Resurrection

It is like a freshly cut jewel: small, beautiful, rare and perfect. The Porsche 956 sits there on the Goodwood tarmac as I am ushered forward by its proud and eager custodians. Any racing Porsche is special, but this one? A million times more so. Because this is the car. Not one quite like, or painted to look quite like, but the actual car. The winner.

In Serge Vanbockryck’s definitive, two-volume, 800-page masterpiece chronicling the histories of the works 956s, the entries for some cars run to many of those pages. That of chassis 956-002 – this car – does not. It reads as follows: 12 June 1982, shakedown test at Weissach, Derek Bell and Roland Kussmaul driving. 14 June 1982, ‘final verification test’ before Le Mans, Bell and Jacky Ickx driving, 19-20 June 1982, Le Mans 24 Hours. Which it won.