911 and the 904: On the left was the race-legal road car and on the right was a road-legal race car. Especially for international rallies, such as the Monte Carlo, these two models often competed together but in different classes. Porsche Archiv](https://volksbibliothek.com/porsche-911-50-years/9780760344019_192.jpg)
RACING THE 911
It was inevitable. As soon as the new Porsche reached its customers, they felt the urge to test it, to compare it against the other makes out there. Neither the factory nor privateers wasted much time. Barely four months after production and deliveries began in September 1964, Peter Falk and Herbert Linge ran a factory-prepared 160-horsepower 911 on the Monte Carlo Rally, starting from Frankfurt on January 15, and finishing in Monaco on the 20th. From the start, they kept pace with another Porsche entry, a 904GTS, with Eugen Bohringer driving and factory racing mechanic Rolf Wütherich as co-driver and navigator. When the results were tallied, the Bohringer/Wütherich 904, No. 150, finished second overall and the Falk/Linge 911, No. 147, came in fifth, giving the new model its first international class win. Ferry Porsche liked his cars competing in rallies. The multi-day events usually drove through several countries and brought attention to the cars from spectators and newspapers. To anyone with doubts, events such as the Monte, the Liège (Belgium), Rome-Liège, and other long-distance runs demonstrated the versatility of these cars and their durability and tractability on hard pavements as well as on dirt, ice, or snow. The next year, Günter Klass and codriver Wütherich took first in the German Rally and first in the GT class on the Alpine Rally, and they finished well enough through the season to win the Group 3 European GT Rally Championship for 1966. Porsche 911s first appeared at Le Mans in 1966 as well. French distributor August Veuillet, founder of SonAuto, begged Zuffenhausen for cars to race and Ferdinand Piëch sent a prototype 911S for the 24-hour endurance run. Drivers Jean Kerguen and Jacques Dewez finished 14th overall, covering 2,369.3 miles averaging 98.7 miles per hour. They stayed clear of the Ford GT/Ferrari battles and won the under 2.0-liter class. Dewez drove it from Veuillet’s dealership in Paris to Le Mans and back after the race. To prove this was not some fragile prototype, Veuillet put it on sale in his 16th Arrondisement showroom on Rue Paul Valéry the following morning. The company had long supported hillclimbs as well, and since the inauguration of the European Hill Climb Championship in 1957, Porsche cars and drivers had won the outright title in either Sports Cars or GT every year since. These uphill sprints not only earned newspaper space, but also provided engineers opportunities to explore extremes of power development and weight reduction. Eberhard Mahle won the GT class championship in the seven-event series driving a factory-prepared 911 in 1966. Across the Atlantic, in early February at Daytona during the first race of the International Sports Car Championship season, Jack Ryan, Linley Coleman, and Bill Bencker finished 16th overall and first in two-liter GT class. This was the car’s first significant North American victory. They took second in class at Sebring six weeks later. In southern California, former Porsche racing mechanic Vasek Polak had become a Porsche dealer, but he never lost his roots in or love for competition. Polak teamed up with Jerry Titus, onetime jazz trumpeter–turned-mechanic-turned-racer-turned–Sports Car Graphic magazine editor. In 1966, Titus drove a Polak-prepared 911 to win the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) D Production national championship.![On the Rossfeld hillclimb in 1966, Eberhard Mahle drove this 166-horsepower 911 to victory. At season end, he placed first in the European Hillclimb Championship. Porsche Archiv](https://volksbibliothek.com/porsche-911-50-years/9780760344019_193.jpg)
![Porsche provided a 911R for Nurburgring medical crews to use during the 1,000-kilometer race. With its four tires off the ground, it’s likely the M-car driver was Porsche racer and test driver Herbert Linge. Porsche Archiv](https://volksbibliothek.com/porsche-911-50-years/9780760344019_194.jpg)
![Codriver Jochen Neerpasch settled into one of the three 1968 911R models that Porsche entered in the 1967 Marathon de la Route at the Nurburgring. He shared driving duties with Vic Elford and Hans Herrmann to win the 84-hour trial in this R equipped with the Sportomatic transmission. Porsche Archiv](https://volksbibliothek.com/porsche-911-50-years/9780760344019_195.jpg)
![Around and around they went, four Swiss drivers challenging a collection of distance records in October 1967 on Monza’s banked oval circuit. With extensive factory support, Jo Siffert, Dieter Spoerry, Charles Vogele, and Rico Steinemann set five world and 11 European records in an already-tired 911R. Porsche Archiv](https://volksbibliothek.com/porsche-911-50-years/9780760344019_196.jpg)
![The Tour de Corse in November 1966 was Vic Elford and co-driver David Stone’s first experience rallying in a 911. They adapted well, winning the under 2.5-liter GT class. Porsche Archiv](https://volksbibliothek.com/porsche-911-50-years/9780760344019_197.jpg)
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