Page 5 - Sample pages "Forty Six: The Birth of Porsche Motorsport"

CHAPTER 1
PORSCHE – THE EARLY DAYS
22 FORTY SIX The Birth of Porsche Motorsport
His new independence introduced him to experiences he had never anticipated. The French especially took it hard when the German Grand Prix teams triumphed over them in the 1930s. It was common knowledge that Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich was throwing Reichsmarks at Auto Union and Mercedes-Benz, using motorsports as a political statement of superiority. French racer René Dreyfus gained intimate knowledge of this endeavor. He scored a significant victory against the German teams while driving a French Delahaye at a course at Pau in the south of France in April 1938. It was common practice in that era to honor the race-winning team by playing their national anthem at the trophy presentation after the finish. In his biography, My Two Lives, he commented that he had never heard the French anthem played with such deep feeling before in his career. But Dreyfus came away with an even more powerful impression. The French teams were modest, operating with the smallest number of people possible to manage a racing car for an international series.
In contrast, the German teams were vast. They typically arrived with spare race cars for each team driver. Unlike the French, who relied on universally talented mechanics, German crews had numerous specialists and masters in their disciplines while still
[LEFT] Ferdinand Porsche, circa 1935.
[OPPOSITE] Ferdinand Porsche at the wheel of the Austro-Daimler at the 1910 Prinz- Heinrich race.
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