0 Racing Porsches at the Ault Park Concours

The main display this year at the 36th Annual Ault Park Concours d'Elegance was entitled Porsche: From Road to Racing. So far I've been showing a lot of Porsche road cars and really only a couple that were actually racers. Here is a collection of some of Porsche's famous racing machines.

Detail: Racing Porsches at the Ault Park Concours

0 Porsche Becomes a Supercar

By the late 1980s Porsche, like other European sports cars, was getting the reputation for running fast. Not just fast but at insane speeds. Though the cars were street legal they had such power along with a vast array of computer controlled mechanics and electronics that they rivaled not only race cars but jet fighters. These have become known as supercars.

As part of the display of Porsche: From Road to Racing at the 36th Annual Ault Park Concours d'Elegance, some of these newer, supercar model Porsche 911s were gleaming in the warm late spring sun.

Detail: Porsche Becomes a Supercar

0 911 at the Ault Park Concours

 

In 1963 Porsche introduced its first all new car. Dubbed the 911, like its predecessor the 356, it was a rear mounted boxer style air cooled engine. Unlike the 356 this car sported a flat six of 1991 cubic centimeters; essentially two liters of power. Since that first  911, the car has continued to grow in both power and reputation.

As part of the primary display of Porsche: From Road to Racing, the 36th Annual Ault Park Concours d'Elegance had a number of fine examples of 911s on display, including the one at the top which was a 1965 model, the first year this car was for sale in the USA.

Detail: 911 at the Ault Park Concours

0 Early Porsche at the Ault Park Concours

Porsche: From Road to Racing was the premier display at this year's Ault Park Concours d'Elegance. Most people know the iconic marquee's history. Austrian engineer Ferdinand Porsche started the company in 1931 to supply designs to other firms. His first commission was from the German government to build a "people's car" which, of course, became the Volkswagen Beetle.

Following World War II Ferdinand Porsche was removed from his management position overseeing the Volkswagen line. Though he had designed a car under his own name, the Porsche 64, it basically used Volkswagen parts.

Porsche's son, Ferry Porsche, then took over the company name and decided to build his own car, the 356. Again, he relied on his father's design and many parts originally designed for Volkswagen. The car at the top of this post is a 1948 356/2 and is chassis number 17 of 52, making it one of the oldest original Porsches known to exist. Also presented here are a couple other examples of the 356 from the 1950s and 1960s with the car was replaced by the famed 911.

Here, too, is Porsche's first true dedicated racing sports car, a 1955 550 Spyder. This car, with its 1492 cubic centimeter dual overhead cam flat four engine actually finished second in the SCCA F modified class in 1956.

I also have examples of some of the company's other cars. Here is a 914, a 924, a 928 and a 944, all models I have written about in previous blogs. Some of the more modern Porsche gems are to follow.

Detail: Early Porsche at the Ault Park Concours

0 Horse Power From Horse Country

Back in the early days of the automobile there were manufacturers popping up all over the place. One of the least likely was the heart of Blue Grass race horse country, Lexington, KY. But in 1909 a race horse promoter named Kninsey Stone founded the Lexington Motor Company.

The company didn't stay in Lexington very long. A group of businessmen from Connersville, IN saw the handwriting on the wall for their various buggy manufacturers and managed to entice Stone to move his young company there. By 1910 they were rolling cars off the line and making some interesting innovations. A dual exhaust system proved to produce about 30 percent more power while using less fuel. A Lexington wore one in 1911 courtesy of chief engineer John C. Moore.

Through the next decade the company had successes and also suffered from financial problems. Through the early 1920s the company partnered with the Ansted Engineering Company and turned out some amazing engines which helped Lexington to some impressive racing victories, including the famed Pikes Peak hill climb.

But even with this success and orders for that engine from GM, the post World War I depression and the growing competition out of Detroit sent Lexington the way of so many other small car makers. Eventually Cord Motor Company bought the Lexington facility in Connorsville and by 1927 the Lexington was nothing but a memory.

The Lexington shown is a 1921 model with a 224 cubic inch six cylinder engine that generated 60 horse power.

Detail: Horse Power From Horse Country