Festival of Porsche Brands Hatch

Porsche’s 70th anniversary celebrations continued with the Festival of Porsche, taking place at Brands Hatch (Indy) Circuit on 2nd September.

The festival of all things Porsche was organised between the Porsche Club of Great Britain and MSV, attracting thousands of Porsche fans and petrolheads alike after a four-year break. Along with hundreds of Porsche road cars adorning much of Brands’ greenery, the paddock welcomed several no shortage of iconic Porsche racing cars, including the likes of a 356 that had been immaculately restored, a fleet of several generations of 911s as well as a pair of 904s and a 910, which took to the track in demo runs. Numerous racing legends formed static displays loaned from the Porsche Museum and Porsche Experience Centre such as the 550 Spyder, a 959 (competing at the 1986 Paris-Dakar Rally), a Gulf-liveried Porsche 917K and the #26 911 GT1 Evo, which one the 1998 24 Hours of Le Mans. Also featuring in the static display was the #23 917K that took Porsche’s first outright victory at Le Mans in 1970, driven by Richard Attwood and Hans Hermann, the former of whom would make a last-minute guest appearance at the festival, competing in the two of races at the wheel of the #58 Porsche Boxster S. Five-time Le Mans winner Derek Bell made a special guest appearance and and his Porsche 956 from the 1983 World Endurance Championship (with the late Stefan Bellof) featured in the demo runs at the circuit.

In addition to the on-track demo runs were the Porsche Club Championship (sponsored by Petro-Canada Lubricants) and Porsche Classic Restoracing Competition series. Two second-place finishes were enough for Mark Sumpter to claim the former series title. Though Ben McLoughlin won both races in the Restoracing Competition, he was ineligible to claim points thus leaving the championship battle further down the field. Points leader John Morris’s 3rd & 4th place finishes in the two races secured the championship for the Porsche Bolton Centre. Porsche Club Motorsport also arranged a two-race Porsche 4-cylinder Challenge, which was won by David Botterill taking victory in both races with his Porsche 944 Turbo.

One of the most notable highlights of the Festival of Porsche was the three demo runs of marque’s tribute to the 919 Hybrid, which won the 24 Hours of Le Mans three times in the form of the record-breaking 919 Evo. 2015 Le Mans winner Nick Tandy took to the wheel of the 1160bhp prototype setting an unoffical fastest lap time of 38.1 seconds (with a top speed of 308km/h on the Brabham Straight) on the Indy Circuit using show tyres, just shy of the official 38.032s lap record.

Porsche will conclude its 70th anniversary celebrations at Rennsport Reunion VI, hosted at the Laguna Seca circuit from 27-30th September.