McLaren M8D - In the nude

Dan Gurney in the McLaren M8D at St. Jovite, 1970, in the days before crash stuctures and carbon tubs...

Photo Credit: Dave Friedman

Porsche in Formula One - What could have been?

Throughout its history, Porsche has flirted several times with single seater formula cars, but never more seriously than in the early 1960's when Dan Gurney, Jo Bonnier, and Wolfgang von Tripps campaigned their Formula One cars.  The best result acheived was Gurney's 1962 French GP victory at Rouen. Gurney is shown above, at rapt attention behind the wheel of the 804.

At the end of the 1962 season, Porsche withdrew from F1 citing costs, and there is also a belief that they felt F1 was too far divorced from their road cars. Perhaps they just didn't like to lose, and they had never been in a truly competitive position with their air-coooled flat 8 engine, in a time where V-configured engines were far more par for the course.  All this makes one wonder what might have been had Porsche decided to double down on F1, and put the sort of technical and financial resources behind it that saw them develop their world-beating Sports Car prototypes as the decade progressed.  It is also interesting to consider that Ferrari, a smaller volume carmaker (also probably more mismanaged at the time!), was able to carry on simultaneous F1 and Sports Car programs in the 1960s, yet Porsche was not seemingly willing to shoulder the expense. We'll never know what might have been had Porsche gone head to head with Ferrari and  Lotus in the mid 60s. They coulda been a contender. For additional historic photos, click HERE. 

All photos credit: Julius Weitmann