Rare sports cars spanning six decades are heading from Germany's Porsche
Museum to the 2011 Phillip Island Classic Festival of Motorsport from March
18-20 to celebrate Porsche's 60th anniversary in Australia.
The headline
act of the collection is the 935/78 coupe nick-named "Moby Dick" by Porsche race
mechanics because of its large and extended "whale tail".
Based on a
production 911 body shell to Group 5 regulations, Moby Dick was with climax of
935 race car development. Powered by a 845 hp turbocharged 3.2-liter
six-cylinder development of the production 911 engine, it reached 227 mph (366
km/h) at Le Mans in 1978.
Perhaps the most recognizable of all Porsche
race cars - the famous 956/962 which won the Le Mans 24 Hour seven times between
1982 and 1994 - is also part of the exclusive collection that will be seen at
the Phillip Island Classic in March.
The car secured for Australia is the
Rothmans 962 raced to victory in 1987 by Derek Bell, Hans Stuck and Al Holbert.
From the
1960s comes the eight cylinder 908/02 Spyder that won the 1969 Targa Florio and
the 718 RS 60 Spyder that won the 1960 Daytona 24 Hour race.
Other
special Porsches in the collection include the lightweight 911 SC raced by
Walter Rohrl in the gruelling 1980 San Remo rally and a V10-engined Porsche
Carrera GT road car from 2003.
The Porsches will all be demonstrated at
the meeting, which has again attracted a huge entry of more than 500 sports,
racing and touring cars for the third consecutive year.
A highlight of
the meeting is 30-minute sports car race on the Sunday that will see at least
three Porsche 956/962 sports cars, up to four Porsche turbocharged six-cylinder
935 coupes, a V8 Sauber-Mercedes C9, an ex-Le Mans JCB Chevron-Cosworth V8, a
GT40 Ford, and a number of V8-powered Lolas from the 1960s, '70s and '80s
compete over 20 laps of the 2.8-mile Phillip Island Grand Prix circuit.