HOLY MOLY

“Porsche 935s were war horses. They got a lot of races and a lot of miles, because they were so successful. They were endurance cars, so they did a lot of long races. Guys could just pound that car for a long race. There weren’t many race cars that you could pound it for 12 or 24 hours. There just weren’t, and the 935, they could do that easily. They got used,” says Bruce Canepa.

He should know, as the American was one of the drivers using them. He still owns one, obtaining and racing the last 935 from the Porsche factory in 1979, with a notable 3rd placing in the 24 hours race at Daytona in the same year. Canepa started racing on dirt tracks, confessing that that was advantageous when driving a 935. Of those dirt track racers he says: “they were a blast, I mean they were a handful, with them it’s all in the throttle, it’s all in your foot. You drive 935s in the same way, steering the car is in your foot because they’ve got a lot of oversteer, a lot of throttle oversteer.”

Racing in the late-1960s and early 1970s was hugely competitive. The CSI (Commission Sportive Internationale), the forerunner to the FIA (Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile), was concerned that sports car racers were becoming too fast. Its response was to cut the size of the engine