Hall of fame
Porsche had done plenty of rallying prior to the ’80s. But the 959 went next-level
The 959 has been tested more than a few times in the pages of CAR, and more often than not it’s found itself in the company of Ferrari’s lag-happy race refugee, the F40. Both are supercars, of course. But only the Ferrari looks like one, with its low nose, pop-up headlights, dart-like profile and rear tyres fat like a cricket-ground roller. By contrast the 959 looks tame: the familiar 911 silhouette sanded smooth and given a retro-futuristic twist that calls to mind Henrik Thor-Larsen’s Ovalia Egg Chair.
But when Porsche readied the 959 for desert-racing duties, the 959 no longer wanted for visual impact. Lifted on all-terrain rubber and resplend-ent in one of the great Rothmans motorsport liveries, the 959 now looked as serious as its spec sheet told you it was. And in ’86 the thing was unstop-pable, coming home first and second in the longest Dakar in history. Key desert-specific modifications included engine ECUs mounted high in the bodyshell, where the water from waded rivers couldn’t reach them, light-weight kevlar body parts, drilled brake discs (all-up weight was just 1260kg), twin shock absorbers on the front axle and a de-tuning of the air- and wa-ter-cooled, sequentially-turbocharged flat-six. (Because of the low-quality fuel available, peak power was turned down to a shade under 400bhp.) Coming hot on the heels of glory with the 953 in the ’84 Dakar and three DNFs – three! – in ’85, Porsche was taking no chances in ’86.
