Welcome to California.
This is Monterey.
This is the world famous Laguna Seca Raceway,
which features the infamous Corkscrew.
OK, so this might require just a tiny bit of explanation.
But every few years, on each major anniversary,
Porsche holds for itself a kind of big birthday party.
It's called Rennsport Reunion
and it's kind of like Porsche's version of Goodwood Festival of Speed or a
flat-six Burning Man.
This weekend celebrates the 75th anniversary of Porsche's existence
and it's being held here, at the legendary Laguna Seca Racetrack in the US of A.
And it's complete with exhibitions, racing,
old cars, new cars, workshops, some shiny things
and - that.
Though, I'm not actually sure what that is.
It's three days of total Porsche fascination,
which also explains why I keep changing my shirt,
but not why I keep waving my hands around.
But as you walk around here, even for the first five minutes,
you realise that even though Porsche, and inevitably the 911,
harmlessly associates with middle-age dentists in my head,
this is a company that's been around for a long time.
Three-quarters of a century is pretty good.
It's a legend of sports car manufacture, but also capable of pretty much anything.
Even walking through the car park shows that Porsche has pretty much all of the bases covered.
The 911 seems, erm… popular.
The company even does a mean line in the odd SUV.
I mean, there's a few here.
Macan, Macan, Macan,
Cayenne, Cayenne…
Black Cayenne,
white Macan.
Yay! Cayenne.
Grey Macan,
black Macan…
And there's some hatchback 911s…
Cayman, Cayman,
Cayman,
Cayman with carbon,
Cayman,
Cayman, Cayman…
911,
911…
There's a 911 but it's kind of a lemon colour.
That's a yellow 911.
That's a 911, that's a 911…
911s with roof racks.
Fun colours.
There's even a few examples of the more modern stuff.
White 959 and a kind of…
Grey 959.
There's a silver 959,
and a green 959,
red 959.
That's all the 959s.
When Porsche does something, it's almost always worth paying attention to
because just how good do you have to be to become a cliché?
But what is it that makes Porsche so iconic?
Well, in an attempt to find out,
we're going to go full brainwash.
There's a lot here.
Last night, Porsche launched the GT3 R Rennsport.
It's literally hours old and we were there when they pulled the covers off.
A million-dollar, no-limits, track-only version of the GT3 R.
The Rennsport is fabulously mental.
Only the bonnet and roof are the same as the regular GT3 R,
and the wing is massive.
That bit apparently echoes the 935/77 Brumos Porsche
that raced at the Daytona 24 Hours in 1978.
It's also very, very loud.
And the derestricted 4.2-litre boxer
develops 612 brake horsepower,
up from the GT3 R's 557,
and revs out to 9,400rpm.
There will only ever be 77 of them
and, yep, they've already sold out.
And this is the Mission X,
which is a vision for the future of Porsche.
So while the GT3 R Rennsport is current,
the Mission X looks forwards.
It's an all-electric, two-seater hypercar concept
that's the spiritual heir to the iconic Porsche
sports cars of the past, like the 959, the Carrera GT and the 918 Spyder.
Four motors and a 1:1 power-to-weight ratio,
meaning that it'll probably have north of 1,500 brake horsepower.
I don't mind if I do,
albeit in 2027.
But if you want something a bit more old-school,
there's plenty of that too.
And that is the very first Porsche, a 356 roadster.
And they're just driving it around like it's any other car.
This is absolutely bonkers.
It's called a 917/30. It's a Can-Am car.
It was over 1,000 horsepower in qualification trim
and the famous thing about it is that it won every single race it entered,
it got pole position in every single race it entered
and then promptly got banned because it was too good.
But at this festival, when you're filming a little bit with the car,
you also just might run into a bloke that's actually driven it.
My name is David Donohue.
Mark Donohue, my father, is the one who drove this.
Did a lot of engineering and development with Porsche and Penske Racing.
And I had the privilege of driving this back in 1993, here at Laguna.
The museum car. I went from a showroom stock car,
a Porsche 944 S2,
to 1,200 horsepower Can-Am car with
all the cameras and attention and everything.
It was quite an experience.
I had read my father's book and I understood some of the stuff that he was doing.
I was really new to racing in that environment and meeting
my dad's colleagues and friends and co-workers and so forth.
And the pressure was pretty big because there were so many people and the
rows of photographers taking pictures,
and I'd never even sat in it before.
So when I got in the car, they made sure I knew it was insured
for $3 million, except for on the racetrack.
When I raced here, we would just go right on to the racetrack
and now they go all the way around what we used to call the motorcycle pit exit,
and it was closed off for the motorcycle pit exit.
So I go down there and it has a spool. I locked rear end.
The tyres are huge and I turned the wheel and went dead-nut straight.
And I'm, like… I'm the dunce because I'm two wheels on the dirt
and I'm not even out of pit lane yet. I drove it twice.
They told me to do a couple of laps, a certain number of laps,
and I figured I was just going to go until they waved me in.
The second day was really when I got to kind of absorb that
that's… this is what my dad saw.
This is… And again, I was new to racing.
I grew up away from racing and away from all my dad's friends and so forth.
So it was really an emotional… an emotional time.
They left really big black marks coming out of the corners.
If you take the worst 914 shifter and make that
maybe 50% worse than it already is, that's how that thing shifted.
The people on the brand have just, you know, carried on a tradition.
I think in motorsport, Porsche has been one of the most consistent
if not the most consistent sports car manufacturer.
And the cars last, that's another thing, right?
You take them on the racetrack and people flog the heck out of them and they…
and they just keep going and going and going.
But there's a lot of other stuff going on.
And I do mean a lot.
So in an attempt to figure out exactly what makes Porsche so iconic,
I'm going to go and talk to a few people
and try and figure it out.
Hello, my name is Andy Preuninger.
I'm running the GT department at Porsche
and, erm… Porsche for me,
what stands out is the people,
the passion. The people that work for Porsche,
they're enthusiasts.
We're all like this big family
and I don't think any other brand in the world is like that.
And this is… The people are the beating heart of Porsche.
Hi, my name is Claudio Maringoni and I'm a Porsche fanatic.
I'm an owner of a Porsche 964.
And what it means to me when I'm sitting behind the wheel
and I'm feeling the tactility is, I'm feeling history,
through the seat of the pants and through the connection of the steering wheel.
It's amazing. I'm addicted to it.
Hi, my name is Chad.
This is my Cayenne.
I race Baja and other off-road events.
For me, Porsche - it's just sexy and that's it.
Hi, my name is London.
Erm… this is my dad's car. Been racing for a little bit.
And my favourite thing about Porsche is that, honestly, I'm gonna go with him.
It's just sexy.
Porsche is just sexy.
Hello, my name is Mike Sherman.
I own this '87 928 S4.
Owning a Porsche is all about the people.
I've met a ton of great people here at this event and it's pretty awesome.
Hi, my name is Andrew Sherman.
I own this 928 and I think Porsche is cool
because they look beautiful and they're unique.
My name is Michael Schrom.
I'm driving the '66 Porsche today in the Flacht Cup.
What makes them the unicorn?
I would have to say reliability.
I won the 24 Hours of Daytona overall driving a Porsche.
And to me, it's the ultimate reliability.
Hi, my name is Pat Heptig.
I'm from Dallas, Texas.
I'm part of the Porsche Club of America.
I'm part of the national staff of Club Racing.
And what does Porsche mean to me?
It's a car that… there’s such an engineering solid foundation
it allows you to take
a streetcar and convert it into a racecar
without a whole lot of effort and have a heck of a good time on the track.
Hey, my name is Mike Musto,
and I do love Porsches for one simple fact.
They just BLEEP work.
Hi, I'm Richard Porter,
and I like Porsches because they give you somewhere to keep your shoes
that's not quite in the house.
My name's Jonny Smith.
Porsches are special because…
(Clears throat)
no other sports car offers
that spellbinding blend of performance, precision and, crucially, practicality.
Oh, and because they're basically Beetles.
Of course, it wouldn't do to come to Laguna Seca and not go around the track.
So I asked Brazilian Porsche factory ace,
IMSA SportsCar champion and ex-F1 driver Felipe Nasr
if he'd show me around.
And I'm pleased to say that I remained cool as a cucumber the entire time.
What's this track like?
Is it a good track to drive?
Ah, BLEEP!
Corkscrew!
Whoa!
That feels amazing.
It's still got loads of grip! Wahey! Argh! (Laughs)
(Inaudible)
- I hope you enjoyed, buddy. - That was brilliant.
You've broken your windscreen, by the way.
Yeah, that's been for some time already.
And we watched some classic racing, which has to be my highlight.
Watching old Le Mans cars get thrashed about would stir anyone's soul.
And even though they weren't supposed to go flat out,
nobody apparently told the drivers that.
And there was some modern racing,
including some fast laps of the very modern stuff.
And we generally soaked up the very Porsche atmosphere.
And slowly but surely, I began to get what makes Porsche
such an iconic manufacturer.
OK, so I've spent three days trying to be indoctrinated into the world
of Porsche here at the Rennsport Reunion number seven.
And I have to say, I kind of do get it.
Because as it turns out, Porsche, the fan base is as deep
and as wide and committed as its range of cars.
There's literally something for everyone.
Some people like the engineering, some people like the style.
Some people just like the idea of a brand that's been going for 75 years.
But everyone is really passionate about it.
And when you get passion and cars together,
then magic can happen.
And that's what this place is.
It's just magic.