A 1969 Gulf Porsche 917, chassis 017/004, will be shown at several events during the 2014 Monterey Classic Car Week. This special Porsche 917 will be shown at the Carmel Concours on the Avenue on Tuesday, August 12, McCall Motorworks Revival on Wednesday, August 13th and in the Porsche Pavilion at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca from Thursday, August 14th through Sunday, August 17th.
A special era in the history of the Porsche 917 stems from a private conversation held between Porsche team manager Rico Steinemann and the legendary John Wyer the night before the running of the 12 Hours of Sebring in 1969. Steinemann had been authorized by Porsche management to offer J.W. Automotive Engineering the Porsche factory racing program for 1970 and 1971. Now there were several reasons behind the invitation, foremost was the ability of the Slough based U.K. team to consistently win against newer cars backed by better funded teams.Case in point being that the Gulf Oil backed J.W.A.E. outfit was using what many considered an obsolete car in their Ford GT40 against current competition, and beating them. Wyer replied that he would take the matter up with Gulf Oil who were more circumspect as to what could be gained by joining Porsche. When the 917 was shown at the Geneva Salon a week earlier John Wyer had clearly seen the future of sports car racing. In Wyer’s own words, “Porsche had, typically, done it first, and at a stroke every other car was out of date.” In addition, he pointed out, in the direct Wyer manner, that he could offer no prospect that would be able to beat it.
