John Fitzpatrick
remembers a favourite Porsche 928 and an intimidating golf cart
What a pleasant surprise it was to see a 1988 Porsche 928 sell for £130,000 at Silverstone Auctions’ sale at Goodwood. The 928 has always been one of my favorite road cars and is the perfect, comfortable, high-speed tourer. It was introduced in Germany in 1977 but wasn’t available in the UK in right-hand-drive form until late 1978. I was racing in Germany almost every other weekend and decided to buy one as my autobahn cruiser. I had an early LHD model, which attracted a lot of attention in the UK. I received a lot of offers for it.
In 1980 I went to the United States to contest the IMSA Championship in a 935 Porsche, entered by Dick Barbour from San Diego. I had met Dick in 1979 at Le Mans where we were both driving Porsches and based in adjoining pits. He asked if I would be interested in driving for him in the US the following year. I had competed quite often in the US and always enjoyed the way of life there, so I jumped at the chance. It was a hectic schedule, so I decided to move to San Diego where Dick Barbour and his team were based.
We had a successful time over there, winning the IMSA Championship and the Porsche Cup. We competed in races all over the US and Canada and even entered two cars at Le Mans, where we led until early morning when we hit problems. We still finished fifth and won the IMSA class.
When Dick Barbour Racing folded at the end of 1980, I made the decision to start my own team. I was introduced to financier Jerry Dominelli, who was a great Porsche enthusiast and was interested in sponsoring a Porsche team to help promote his investment business. We met in his plush offices and agreed a deal to run our own team in the IMSA Championship.
We found a nice place to live in Del Mar near San Diego and Jerry lent me one of his cars, a 928. I used it as my daily runabout and to explore southern California.
Jerry introduced me to a client who lived in Palm Springs and was a keen golfer. Subsequently we spent many pleasant weekends driving over the mountains to Palm Springs in the 928 and staying with Jerry’s client. This larger-than-life character owned a Rolls-royce-inspired golf cart, which had a loud horn he would sound if we were being held up on the course and wanted to play through. The horn played the theme from the Godfather, which was a bit of a giveaway. Needless to say, no one got in the way or held us up.
Dominelli was a great sponsor, who financed our team to compete all over the US and Europe. Eventually, like most situations that seem too good to be true, it was too good to be true. Dominelli was convicted of financial fraud, duping investors out of huge sums of money. Dominelli owned 50 per cent of my team, which we subsequently had to wind up, and we returned to Europe.
We even lost the 928.