NISSAN-OWNED 959 NOW REIMAGINED BY CANEPA HITS AMELIA ISLAND SALE
Fewer than three hundred 959s were built, with production of each example estimated to cost much more than the DM420,000 asking price. Faced with these substantial losses, Porsche didn't modify and test the model to comply with NHTSA safety standards. As a result, the 959 wasn't road-legal in the USA.
While a number of 959s slowly trickled into North America, the model was the prime example of the type of car petitioned by Bruce Canepa and others to include in the Show or Display rule, passed in August 1999. The rule allows for the private importation and limited road use of certain vehicles deemed to meet a standard of historical or technological significance, a move famously enabling Bill Gates to drive his 959 after it was kept captive by the US Customs Service for thirteen years. In the decades since the rule was passed, Canepa's ceaseless obsession with extracting as much performance as possible from the 959 has culminated in a series of refinements and performance upgrades for the model.
Drawing on his many years and thousands of miles driving the 959, Canepa developed a ground-up approach to reconditioning — and, in some areas, outright re-engineering — every element of Porsche's already superb creation. Starting
