Porsche 906

The Long Way home

Le Mans, a small town in Northern France where, annually since 1923, the brave and the bold have gathered to do battle in the 24 Hour Grand Prix d’endurance. There are many tales of great rivalry, of heroes and underdogs, and of great loss and peril. Nineteen sixty-six will forever be remembered as the year that Ford crossed the line 1-2-3 to fill the podium, beating the great Ferrari. But behind all the hype there was another manufacturer who also scored a significant 1-2-3, a team that was well on its way to becoming the most dominant force in the history of sports car racing. Thanks to a recent Hollywood effort, even my mum knows that Ford GT40S crossed the line in 1st, 2nd and 3rd. Following in fourth, fifth and sixth and securing the 2-litre prototype class was Porsche with its brand new 906 sports racing car.

Because this wasn’t an outright win and up to that time in Porsche’s 15-year history at Le Mans the marque had yet to challenge for the top spot, it’s easy to overlook the significance of this result. Ford was playing the short game, working hard and making an immense investment for just four seasons of racing. After its second Le Mans victory in 1967, the Ford factory pulled out, leaving the GT40 in the hands of privateers. Porsche, on the other hand, had much greater aspirations, carefully laying the foundations to become the greatest sports car manufacturer of all time. Porsche first entered a car at Le Mans in 1951 and apart from 1959, had won its class every year. While the world was watching Ford, the Porsche that finished fourth was constructing a cultural legacy.

In 1963, Porsche focused its sights on sports car domination, a year later unveiling the 904. Gone were pressed steel and aluminium panels, replaced by a very lightweight construction with a fibreglass body over a tubular steel chassis. It was a recipe that would carry the team through the 906, 910, 908 and to the inevitable victory of the 917. At the 1964 Le Mans 24 Hours the all-new 904 finished seventh and eighth outright and first and second in class. Two years later Porsche unveiled the 906.

Under the direction of 28-year-old Ferdinand Piech, the design of the 906 took another leap forward. The fibreglass body over tubular steel chassis concept was retained only this time the body was completely unstressed; the chassis was designed to bear all the load so the bodywork could be made as thin and lightweight as possible. As a result, the 906 weighed just 1280lb, 250 less than its predecessor.

It was important that the new 906 was a versatile racing car but Porsche was still focused on Le Mans success. Alongside the standard coupé bodywork, designer Eugen Kolb developed a long-tail version specifically for Le Mans with its long Mulsanne straight, adding the designation LH for Langheck (long-tail). After the prototype, the first three production 906s to receive the LH bodywork were chassis

numbers 151, 152 and 153. All went to Le Mans.

Chassis number 906-153 was assigned to the driver pairing of Jo Siffert and Colin Davis. In practice, Siffert was quickest with a lap time of 3:51.0, resulting in a grid position of 22nd. In 23rd was Hans Herrmann and Herbert Linge in 906-151 and back in 31st was Udo Schütz and Peter de Klerk in 906-152. The short-tail 906 K of Günther Klass and Rolf Stommelen started 27th. Porsche entered a total of seven cars and after 24 hours, five crossed the line. A testament to Porsche's long-term investment in engineering, in a year when just two out of fourteen Ferraris finished, and only three out of thirteen Fords. The first of the four ina-row Porsches to cross the line, wearing the number 30, was 906153 of Jo Siffert and Colin Davis. The long-tail 906 you see here, wearing the number 30, belongs to Cary Decker and although it is not the original 906 that followed the GT40S across the line at Le Mans in 1966, it is a faithful recreation which was built to play the role in that recent Hollywood production. In total, 88 cars of various kinds were built for the movie, including stationary prop cars, however, 27 of the 88 were fully functioning, accurate re-creations, and included a handful of Porsches. In order that the cars were correct, the guy who built them insisted that the producers have an open chequebook and instead of getting paid for the job he asked that after filming he could just keep all the cars. I caught up with Cary to get the whole story.

They finish the movie and he basically gets a knock on the door saying, hey, we got 88 cars here, where do you want them? So, he piles them up in his garage. A little overwhelmed, he reaches out to a couple buddies and says, keep it on the down-low but put feelers out for these cars and if anyone’s interested, let them know which ones are prop cars, which ones are track-ready and that all of them were in the movie. Within about 72 hours, all 88 cars were sold.

So how did you end up buying the 906? My father owns one of the largest collections of pre-1930s racing motorcycles and it just so happened that one of the guys reached out to my father who was coming over that evening to watch my son while my wife and I went out on a date. So, as I’m leaving our house he says, ‘I think those cars from Ford vs Ferrari are available and if you are interested I think there are

I DROVE THAT CAR 800 MILES IN THE MIDDLE OF SUMMER!'

WHEN I GOT TO VEGAS I HIT TRAFFIC. IT WAS 107 (F) OUTSIDE AND INSIDE THE CAR IT WAS 130 DEGREES.

a couple of Porsches.’ So I’m in the movie theatre with my wife furiously texting and within a week I was able to purchase it. This all happened at the start of 2020. Cary travelled out to Southern California, from his home in Utah to pick up the 906. His grandparents live near LA so he drops the car there before attempting to arrange the transport home. Then COVID hits and everything locks down.

For about five months it sits at my Grandparents property as I had the hardest time trying to transport it from California to Utah, because transportation was down, or people couldn’t go in and out of California – all these issues. Finally, when things started opening up, I thought screw it, this thing was built as close as it can be to the original so it must have blinkers, tail lights, brake lights and mirrors. I contacted a buddy here who owns a dealership and he gave me a transporter’s licence. I went out to California and I drove it back! I drove that car 800 miles in the middle of summer! Nineteen-sixties racing cars are not known to have great ventilation and they certainly never had air-conditioning. What was the drive like?

It was scorching, the ventilation was awful, it was like a greenhouse, and there’s just a sheet of metal about an eighth of an inch thick between me and the motor. When I got to Vegas I hit traffic. It was 107 (F) outside and inside the car it was 130 degrees. At one point I ended up throwing open both gullwing doors and riding like that down the freeway, I was down to my boxers, just sweating.

Despite the unbearable heat, Cary and the car made it back to Utah without issue, and having proved itself reliable the 906 now sees daily use. ‘The great thing is that it looks like the $2 million car, it drives like the car but it’s not the real one. And it’s street legal so I actually get to daily this thing.’ Cary has a deep appreciation for Porsche racing cars of the 1960s, his all-time favourite being the 908 coupé from 1968. Porsche racers of this era are mostly out of reach to mere mortals so when presented with the opportunity to buy the 906, albeit a recreation with its own great back story, he thought, this might be as close as I will ever get to owning that dream. I think we all would agree that the greatest part of this is that, through its starring role on the silver screen and daily driver duties, for many people this longtail 906 will open a window into one of the richest decades of Porsche racing history. Long live the appreciation!

IT’S STREET LEGAL SO I ACTUALLY GET TO DAILY THIS THING.