Our Adventures At This Year’s Luftgekühlt 11
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Concept
Luftgekühlt
Luftgekühlt is an event where fans of older Porsche cars, especially those that run on air-cooled engines, come together to show off their vehicles and enjoy the community.
Concept
Cars and Coffee
Cars and Coffee is a fun event where car lovers meet up, show off their cars, and drink coffee together. It's a great way to see different types of cars and meet other people who like cars.
Term
air-cooled
Air-cooled means that the engine stays cool by using air instead of liquid. This is common in some older cars, especially Porsches, and gives them a unique sound and performance characteristics.
Car
Porsche 914
The Porsche 914 is a small sports car made by Porsche that was produced in the 1970s. It's known for its unique design and is popular among car enthusiasts.
Car
Porsche 356
The Porsche 356 is an old sports car made by Porsche. It was one of the first cars they made and is famous for its unique look and driving experience.
Car
Porsche 930
The Porsche 930 is a special version of the 911 that has a turbocharger, which gives it more power. It's a classic car that many enthusiasts admire.
Term
2 liter
'2 liter' means the engine can hold 2 liters of air and fuel mixture. It's a way to describe how big the engine is, which can affect how powerful the car is.
Part
spark plug wire
Spark plug wires carry electricity to the spark plugs, which help start the engine. If these wires are loose, the engine might not run properly.
Part
distributor
The distributor helps send electricity to the spark plugs at the right moment so the engine can run. If it doesn't work well, the engine might not start or run smoothly.
Term
points
Points are parts in older cars that help start the engine by creating sparks. If they get worn out, the car can run poorly or backfire.
Part
throttle position sensor
A throttle position sensor is a part of a car's engine that helps control how much air goes into the engine. It tells the computer how open the throttle is so it can adjust the fuel mixture for better performance.
Car
Porsche 964 Turbo
The Porsche 964 Turbo is a specific version of the Porsche 911 sports car that has a turbocharged engine, making it faster and more powerful than non-turbo versions. It was made in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Car
Porsche 256
The Porsche 256 is a specific model from Porsche. It's not as well-known as some other models, but it has its own unique features that make it special for car enthusiasts.
Brand
BMW
BMW is a well-known car company from Germany that makes luxury cars and sports cars. They are famous for their high-quality engineering and performance.
Car
Ford At Model
The Ford Model T is a historic car that was made over a hundred years ago and is known for being the first car that many people could afford. It changed how cars were made and helped more people own cars.
Car
Porsche 550
The Porsche 550 is a classic sports car from the 1950s that was designed for racing. It's known for being very light and fast, making it popular among car enthusiasts.
Car
Porsche 904S
The Porsche 904 is a classic racing car from the 1960s that is famous for being lightweight and fast. It's admired for its design and success in racing.
Car
Porsche 959
The Porsche 959 is a very fast sports car from the 1980s that was ahead of its time with special technology. It's famous for being one of the quickest cars made back then.
Car
Porsche 918 Spyder
The Porsche 918 Spyder is a super-fast car that uses both gas and electricity to run. It's special because it's very rare and combines high performance with eco-friendly technology.
Car
Porsche 550 Spider
The Porsche 550 Spider is a famous sports car from the 1950s, recognized for its racing history and unique look. It's a favorite among car enthusiasts and collectors.
Car
Porsche RSK
The Porsche RSK is a vintage racing car from the 1950s, famous for being light and fast. It's a popular choice among car collectors today.
Car
Porsche Slant Nose
The Porsche Slant Nose is a special version of the Porsche 911 that has unique slanted headlights. It became popular in the 1980s and is known for its sporty look.
Car
Porsche 917/30
The Porsche 917/30 is a famous race car that was built for racing in the Can-Am series. It was very powerful and lightweight, which helped it win many races.
Term
horsepower
Horsepower is a way to measure how powerful an engine is. When someone says a car has 95 horsepower, it means the engine can do a certain amount of work, which affects how fast the car can go.
Concept
Le Mans
Le Mans is a famous car race that lasts for 24 hours. Cars compete to see which can go the farthest in that time, making it a test of speed and endurance.
Car
Porsche Carrera RS
The Porsche Carrera RS is a special version of the 911 sports car that is designed for racing and is lighter than regular models. It's very popular among car fans because of its performance and rarity.
Car
America Roadster
The America Roadster is a special car made by Dodge that not many people have. It's unique and hard to find, which makes it interesting for car lovers.
Part
water pump
A water pump helps keep the engine cool by moving coolant around. If it breaks, the engine can get too hot and might get damaged.
Car
Porsche 962
The Porsche 962 is a famous race car that competed in endurance races. It was very successful and is recognized for its speed and design.
Car
Porsche 966
The Porsche 966 is a specific model that was created for racing purposes. It represents the brand's efforts in motorsports and custom car builds.
Company
Auto Atlanta
Auto Atlanta is a business that sells parts for Porsche cars. If you need something for your Porsche, they likely have it or can help you find it.
Car
Porsche 944
The Porsche 944 is a classic sports car that was made in the 1980s and early 1990s. It's loved by car fans for its good handling and is often restored by enthusiasts.
Car
Porsche 911
The Porsche 911 is a famous sports car that has been around for a long time. It's known for being fast and stylish, and many people love talking about it because of its rich history and impressive performance.
Car
Porsche Macan
The Porsche Macan is a smaller SUV that offers luxury and sporty driving. It's popular because it gives people the feeling of driving a Porsche while being practical for everyday use.
Car
Porsche Cayenne
The Porsche Cayenne is a fancy SUV that offers a lot of space and comfort while still being fun to drive. It's popular because it lets people enjoy the luxury of a Porsche while having the practicality of an SUV.
Car
Porsche Taycan
The Porsche Taycan is an all-electric sports car that offers fast speeds and a luxurious feel. It's part of Porsche's move to make electric cars exciting and high-performance.
Car
Porsche Panamera
The Porsche Panamera is a stylish and powerful four-door car that combines luxury with sports car performance. It's designed for people who want a comfortable ride but also enjoy driving fast.
LIVE
Welcome to the Porsche Club Insider, your one stop for all things Porsche and PCA.
Here's your host, Vue Gwynne and the Insider crew.
Welcome everyone to Episode 188.
We have a fun episode for you.
We've got some great guests to talk about Lyftacult 11, but before we do that, we want
to make sure we thank our presenting sponsor, Pirelli.
Pirelli tires have to achieve the highest levels of performance, safety, noiselessness,
and grip on the road surface.
Innovative tires that can satisfy even the most specific mobility needs of the
end consumer.
And I want to thank all of you for listening.
If you aren't currently a PCA member and own a Porsche, what are you waiting
for? Grab that VIN, head over to PCA.org, make yourself a member.
And for those of you that are looking for a Porsche, we have the test drive
program. Again, just head over to PCA.org.
Now, this is a little odd for me because I'm at a different position at the table.
So hopefully this will work out.
This angle adds 20 pounds to you.
Oh, God, I'm very sensitive, sir.
I'm very sensitive.
That's why I'm sitting in your spot.
I know, right?
Yeah, exactly.
That's a perfect camera angle spot.
So I've gifted that to you for this episode.
Thank you.
We have Manny at the end of the table there.
Damon's going to be on control.
We don't have a camera on him, but hopefully he'll be able to chime in with the audio.
We have a guest that you've seen him before, Bob Miller, co-owner at At Speed Motors.
And we have a young buck in terms of PCA.
Yeah, in terms of PCA.
But I would say probably out of all of us, the coffee connoisseur of the group
with his little pinky drinks that he has.
A member of Nine Years, Richard Bauer.
But I don't think I've ever called you Richard.
That's, like I said, it's introducing myself.
That's usually how I go, just Richard.
All right.
Sounds a little more professional.
All right, stop.
But call me whatever you want.
We're going to say Rich.
On this episode, as I said earlier, we're going to be talking about Luft or Luftgekult.
This was the first Luft on the East Coast.
Did it meet our expectations?
What was the experience like for those that entered the cars?
Plus, we'll talk about portion news, PCA videos, and upcoming events.
And I thought we'd start out.
Maybe there's a few people that don't know what Luftgekult is.
I have a feeling it's more than a few.
Yeah.
Because our favorite social media guy from PCA.
Oh, you're going to throw him under the bus.
I am going to throw him under the bus.
Throw him under the bus.
It's the source of entertainment for me with this night,
every day, with things American and the Porsche world.
So Monday, I walked up to him and I said, so what did you think?
And he goes, oh, I loved it.
It was great.
I'm like, yeah, I said it was pretty awesome.
And he goes, the only thing was, I didn't see any newer cars.
Don't you see that me?
I just saw Luftgekult.
It means cold by air.
And he saw the look and I said it was air cooled.
1998 is the last year that the cars you could enter.
And he was like, oh, wait, we need to give Bogdan a little bit
of credit here because it wasn't Bogdan.
It was Bogdan's parents.
No.
Yeah, you weren't here.
You weren't here when I asked him.
I'm pretty sure he admits it.
I thought we were in the content meeting.
And anyway, I thought it was the parents.
No, it was a, but once again, that illustrates
that a lot of people do not know because it is not
a name that tells you what the event is.
And also, if you know, you know type name.
Right.
And often people just refer to it as Luft.
So some people may not even know what that means.
That's air.
Yeah, we're going to an air.
All cars have air, right?
Before you get into the details of what Luft is,
you put in here and I want to remind those.
If you're interested in being a part of Porsche Club Insider
Live, we're going to be recording the podcast
at this year's Boardwalk Reunion in Ocean City, New Jersey.
So hopefully you've registered to be in the event.
I hear it's almost sold out.
But even if you're not able to bring your car
onto the Boardwalk, come join us.
We're going to be at the Music Pier 2 p.m., October 18th.
We're going to welcome guest David Whitlock, which we've
had on the podcast before from Stuttgart Market Letter.
We'll be reviewing some of the interesting Porsche Auction
results as well as taking questions from the audience.
So again, if you're not doing anything on the 18th,
join us at Boardwalk Reunion.
And you could be in person live.
At the Music Pier.
A Music Pier.
Or I think you're not.
I know Rich is going to Boardwalk.
He loves that event.
But you're not a Boardwalk Reunion guy, are you?
I've tried twice.
And each time something went wrong and I couldn't make it.
Are you trying to get in this year or are you giving up?
I don't know.
I could be persuaded.
I will volunteer to walk along with the applause sign.
You should come up for your audience.
Not for the podcast.
It's come up for the show itself.
Like did you try and like you broke down or something?
Or you just like?
I just, I think one at a time.
Is this one easy?
I got to wake up early type things.
Stop it.
Yeah.
It was just time.
Gotcha, gotcha.
All right, so back to Luftgekult.
Maybe talk about how it came about.
Who's the lead?
I do want to tell you last year in Chattanooga,
there was a mini Luft.
And so that was the first East Coast Luft.
No, I'm sorry.
Anyone from the East Coast knows Chattanooga is not
East Coast.
Come on.
I mean, it leaked while Patrick was there.
Is there any signs in Tennessee that says beaches?
That's all I need to say.
Wow, you're so passionate about that.
Really, this is going to be a bad podcast.
I can tell you.
Tennessee has their own place.
Yes, I love them.
But I do not consider it at East Coast.
Closer to the water for sure.
So again, for those that don't know, share what Luft,
how it came about and what it's all about.
So this was Luft at 11.
I don't want to speak for Patrick as far as,
PC has nothing to do with Luft.
That's an event that was formed by Patrick.
And I believe his co-creator was Howie.
And I'm drawing a blank list name.
Anyways, they did this out on California.
I think the first event might have had less than 50 cars.
It was, was it a coffee shop?
It was basically a cars and coffee.
Yeah, basically.
But work really got around and it got a lot of media
coverage because it was all only air-cooled.
And they curated some very cool cars at that event.
And then from that point on, word of mouth,
and it was the event you had to be in.
And what made it really unique was in the curating
of special cars, a lot of people got declined.
They were told to reject it.
Became the Luft reject club that it was very hard
to get your car in there.
If you got it in there, it was a pretty big deal.
And it wasn't just like a Porsche Parade concor winning
cars.
These are cars that had patina sometimes, modified cars
that people who may be sitting on an RS were getting rejects
because they already had RSs.
So from a photographer and spectator standpoint,
it was just a dream.
It's not a photographer part.
I think Jeff Short steps in and demands a genius.
Oh, amazing.
I don't have a photographer's eye.
I freely admit that.
Even when I do the layout for Unstock,
I'll bring in Damon and Bogdan
who have that photographer's eye and I'll say,
how should we put these cars?
This is where I want to put them.
But you tell me the angle, front, back, blah, blah, blah.
The photographer would love it.
And that's what Luft is like, anywhere you look.
Well, and you saw that.
I mean, Jeff was everywhere at this event.
Every single car was parked by Jeff.
He was easily the hard-working guy.
Oh, he was everywhere, but he's moving people an inch.
Oh, stop.
So that became, the events gone worldwide.
I've lived on European events.
The one I hear, I heard everyone still talking about
that I did not go to was Universal Studios
as being one of the biggest and memorable.
To hear people who had been to multiple ones
talk about this one on the same level
was pretty impressive.
So I've only been the one.
I went to Port of LA.
I'm not sure if that was four or five.
Did you go to Indianapolis?
You didn't?
No, because we were working sports car together fast.
I didn't hear great things about that.
It wasn't the same.
That was like a mini-Luft too, I think.
I don't think that was a...
There were a lot of cars.
It just wasn't the same venue.
I mean, the venue in Durham,
as which I think is where you're going with this is,
it was unbelievably diverse.
You had cars in car, you had cars in buildings.
You had them in lobbies.
You had them on the street.
You had them like next to the flowing water.
That's part of the allure of Luft
is they pick some places you don't expect to see
Porsches at and that adds to the photographic nature
of the event that just creates Instagram heaven
for people that are taking photographs.
So much so that I personally didn't take many photos
because I knew I will be able to find every angle
of every car if I look through Instagram
because there were so many guys with cameras
that I knew would be posting online.
So when it was announced in 2020
that they were coming to truly the East Coast
and Raleigh, we were all excited.
I remember we had hotel rooms all set up
and then the pandemic hit and it was canceled.
And then there was no talk of it coming back for a while
and we thought maybe they changed their mind
but this year when the rumor mill started saying
that they're gonna come back
and everything I was immediately I was like,
there's no way they're not gonna use the same campus.
They did way too much work
to just walk away from that.
And I'm so glad that they went back
to what they wanted to do originally.
So that's hopefully after the end of the show,
Nali, do you wanna go to Lough?
But you'll enter your car,
which was something that we'll get to
that I didn't think my car would ever be accepted
or shown at Lough, but I'm sure Richard,
you're Richard, you're the same way, right?
Yeah.
Cause you see all these cars and other Lough's
and you're like, yeah, these cars are all like
Primo, nine of six, this third red car,
not pedestrian cars.
Oh, no, I think you're being,
your car is not pedestrian.
Yeah, I was going to say.
Neither is his.
In the world of these kind of Porsche,
that was the troll.
That was the,
The cleanest 914 there, like the most original,
I believe that was there.
Your car was probably the most 80s cocaine
drug habit representative car.
So Richard, I don't know.
He has a 85, is it Richard?
84.
84 slant nose.
Black.
Black.
With lipstick red interior.
Red interior.
I heard really red.
Red, red.
Everything's red.
It's a thunderwunch interior.
And if it wasn't for that red interior,
I hate to say it, but it would have probably
been walked by.
Absolutely.
But the, yeah, it's on the screen.
The red interior, as soon as they opened that door,
everyone took photos of that interior.
They were blown away by, I remember the first time
we saw his car, it was a Carson coffee.
And the way the sun was shining on the red seats,
reflecting, I thought the headliner was red.
Cause I was like, oh my God, the headline is red.
And he said, no, it's black.
It's just a reflection.
There's that much red in it though, right?
Yeah. And if it's sunny out,
you definitely have to drive it with sunglasses on.
It's, you can't, the reflection off the dash
is just outrageous.
You feel like you're in a brothel when you're driving.
Yeah, absolutely.
So for Mani and I, and Bogdan, to an extent,
this was on our own.
We weren't there officially on duty.
So that in itself was a special treat for us
because to go to an event that large
and be around Porsche, Porsche people,
and have zero responsibility, man, that was very cool.
You thought you were on vacation?
Almost, almost.
I mean, we weren't, you know, and to have all the cars there.
And this was my very first lift.
I've never been able to put my hands up high enough
and fast enough where I got to go to one of the lifts before.
So yeah, what a treat.
And just like Mani, I knew there were gonna be,
okay, Jeff himself and tons of people with camera gear
and there's gonna be beautiful photos.
So Larry Chen was there.
Larry Chen was there.
At that point, do you really care
about what kind of photographs you take?
However, however, I was like, I'm going on my own.
So I know I gotta do something.
And for those who may have heard before
or follow me on Facebook,
I bought this disposable camera lens.
It's like cheap.
Like I basically made my SLR into a disposable camera.
And I challenged myself and I said,
can I take decent photos with a crappy lens?
And so that's what I did.
I had to have fun.
I took this little $49 disposable camera lens,
bolted it up to my Canon and walked around with it.
And it was hard, but it was so much fun
to create these vintage like photos.
Yeah, that's what my photos are too.
I meant to make them crappy looking.
Right, you gotta try harder.
Yeah, so, man, but everywhere you look today,
interestingly enough,
at Monterey, for example, Works Reunion,
we have what, 800, 900 cars easily.
I believe Lutfo was around 400, maybe 450 or so,
but because they spread them out
and you treated it almost like Easter eggs
and you saw like the footprint of the event
seemed way larger than the number of cars,
but it was cool because cars were isolated
where you could take that singular picture
of Rich's car and not be distracted
by a 356 next to it or-
Damn, 356.
Exactly, right?
Each car could have its individual model shot.
That was so cool for me.
And they don't give any type of map.
And so you don't know where things are,
you just sort of wander and then you,
like you said, you find a new Easter egg.
There was the rooftop that I heard about later
where some of our members were parked
and I'm like, I didn't even know about it.
I kind of like the Easter egg hunt,
but at the same time, if I'm going to a event,
I really would like to know.
So I don't miss out on,
because I feel like I missed out
on probably a dozen or so cars
because I didn't know to go there.
Sure.
So you flew down.
I did.
Rich, you towed down.
I towed.
930.
You took two cars down,
so you had to tow them down.
Did you take the big rig?
Yeah, I towed the big rig.
So what did you bring down?
I brought a 53 pre-A and a 93 RS America.
Oh.
And I brought my, I drove down,
my 73 2 liter,
shout out to Gennady and GTP
because the night before,
I did not think I was bringing that car.
Back two days before,
I spent quite a few nights cleaning up my 964.
That wasn't in the show,
but I was hoping maybe when I got there,
I could beg and plead to let me in
because at some point,
I think they changed where you had to pay
to enter your car.
Wasn't this looked,
I think it would have been,
I don't think in the beginning,
you had to pay to enter your car.
So I think, you know,
once you got it,
once you got accepted, you could,
but I remember last year,
Elko mentioning that he got the car,
he got accepted,
but he had to pay this amount of money
to get it in.
And this year,
when you registered,
he asked you,
did you want to be a feature?
Can I ask you how much it is?
Yes, feature was what I had.
$400?
Was $150,
I don't know,
like $495, wasn't it?
Wait, it was $400
and it was like $411 with tax or whatever.
So $400 for a premium.
Oh, okay, there's different levels.
So premium,
you also got two tickets
and access to the 1948 lounge,
which was above in the Tag Heuer building or room.
And you got a photo package.
I don't know what that is yet.
I'm still waiting to find out what that is.
I don't know what that is.
Have you been contacted?
I think you had to put that little sticker.
Yeah.
That's what the plan was saying,
don't put it behind the glass,
put it on top of the glass
because the photographer they have there
were matching up your card.
At least this is what explained to me,
I may be completely wrong,
but that QR code was helping determine
what pictures you're gonna get.
Wait, you're killing me.
What happened to the 914?
Oh, I got the...
You were distracted.
I was distracted.
Anyway, so right before the two weeks prior,
coming home from a PCA,
but the 914 started running terribly all of a sudden.
Just terrible.
So I pulled over,
looked for anything like a loose spark plug wire,
check the distributor, everything looked fine.
So I limped it back home,
had it towed to Gennady
because I just didn't have time
to do all the PCA stuff we were busy with.
I'm like, I need someone else to look at it.
So he couldn't find anything.
And there's so many things
when you have a fuel injector 914
that you have to narrow down.
And I went to pick up my sticker
that I left in the car for Luft.
And he goes, oh, perfect timing.
He goes, I think we figured it out.
I go, what was it?
He goes, take it out first
and I'll tell you after you take it out.
So I took it out, the car ran 100%.
I said, it's running fine.
And he goes, the problem was he goes,
I wasn't using my reading glasses
when I looked at your car.
He goes, and neither was I.
And he shows it to me.
I'm like, I can't see.
I said, I gotta put my glasses on.
The points, you know the points,
the extra parts that click.
The bottom part had broken off.
That'll do it.
So now my gap is really big.
And that's why all of a sudden
it started running terribly
because it broke off all of a sudden
and now the gap's big
and it's backfiring and whatnot.
So just replaced the points
and the car was running.
That's gotta be one of the cheapest
Porsche repairs even possible.
And once again, that's why we love Gennady
because he's so honest
and I thought it was the throttle position sensor.
Or a head temp.
So the car is 52 years old
and has so much original parts.
That he looked at that too.
I mean, he was calling Brad Meyer
and getting his opinion on what made me wrong.
So blindly, I drove it down six hours
and five hours, whatever, and no issues.
Perfect.
So again, just back to, there was different packages,
400 and some dollars for the premium.
Is that what you did too, Manny?
Was yours 400 or something?
No, Manny went the cheap way.
Manny can't explain to his wife why he paid 400 dollars.
That's a good tip.
So how much was yours?
What was the price?
150.
150, okay.
Mine was called feature car.
Feature car.
And there wasn't another package
above the premium, correct?
I feel like I heard someone say there was a diamond package
or something.
So was there only two packages
or were there more?
Only two that I saw.
Only two, okay.
So for those of you that are listening,
you're probably going, oh my gosh,
I can't believe you paid 400 some odd dollars
to show your car.
To show your car an event.
Here's where I'm going to stand up
for the event organizer and Luft
because the amount of investment they had to make
to secure the perimeter of that property,
all the gates, all the security staff,
all the, and that doesn't include the stuff
that they made the facility look unique
with the lift to cult signage and everything.
That's what you're contributing to.
Like you have to, you have to disconnect from,
I bought, or I paid 450 to go to this.
No, you contributed 450 to an amazing experience.
That's a great way to look at it.
I think Bob, we probably would have spent $1,000
spending it all twice.
Now the question was-
Well, wait a minute, so hold on a second.
All right, all right.
So I will tell you, I cheaped out a little bit.
So I had two cars
and they were going to charge me twice.
And so I talked to one of the guys I know there
and I said, Jeff, I get it, but what am I doing?
I'm paying twice to get these two cars to help the event.
And he goes, well, you get food and this and this and this.
You get the photography package.
That's right, the photography package.
Wait, I said, I'm only one guy.
How in the hell much can I eat?
So he goes, don't worry about it, Bob, we'll just do one.
So I pulled a many.
Oh my goodness.
But like I said, for those people that kind of scoff
and don't understand why you would do that,
trust me again, for the experience and what they had to do
to make sure the amount of volunteers they had,
the equipment, the audio, everything,
all of that takes money and it's a risk for them
if they don't.
I mean, just the audio was amazing.
Everywhere you went was exactly the same music
at the same time.
I mean, that must have taken forever to figure out.
And kudos to you for having your car
inside the Tag Heuer showroom area.
Oh, we'll get to that too.
So they were taking bets like how you may have had
a meltdown if Rich's car was going to be placed
in a better location because Rich got notified
that he was accepted before Bob.
And further back to that, Bob always sees Rich
that he has low-hanging fruit cars.
The only reason why I own the 930 is because of Bob.
I got shamed.
My entire car collection is hanging through.
That is not true.
That is not true.
So when word got out of cars and coffee
that Rich was accepted,
the first one of them was to get accepted,
but Bob had not been accepted yet.
Oh, brother.
Here we go.
That's why you went up to me and you're like,
so are you in Luft yet?
I was like, no, why?
Oh, Rich got accepted.
Man, he lives for a moment like that.
This is what he does to me, 24-7.
He lives for this kind of moment.
So then when he didn't get accepted,
you remember you told me,
I'm not even sure I'm gonna come now.
No, no.
Yes, you did.
You said I'm not.
You were asking on a date and then you're like,
well, now I don't know if I want to go.
No, that is not true.
Oh, my God.
Wave three of invitations.
We were having so much trouble with the little pre-A.
We couldn't figure out why it was turning into the Valdez.
And we had so many clients
that it came right down to the end.
Now you did offer them,
I think you said you offer them seven of your cars?
Yeah, seven or eight cars.
But did he tell you how they,
why do you pick these two?
Or did he just say we want these two?
It's, you know, Jeff Swart is a,
he's a huge pre-A fan.
He loves the early cars.
And I thought that car might have a real shot.
But in addition, I presented, you know,
sort of some ideas because I could get hold,
and by the way, I didn't tell you,
but I was offering your nine, six, four.
Because I could get hold of a bunch of nine, six, fours.
And I said, why don't we do a nine, six, four theme?
And, you know, I offered up one of two of mine.
And then I offered yours, Steve's,
you know, nine, six, four turbo.
I know where the lightweight is.
And they just sort of, they bailed on it.
But initially they were really excited about it.
So I had no idea what was going to be taken.
Wow.
So going down there was uneventful for you?
Uneventful for you as well?
Sort of.
We got a call from Scott Johnson.
And,
I knew that was, I just said it that way.
I mean,
Not only did we say his name,
Scott is a recent, long time PCA
and Porsche owner, but first time 256 owner.
Yeah. So it's got a T561.
And it's just a great-
It's a beautiful car.
A beautiful car.
Etna blue.
Etna blue.
But, you know, a great driver car,
a great event car.
And we had only gone through it a little bit.
And Scott decides, well, I'm going to take it down the lift.
And I'm looking at him.
No St. Christopher statue, nothing.
He just went the-
Have you lost your mind?
Mucho respect.
Well, man, he told me he was driving that car
because he brought it to the open house.
And he's like, how do I open this?
Or what do I do with this?
Oh my God.
And he's going to drive to-
That's going to type what's guest in it.
Oh boy.
Well, the hilarious thing is he calls us.
And we're in the big rig.
Can't hear a damn thing.
And so I handed the phone over to my buddy
that was going with us.
And Scott's going to town, all this.
We find out he's sitting in the parking lot
of a BMW German sports car repair facility.
Calling us in a truck.
And we're like, Scott,
why haven't you gone inside
and asked those guys to help you?
Oh, I don't know.
Anyway, it turned out to just be the positive lead
on the coil.
They fixed it in five minutes and off he went.
Oh, nice.
But he's sitting there and calling us,
we're 500 miles away or whatever it was.
But he got it going, made it, had a great time.
Did he bring any tools with him?
Not a thing.
Didn't even bring an extra cord of oil.
I wish I could live like that.
Yeah.
That's like the Rob Sass way of traveling.
I'm jealous that people are that confident.
Nope.
I had all these tools at the few spare parts that I had,
but I was like...
But you also left with other people.
It wasn't just you.
You didn't just go solo.
Scott went solo, right?
It was just him.
Well, here's the great part.
So on the way back, we get another call.
And Scott's, you know, he's going to town,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And he said, I don't know,
it just sort of lost power.
And we figured out where he was.
And we were behind him.
So we pulled over, came up, and I got out.
I said, what did it do?
And he told me, and I said, it sounds like it's fuel.
I went in, opened the fuel tank, looked down, looked at him.
Scott, you're out of fuel.
No way.
It was that simple?
He's out of fuel.
I ain't got no gaze.
And I said, there's a fuel gauge.
So, you know why?
Because he used to have a light popping up
or something that tells him it's unbelievable.
Again, that's better than it is.
61 has a fuel gauge, though.
Yeah, of course.
And it has a reserve switch that you'd sort of take
the toggle and you'd go to reserve.
Did he have enough reserve to go to the gas station?
No, he had already gone to reserve.
Oh, God.
So, we just had to scold him a little bit,
but once again.
But on the fuel leak, it was just...
He did have a little fuel leak,
but he was literally bone dry.
Lack of gas was the bigger problem.
And it goes to him for being an enthusiast.
His car wasn't even in the show.
No, no, he just drove it.
Oh, he just drove it.
It wasn't in the show.
It is a celebration of air-cooled Porsche, isn't it?
I saw a lot of people do that.
He didn't have to partner a show,
but drove it down to be part of the brotherhood,
if you will.
So, it goes to him.
Say it with Joe Heichel.
Yep, Joe Heichel.
Yeah, he drove down his Emery, right?
I guess before.
I think he drove the Singer down in the trailer.
Yeah, I think that's okay.
Yeah, he drove the Emery.
Hey, Voo, did you take down your A?
No, sir, I took Southwest.
I had a, it was actually my wife's birthday weekend.
So, we...
What do you think his wife is excused?
I get that a lot in car sales.
Well, I need to talk to my wife.
So, we flew and actually spent a nice weekend
in the Raleigh-Durham-Carry area.
That's a nice area.
It is.
I haven't spent time there before.
It's kind of like Columbia in a sense, but just...
It's the influence of Duke.
I mean, imagine what that university brings in.
Incredible.
I don't know if this was a hint or anything,
but we went to look at model homes.
Uh-oh.
Oh my gosh.
Like, I haven't been in a model home park in forever.
And like, you know how new cars and new features,
man, these new homes are like,
oh, I didn't know I needed that.
Yeah, you've got to start planning
now that you're mid-50s, right?
Oh, yes, yes, yes.
We are actually, today is, in fact, my birthday
and I'm going deeper into the 50s and I'm not...
51, oh my God.
The world is ending.
Seriously.
51.
It's ridiculous.
And we were talking about this over the weekend
because I didn't...
How do I say this?
I did not know how old you were
and you're actually, you are younger than...
Yeah, don't let the grades fool you.
I think Boo has to boo his retards.
Just mentally.
Yeah.
So this was your first love?
My first one.
And did it meet all of your expectations?
Did you...
You were also parked in a very...
Like it was a very unique area,
but to get there was not exactly easy.
Oh yeah, no, getting there was half the adventure.
But no, this was my first loft.
I watched enough of them on social media and YouTube
and such to know what I was getting into.
But the whole experience in the way it was curated,
curated is the best word to describe it
because it's the call to car show
would be doing it at the service.
It is more set up like a curated museum.
Like there's a lot of thought process into it.
It's not like a bunch of cars just in a row.
It exceeded my expectations.
My expectations were high and they exceeded them.
Yeah.
And even before we did lift Rory and Cam Ingram,
each had their own open house.
Road scholars in an Ingram collection.
We went to the Ingram collection
and they had quite a showing of cars
that weren't replicas of 550, 904s.
You got to see your 959 Sport.
You had never seen it before.
Yeah, I'd never seen one.
I've always seen Comfort.
I've never seen a Sport in person.
They had, in fact, they had the Holy Trinity
as I call it, the 959, the Courage 18 and 918,
all parked there.
And for two of the guys,
they bought Alwin Springer's book that sold out.
They had the book?
They had the book?
The Ingram family bought a whole bunch.
Did you buy the book?
I was going to, but 962 wasn't available.
That's always easy wanted to buy it.
I don't know.
I do know what you did buy.
We'll talk about that later.
So Alwin was signing the book, too, as well.
Alwin had Yolanda and they had their daughter
and their son there also.
But the funniest scene was Juan,
who came down with the CS932.
He buys the book and so we tell him,
hey, he will write anything you want in the book.
They're dedicated to anything.
He's very serious about these books.
Juan froze up like he was talking to a supermodel.
It looked like he was having a stroke.
Let's tell Alwin he's now a supermodel.
It looked like he was having a stroke.
I think he said,
make it out to the bestest Porsche fan
or something like that.
He wasn't prepared.
And then afterwards he was like,
oh, I should have had him like this.
Oh, I should have had him like that.
I can't believe that I didn't.
But Alwin remembered him as the one who froze up
as to what he wants to write.
That's funny.
Juan seemed like he had a good time.
Yeah, I'm going to defend him.
English is not his first language, so.
Oh, he speaks English perfectly fine.
But you know what I think he enjoys most
is how much we give you a hard time.
And you guys love giving me a hard time.
That's okay.
Yeah, it's okay.
I said that was a good start.
And we literally, they had gotten there the day before
but a lot of us just got there on Friday.
So we went straight to the Ingrams.
And then we went back to the hotel
because Rich and Juan, since they were premium,
they had to get their cars placed.
Now they started placing cars Thursday.
So that's when you had,
because I saw on Instagram, your Instagram,
you had photos of placing the cars.
Yeah, so as you mentioned,
this was a little hairy, I gotta tell you.
We're in the Tog Horyer building, if you will.
It's not Tag, it's Tog.
It's Tog, Tog, Tag.
And I pulled up, I've got Jeff Schwartz with me from ASG
and they start sort of bringing me in and I just stopped.
I wasn't going to move at all.
And I said, Jeff, can you get in front, please?
Because I don't trust these other folks.
It was maybe a half an inch on each side of that car.
I mean, it took us a little while to get it in.
They, at one point we had-
This is the, the 256, the Priya.
The Priya, at one point we backed out.
They took the door off to get the dead car.
Not the car of the-
No, of the building.
Of the building, yeah.
And Jeff Schwartz, he's looking at me.
He's like, Bob, I've already, I'm telling you,
I've measured this, it's okay.
And I'm looking, I'm going, yeah, but it doesn't matter
if I wipe the side of the car out.
But it was tight.
It took a little bit.
And then as we said, Schwartz stood there
and just to the millimeter decided
where that car was going to be.
Did they get all those cars in there like that?
Yes.
Good God.
Yeah, but think about the width of a 904.
Yeah, but the value.
Oh, I know.
Well, then there's an RSK and then there's a 550 Spider.
I mean, it was-
Was your, I was thinking your-
I'm the cheapest, yes.
You're the widest though, too, also.
Probably with the front bumper, yes.
So I wonder if Bobby Rahall was there
to watch this car go in.
He was.
Was he really?
Yeah, he was right there.
Yep, he was.
Wow.
So yeah, people were wondering
how they brought the cars in.
Well, you guys didn't see.
So we were there Thursday and there were maybe 60 cars.
By Friday morning, there were maybe,
I'd say 180, 150.
Friday night, there was just a deluge of cars.
By the time we got back Saturday morning
for the beginning of the show,
there had to be another 200 cars parked.
We have no idea how they did it.
Yeah, and the way they parked it,
they needed all that time.
It's not like you just roll up
and park on a fairway and just park them all together.
Well, they weren't doing a first come first serve
because I went with Rich in his car to...
They knew exactly where they were putting all the cars.
As we offended every single person on the sidewalk
when Rich would let off the gas in here.
Bop, bop, bop, bop, bop, bop, bop, bop.
That's amazing.
It sounds amazing.
Yeah, there's no sneaking out.
One of those guys.
One of those guys.
How'd he get in here?
Like God, it was the afternoon, not the morning.
But we waited in line for an hour.
Yeah, it was a good solid hour.
We were waiting.
Luckily, the weather was absolutely beautiful every day.
Oh yeah.
We sat in the car, a black car,
that just be a beautiful weather.
Is your AC working?
I don't know.
That means no.
Okay.
Larry.
I mean, it's an 84 air-cooled.
Yeah, it'll work.
It can work, it can work.
Even at its best.
Yeah, okay.
Oh, absolutely.
I'm risk averse right now.
I don't know if it works.
I've never tried it.
You can push it back.
So in my head, it works.
Okay.
I don't know.
It's just like the sunroof.
Touch the sunroof on it?
So as far as I know, it works.
From his house to Hunt Valley,
I don't even know that it could get cold
if you turn it on.
So under that philosophy,
you know that the car goes fine up to 3,000 RPM
and that's it.
Yeah, I have reached that.
Yes, yes.
Oh, man.
But anyways, yeah, we were waiting.
And a lot of us, like what Bob said,
they knew where each one of these cars was gonna go.
So they were waiting,
or at least they were waiting for certain cars
so they could clump them together with Rich.
They took another slant nose,
and they put a nose to nose.
Slant nose to nose.
Yes, exactly.
But the funny thing was, it wasn't a parking lot.
This was areas where it's for pedestrians
to walk through, not for cars to drive through.
And so by this time,
I think everyone can easily turn these cars around
with no problem.
And they're telling Rich to navigate
past a cement trash can, a cement bench.
Yeah, and a potted cemented plant.
So we have a picture of the nose to nose.
I do have to make a disclaimer.
This is not a drone shot.
Okay.
For those watching YouTube, not a drone shot.
Thank you.
But yeah, and then he didn't come in from that direction.
He came from the direction that the
opposite direction of where that is.
The copper colored slant nose is so.
And of course, Jeff has all the cars to park.
So he has very little patience
for people that need 19 points to make a turnaround.
Right.
Because until he parks you,
he cannot move to the next set of cars.
And like you said, they had a ton of cars.
They were parking.
Were you the one who told me about
the guy that didn't like his spot?
That was Juan.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Because while we were being parked.
It wasn't Juan that didn't like his spot.
It was a person in Juan's group
that did not like his spot.
And he was said, if he didn't like his spot
then he's welcome to leave.
Right.
Basically that's what he told me.
He's like, I can show you the door.
Yeah.
If you don't.
Good for him.
Yeah, I mean, Jeff has no patience for that.
You've got to be kidding me.
No, I mean, a poor guy,
I'm going to say 70s and he was nonstop on the bicycle.
I would have been done with that.
Would have been give me a electric bike
at least for the scooter.
He was going to make me roll around these hills.
He did make a point.
He was on his regular mountain bike.
And Patrick Long was on an electric bike.
He liked it.
That's a, OK.
As soon as he parked you,
he would move to the next.
No time for chitchat or anything.
He had to move because other cars.
Because every time we were done,
the group was done.
He would have another group of cars
waiting to be parked.
But as we were waiting,
you know, it wasn't bad weight because
they kept on walking by 15 minutes,
giving us different information.
But at least they were talking to us.
We're going to park you in the north side.
You guys know you're being parked in the south side, right?
You're going to the east side.
At least they're talking to you.
At this point, we're like anything but the rooftop.
Because we didn't know what the rooftop was.
All we knew was that all the cars
were not going to the rooftop.
They were going to this one area.
That was just parking.
It wasn't really part of the show.
It was totally impromptu.
Well, no, I think it's part of the show.
I think it was called display or something like that.
It was $25.
So it was part of the show.
It was organized.
But it was sort of like you guys go up there.
See you later.
But it was something that people
were going to be displaying.
So, all right, so I have a question.
I can tell you a funny story if I forget.
So we're in a car and now it's time.
It's finally our time to get parked.
We're in my car at this point.
We're in my 9th.
And they had these ramps
that can be best described.
They were built by the Cub Scouts.
Yeah, you got to use air quotes when you say ramps.
A two by four wide.
Exactly.
Yeah, serious.
This is great for a 3 and 1 1⁄2 inch wheel on a 356.
Not so much on a 930.
But these guys have loaded a bunch of cars up.
Who are we to question?
But the facial expressions on the guy
bringing us up from the street over the curb
onto the grass.
Oh, you had to bring your car over.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
At an angle.
At an angle.
With these tiny little narrow ramps
that look like they were two inches wide.
And that forgiving front end of yours, I'm sure.
And he would, and Rich, if you're facing the camera,
you could probably make the faces that he was making.
But I was saying the rest of the time,
he is not giving me any confidence at all.
Because, yeah, like that, he would like,
like, he would start falling back
and his hands are going like, small, like, ehh.
But he's doing this.
He's doing.
I'm like, I'm getting mixed signals here.
That's the come forward, I think.
Yeah.
Well, you probably, when you were by him,
I'm like, I hope the guy's you're not a doctor.
Well, there's test results, don't look so good.
Rich goes, I'm guessing he'll play poker.
He goes, not very well.
He can't hide anything.
That's funny.
But we finally made it over the ramp
and then we got him parked.
Then we went to find Juan, where he was parked at
and then he told us about the guy
who did like his parking spot.
And just were told to him that he can park
outside anywhere he wants.
If he doesn't like the parking space here.
But then we got to look around the day before the show.
And while a lot of cars had covers on by this time,
even though it wasn't going to rain,
it was just the morning dew and whatnot.
It was very impressive.
And as much as we walked around,
we were trying not to walk around too much
because we were like, we don't want to roll.
Right, you don't want to roll in the experience.
The show, there was so much to see.
And then we went to the,
to the, what's it called, the preloofed party,
which was the bullpen.
So right next to this campus,
which was the American tobacco campus,
which I guess is where they produce cigarettes.
It was very industrial, very industrial.
And they had built the stadium.
And the famous from,
it wasn't the same stadium from Bulldorum,
but it was the same team that plays there.
And that's where they had the preloofed party,
which did not include food,
but they had food for sale and they had beer for sale.
And they were doing interviews
with some of the Porsche celebrities.
Well, in a 91730 in the outer field.
Second base, yep.
Did you have to pay for that?
Yes.
I think it was 35, 40, sorry.
Unless you got a premier ticket
and then we got it included.
And how many people were there?
500, 600?
Probably more than that.
Couple hundred people.
It was, if you can imagine,
it ran all the way from like first base to the outfield.
Okay.
I don't know.
It wasn't like overly crowded.
It was a great place to have it.
And once again, the weather was just,
it would have been rainy,
it would have been totally miserable.
But because the weather was still great,
you could be in short,
you could be,
it wasn't like it didn't get too cold at night.
So it was a great place to hang out.
And then we decided that we wanted to go eat.
And there's a lot of great restaurants around there.
Rich and I must not have gotten our invitation.
No, Rich did.
No, no, Rich did.
Rich did, but you didn't.
Oh, maybe.
I was there hanging out.
I didn't.
You were hanging out with your people.
Oh, who's my people?
Yeah.
I know.
The whole time I'm like,
where's Bob?
Where's Bob?
And you were just,
I was shunned.
I was like,
I figured he was the tog whore.
Oh my God.
Here we must have been with him.
You were busy shaking hands.
He was VIP.
No, I didn't go into my VIP mode,
but I did freeze up when I saw Alan.
You did?
I didn't know what to do.
Yes.
It was like a supermodel.
There's no reason to freeze up.
He's so, he's so sweet.
Actually, I talked, I'm kidding.
I talked to him about your, your cruise.
Oh yeah.
He absolutely loved it.
He can't, he just kept talking about it.
Since he announced on that cruise
that he will be back for the second cruise.
No, no cruise.
He did.
I said, well, I guess you don't have to worry
about inviting him.
He just invited himself.
He's already there.
He's already there.
So the, the next morning is when I got to get parked
at 7 a.m.
So this time, Rich rode with me.
First time he ever rode in a 914.
Never been in a 914.
I was surprised by the amount of room in there.
Felt the power of 95 horses.
Yeah, it's got a lot of room in it.
I was really surprised.
Yeah, they're great.
So we, then we were wondering,
there's no way they can make us wait an hour.
Like they were rich because the show starts in an hour
and they had to have all these cars parked.
But they, we went to the street that they told us to
and they had cars lined two by two
and Patrick Long was there
and Jeff Short was in his bicycle
and then they would grab cars from the left or the right
and say, follow me.
And that's what they did with us.
One car from one side.
They picked me.
I was three cars back.
They said, you come too.
And they parked us on the hill on one of the streets.
And I got to say, I got parked by Jeff Short.
What's all this?
It was surprising.
I didn't think being,
being feature much less paid than these guys.
No, I thought you had a really good spot.
I thought it was a great spot.
It was a great spot.
He was on the grassy hill.
Yeah, he was on the grassy hill.
No, I liked it.
I loved it.
No, it was a great spot.
I would tell people, I go, have you seen the 91730?
Yeah.
And they would say, no, I go, okay,
that's the next straight over.
So I am about 20 feet from the 91730.
You're across from the Jigermeister car too.
Yeah, so it was the easiest pinpoint people to say
where I was roughly.
You know what the best part about your parking spot
and I took advantage of it as so in the morning
it was cool.
So I had a vest on everything like that
and we got a poster and then his car was there.
It was a storage.
Storage, storage.
Perfect.
Every time we swam by my car,
I would say, anybody want to drop anything off?
Yeah.
Cause it was, yeah.
We didn't have to walk back up to a garage
or something to put stuff back.
So that was worth $150 a loan.
No, that you can explain to Roxanne.
Yeah.
So when we get there though,
there was a coffee shop right down from where I was parked.
So I was like, this is awesome.
We're gonna get some great coffee.
Don't open until it was at eight or nine.
Yeah, it was definitely much later
than our coffee shop should have opened.
Especially for an event.
No one must have told them, hey,
or maybe they did tell them and they decided not to do it.
There's gonna be a ton of people here at 7 a.m.
Was it the coffee shop we eventually was?
It was the same coffee shop, yeah.
They still made plenty of money.
So we had to go in a hunt for a coffee to get started.
And we finally found one almost in the middle.
It was like a pop-up tent.
It was right where you walked in to see the 906.
So we...
Well, luckily Rich had his special ticket.
He could go to the 1948 lounge.
Yeah, but I didn't, you know, I was a little ignorant with that.
I didn't realize all of that until afterwards.
Food, drinks, you know, coffee.
Are you told about that? Air conditioning.
Did you read about that or were you told about that?
No. Who are you talking to?
Me. I mean, I knew when I walked into the Tog,
who are your area?
Well, Tog did not tell Rich about this.
No, I was not part of that.
Because when I went with Rich,
they handed us the,
because they weren't allowing anyone to walk
into the staging area of the day before.
But when we came in, they, you know,
scanned our secret and said,
okay, here's your tube passes.
And I switched and said, you want this for Juan?
He said, no, he's getting his own.
He goes, you can have that one.
Oh my God. So I put it on my wrist
and that gets you into the lounge.
But I didn't see anywhere or anybody tell us
at any point saying, hey, the lounge is over here.
This is what you can get from there.
We didn't realize it, though,
almost past halfway of the show,
that there was coffee and food.
We were just walking around like a newbie.
Actually, there was beer, wine, there was.
Yeah, we find out afterwards.
We find out after we have lunch
and everything that we could have had food.
And to be fair, the show could have gone
on longer in my opinion,
because there was a couple of sections
that I didn't even see,
like where the Baja cars were.
I didn't even see them.
I didn't know they were there.
I saw them after the fact
when they started social media.
But you know what, though?
I do, it was very much like a California show
because right around two o'clock,
like the crowd disappeared.
Yeah, it did thin out.
The attention span for the folks that attended,
I was very surprised.
For me, I agree with you.
You're like, it could have gone longer
so that we could see more things.
But to the masses.
Yeah, it's because at two o'clock,
you became relationship boo.
No, man.
Oh, that's true.
That's why you think everyone's leaving.
Yeah.
I was like, two o'clock,
I'm like, where did it?
Like it started really thin out.
I'm like, man.
I did.
I ran into Manny.
I said, man, I haven't seen Voo the whole weekend.
And Manny said, yeah, he's in relationship boo mode.
So, he did.
I'm not kidding.
I did.
I went into relationship mode.
My wife and her two friends came out
to see what this craziness was about.
And it was good for them to see a little bit
of our world.
And they were, in fact, amazed.
You know, it's sort of cool, though.
And this is serious.
The cool thing was you saw families there.
You saw people walking around with dogs and little kids
and older folks.
And so it really appealed to a wide range.
It did.
And I would say that it had a,
and we say this word all the time,
like this vibe that was quite young, quite young.
And somebody was making fun of you.
And I forgot to tell you about this.
While we were in line.
Well, they saw, let's do it.
It's everyone's finger.
So while we were getting coffee,
the hipster that was in front of me,
and I don't know if he brought a car or what,
but he obviously was there for the show.
He's like, huh, look, he's got a Porsche shirt.
He's got a Porsche backpack and you had something else.
He named three things that you had on that Porsche.
And I looked at him and he had zero Porsche stuff.
But yet, both of us were,
or all of us were still there for the love of the brand,
which was kind of cool.
Yeah, that kind of thing is usually reserved to Ferrari,
where you have the Ferrari hat.
He just had his gear.
That's all it was.
I mean, it's not like he was, he wasn't Joey Tribbiani.
Yeah, you guys are painting me in like a track suit
or something like that.
Oh yeah.
I had a backpack.
Aren't you wearing a track suit right now?
Oh.
And for those of you who are wondering,
this is why Juan was having such a good time
because we were giving a little crap
to our dear friend here.
So speaking of a merchandise.
Oh.
So did anybody bring home any merchandise?
Nope.
I didn't.
Nope, because that line was gosh, hundreds of people deep.
So Friday at the pre-love party,
they had a little booth that was selling hats.
He didn't go to your relationship booth on Friday.
They had a little booth that was selling the book,
hats and a poster.
Which I'm a little bitter about, but you can go ahead.
Yeah.
There was a lot of bitterness in our group.
I did buy a poster.
About the merchandise.
Was the book sold out?
No, we'll get to the bitterness.
But no shirts.
So we told our guys, because Rob Rohrbark was with us
and Scott was with us.
Not Scott, he was Parker, right?
And we said, I said, hey, here's your chance
to maybe go get stuff, because the lines that looked.
Gonna be ridiculous.
From the one I went to, to the one from last year,
they're always long.
They said they're always long.
So you probably want to get it now.
And the next morning we saw where it was gonna be at
and, but it didn't open until nine.
And the early bird tickets that a lot of people got it
was eight.
So we're like, oh, then we wanted to look around.
We're getting to Disney World and saying,
let's wait in line to buy Mickey ears.
Of course you want to go around and we're like,
oh, we'll go back.
The line never seemed to drop until they ran out of stuff.
Finally, when it was empty, we looked in
and it looked like a.
It was just coat hangers.
Yeah.
Is that why you're bitter?
It's small and extra small.
So there were a couple of people who are bitter
because they wanted to buy the merchandise
and they sold out of stuff.
And then at insult injury, they send an email
while we're there saying,
hey, we got more stuff online.
Yeah.
I sold out of all that stuff too.
That was a was online.
So no, we did not get all the,
one of our group was smart enough
that he had a bootleg version.
Because he was showing, I looked at him.
I'm like, how'd you get that?
I can't believe you go there.
You're going there.
How'd you get that shirt?
You're going to remain nameless.
Remain nameless.
Mainly I'm not going to name them.
And it said 11.
Oh, y'all looks pretty good.
She got into the store.
He's like, well, not really.
I had it made a couple of weeks ago.
Oh my gosh.
It looked great though.
It looked great.
It looked better than...
In fact, we all drunk, we're going to water our own
because it was long sleeve.
And...
Tell them to bring it to cars and coffee with all the water.
Hey.
So here's the thing with merchandise.
It's really easy to lose money on merchandise,
especially a one off event.
So if you get Luft 11 merchandise that you can't sell,
like if you didn't sell it during that weekend,
let's say because of the weather
and there was low turnout,
like it really could hurt the bottom line of the event.
So they typically order very conservatively
and they want to sell out...
Like when we did rent sport and stuff like that,
like we wanted to run out.
We want to run out at least a day early
so that we made sure we went...
Because when you have to order 144 smalls,
144 extra smalls, 144 two XL,
you could sell three quarters of it.
But if you have a quarter of it left over,
then that whole program is upside down.
So I totally get why they run out.
And don't be too mad at them
because it's not an easy equation to figure out.
But what I can be mad at them is
they should have more area selling it instead.
I mean, it should have to wait in line.
I can understand not bringing inventory,
but you can spread it around
and have it sold different places.
If you have a line that long,
I mean Porsche at rent sport,
when they had that four hour line,
that was totally uncalled for.
That was just BS.
People are spending a lot of money
to come look at the cars and have to wait in line.
It was over an hour, well over an hour.
Oh yeah, it was three hours.
The worst is if you stand in line
and you get into the store and it's sold out, that's bad.
I agree with you, you have to manage the crowd.
All right, so what we're getting into
is a question I was going to ask you guys.
Since you went, what would you change?
And obviously one of them is you've got to have
a couple of stations for stores.
It's very clear that for people to understand Luft,
they don't return back.
They may go back in a few years,
but the following year they don't go back
to the same place.
It's not gonna be there next year for sure.
Yeah, so people say I'll do it next year.
No, you won't.
But generally as an event, what would you change?
So I thought the car submission was pretty easy.
I would think communication could be improved.
For instance, we all bought tickets ahead of time
because the fact that they sell out in California
so quickly, and I can't tell you how many times
I see on our mart, want to buy Luft early bird.
So I told all these guys, you wanna get early bird tickets
because we wanna get to early blah, blah, blah
before it sells out.
So we all got our, turns out that when you have
your car accepted, you get two early bird tickets.
Right.
Which-
That's what we paid for by the way.
Right, that's what we paid for.
And tickets have no refunds, so.
But none of us thought we were gonna get our cars
in the event.
Of course, no one does.
We just wanted to make sure
we knew Rich was, so.
Yeah, in fact, I did it as a joke
because I didn't think mine would get accepted
because it's just a plain Jane 914.
So I thought, oh, I can wear one of these reject shirts
and talk about how I didn't get my car accepted
into Luft, and I was all prepared to fly down.
And remember telling these guys the cars in coffee
that I'll probably just fly down
or maybe I'll take out my condom
because my wife was thinking of coming down.
Well, half the time you're doing it for the parking spot.
Exactly.
I accepted, I was like, oh, I did not think
I was gonna get accepted.
I think I told you that you were gonna get accepted
from the very beginning.
But yeah, I was surprised.
I mean, I was surprised Rich got accepted, but.
I got accepted first.
I'm just kidding.
First, yeah.
First.
To me, his car was green luft.
Yeah, right.
It was perfect for photos and whatnot.
So yeah, I think better communication
or at least having a policy where they refund
if you've already bought tickets
and you got accepted that, hey,
they'll refund the ticket you already pre-purchased.
So I felt like we all had enough tickets
to invite a whole bunch of people.
Yeah, we could have far more people.
I mean, cause I got two extra tickets too for a feature.
Yeah, I gave mine to the guy I was traveling with.
Yeah, my wife was like, did you just give them away?
I'm like, there was no one to give them away to.
They were all people who already had tickets.
So for me, because I wasn't around Manny
and if you guys know Manny,
you know that there's not almost a car in the world
in terms of Porsche that he doesn't know what it is,
the background, all that kind of stuff.
I don't have that kind of knowledge.
One of the things that I found was that
I would look at a car
and I didn't really know the significance.
Was that a significant whatever?
Was it a 356 GT, one of the whatever's?
They did have those stickers on the car
where you could go up and you could get a QR code.
Yeah, a QR code and you could read about it.
So I wrestle a little bit with
whether or not putting something up
that said this is the basics about this car
would be better than a QR code or not.
Because you walk around and you're not quite sure,
is that a, did that win LeMol or something like that?
So that was one of the things.
The balance you have is I get it like
going through a museum, having a docent,
you have a better experience,
which I totally get.
However, from the photography side,
those signs, they stink for a photographer.
So I think that is more important to them,
which I agree.
But you still got your information
because you did have that QR code.
Well, and then what we had at the very first East Coast Luft,
which was in Chattanooga, we had up on the wood,
there was literally burned into the wood.
It was a 964 Carrera RS club sport,
3.6 engine, 262 horsepower.
They had that for the cars that were on the wood.
Right.
For this one too.
Right.
But not the cars that were on the wood.
We were not wood worthy.
Yeah, we weren't wood worthy.
Yeah.
No, I agree.
There was cars there that I think people
would have really appreciated if they understood.
Like I was telling someone about the America Roadster
and I could see three other people
like leaning in, listening to what I was saying.
Like I said, it is really rare
to have three America Roadsters in one place.
Well, and do you remember the light blue GNW 993?
Yes, the Marshall car.
The Marshall car.
So it's sitting there
and you don't realize the significance of that car
because there's really nothing there.
And you know it.
And so for you to be a docent is great.
But as a normal person, you just sort of walk by,
oh, pretty car, and you keep going.
My favorite story of that car is it's the last RSR
to run at Daytona.
It is not the fastest anymore
because you got the 996, was it R?
Or were you running RSRs back in 2000?
Well, that won because remember
all the water cool cars blew up.
Yeah, but the race started though.
It had no advantage.
No chance.
The 996s were, anyways, our friend Greg Merrill
who used to do club racing,
he buys a ride, a seat on this car.
Good Lord.
And he told me afterwards,
because they finished third place.
Because like Bob said,
a lot of these 996s were having water pump problems.
And they were going bad.
And I think they actually ran out of water pumps.
Because they replaced so many of them.
One of the different,
because everyone and his brother had one,
a 996 they were running.
And Greg said, we never passed the car on the track.
We just never broke down.
So we would pass them in the pits
as they were being fixed.
And he got his name on a poster.
Yeah, that was amazing.
For a second there,
and I was like, that is like the dream of any Porsche fan.
They would not only run in 24-day Daytona,
but the podium.
Is it this one on the screen?
If you're watching YouTube?
Yeah, that's it.
Yeah, that's it.
But the hand prints on it.
But yeah, there was a lot of cars there
that had great stories
that unfortunately you didn't know.
Even like the one inside when you and I were talking,
we weren't sure it was a 50 or a 51.
I think it was a 51
because I saw a post that showed it
and somebody said, oh, that's my 51.
I think he said a split window cabriolet.
But a lot of people just walked by that.
Sure.
He thought it was just a old 256,
not realizing this is the oldest car right there.
The oldest car there, yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
There were no gamoons, were there?
No, no, I didn't see any.
But then again,
I never even saw the richest point.
I never even saw the Jagermeister 962.
I saw a photo of it.
You walked right past that like five times.
I saw a photo.
I'm like, is this from my other loose?
That's what I said.
No, it's this year.
Yeah.
I didn't see the 966 that Kevin Jeanette built
for Gunna Racing.
I didn't see that one.
I feel like there's a whole section of Disney World
that I didn't go to.
It's like Disney World.
It was pretty much impossible to see everything.
And when we're trying to connect
with Paul Gentili and Gary,
and he's like, oh, I'm standing next to the Jagermeister car.
I'm like, I'm standing next to the Jagermeister car.
But I don't see you.
We're at two different Jagermeister cars.
And I'm like, oh, yeah.
Well, it was definitely a fun event to hang out.
And I like the fact there was no judging.
I'm judging as far as a concor or anything.
Oh, there was judging.
Oh, there was judging.
People judging.
And because it was downtown,
unlike the other loose I went to
where there was an hour of wait for coffee,
there was an hour of wait for this.
It seemed like they got the food thing nailed down.
We found a restaurant literally
on the other side of the fence line
took us 15 minutes to walk to
because we had to walk around the fence line.
But we could see the show from where we were sitting.
Had a very affordable, nice view
on the sports bar and walk back again.
Sure, no line.
No line at all.
It was real bathrooms and bathroom situation too.
I don't think they used any porta pots.
I don't think so.
No, I think it was all
because it was a public place.
Yeah, they had a restroom.
Nice clean restrooms, plenty of them.
Yeah, definitely a lot.
I don't know the businesses that were there
did any business.
I think Tog tag.
I think tag sold a lot of watches.
They did, they did.
I saw that one.
One of their customers is right here.
Yes.
Did you buy a watch?
Oh my God, he crumbles on the peer pressure.
Are you wearing it today?
Yes, you are.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
We only have one left pressure.
Oh my gosh.
So I have to ask you, because I never got a chance,
did they give any type of Luft discount, anything?
No, extra, the charge extra.
Well, just keep in mind, these watches
will probably go up in price here shortly.
Because?
Of a tariff.
Here we go, don't get me started.
Yeah, and he wanted that watch.
You had one of those.
I did, I did.
So I wanted, since this was my first Luft,
I wanted to fully immerse myself in the entire process.
And that included going and making.
Oh, there's a close up shot of his arm here.
Oh.
There we go.
So you had history with a watch very similar to that?
Yeah, I'm a watch guy.
Manny, I'll tell you, he zones out
when we start talking about watches.
I do.
It's part of the, I don't know.
I feel like if you're a car guy,
it's not unheard of to be a watch guy also.
I think it kind of goes hand in hand.
But Manny likes to zone out with that.
I got my nice watch.
I just had to happen to have one nice watch, that's it.
That's a nice watch.
Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
So yeah, so they tagged,
I had a very similar watch in the early 90s
and Tag decided to re-release it.
And I was looking for a good time to purchase.
I just didn't want to buy it.
I said, I would either purchase it.
You mean away from your wife, right?
Yes, absolutely.
Absolutely.
But now it's public.
So now she knows.
But I said, oh, when I go on the cruise,
maybe I'll purchase it on the cruise
or I wanted to do something to, but anyway.
So Luft was a great, great venue to purchase.
But it wasn't like a quick decision.
In fact, he almost lost the opportunity
to make all of this happen.
Yes, yes.
If it wasn't for you and Alejandro.
Alejandro, yeah.
Made that happen.
So we hear this story, it's great.
And I'm like, are you gonna buy it?
He's like, oh, I'll think about it.
So then we go to experience the rest of the show
and obviously he's thinking about it.
I'm like, bro, you need to go back before,
because at that time we thought
there was only one left, right?
I'm like, what if someone, then he starts.
I'm like, right now is where he's speaking.
Somebody's putting it on the wrist.
And that's true story.
But that's an absolute true story running back.
And then he starts sweating.
And then as we were walking back,
of course we still want to look at cars
and he's like, let's go guys, let's go, let's go, let's go.
And eventually he just left us and went straight back.
And then I walked through the doors after him
and he looks like someone kicked his puppy.
I'm like, what's wrong?
The guy over there.
Literally the guy was sitting there in the chair
purchasing it.
He's purchasing it, there's no more left.
I'm like, come on.
Are you kidding me?
We told you to go earlier.
He's like, I know, I know.
And say, let me see what we can do.
So, Alejandro, thank you very much.
She went digging and there was one left, one left.
One left.
And here, all is right in the world.
Yes, all is right in the world.
Thank you, Alejandro.
I walked around the rest of the day like this.
Like somebody just got engaged in ring.
All right.
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On to the news and we're, this is an extent,
turning into an extended version of PCA Insider.
So hopefully you're enjoying it.
So let's get into the news.
We have one item that Manny has listed.
And then I also have a congratulatory message.
The first one talking about the hypercar program.
Porsche is pulling out of it,
but it's only pulling out of the WEC program.
IMSA will continue a couple of episodes ago.
I think we talked about that Porsche had not yet committed
to 2026 at WEC.
And I think it's a mixture of, I'm sure,
budgetary constraints.
But more importantly, they were not happy
with what WEC was doing to balance performance
against the Ferrari.
Porsche was trying to run a car,
both in IMSA and WEC,
which originally that's what everyone talked about
that was going to happen.
But I don't think WEC held their end of the bargain.
And Porsche, even though they were second in the championship,
Ferrari clearly had the advantage,
especially with the Le Mans wins.
So what this means is there's a good chance
Porsche will not race at Le Mans next year,
which is a big shame and kind of scary.
Because the last time they decided to quit racing
at Le Mans, we waited 15 years, I think.
For them to get back.
For them to get back, yeah.
So hopefully that's not what's going to happen.
Hopefully, we see the 9.63,
because if the 9.63 doesn't win a Le Mans,
that's going to be your first purpose built Le Mans prototype
that doesn't win Le Mans since probably the 908.
That's how far back you'd have to go
from when Porsche built the car
to race Le Mans that didn't win Le Mans.
That's 50 years.
Exactly.
So the RS Spider doesn't count,
because Porsche said from the beginning,
that was not going to be a car that they set up for Le Mans.
So even though it raced privateer-wise at Le Mans,
that was never considered a Le Mans contender,
but the 9.63 was.
So we'll wait and see,
but at least for us here in the United States,
we get to Celsius and Mimsa.
And quite frankly, I think WC has some arrogance
with them sometimes.
And they were not followed very closely here in the US
except for die-hard racing enthusiasts.
Most people had no idea what the WC was.
I witnessed that firsthand at Seabring last year
when I went and walking around
and people were leaving on Saturday.
They were not coming back on Sunday and I said,
but the WC is racing on Sunday.
And they're like, oh, it's the same cars.
And I thought, yeah, this is how you have not
ingrained yourself like F1 has into the US.
So anyways, that's the news from the 9.63 per man.
A bit sad.
On the flip side though,
we do want to congratulate Porsche cars North America.
They just recently released a report saying
that their year-to-date deliveries
has increased by 5.6% over 2024,
which is incredible considering
not a huge new mix of cars.
I think the Macan was their number one seller again.
I don't know where I read in that report.
Yeah, so the Macan's 21,000 units,
as we know that it carries them.
Cayenne, 14,000 plus units.
The 718s is the one that they really kind of jumped up.
Last year they sold 718s from about 3,800 of them.
This year they sold almost 5,300 of them.
That's a pretty big jump.
Still a small number.
Small, but for that segment,
the Taycan stayed pretty level.
Panamera saw a little uptick as well.
So congratulations to them.
I know in the complete equation for Porsche AG,
it's not necessarily enough
to overcome all of their challenges,
but from the state side, congratulations.
And to Damon's,
Damon brought this up two episodes ago, I think.
So the news was, of course, that the 718's coming back.
But as we just said, it's not the way you think.
Kind of like maybe like Pet Cemetery
where your dog came back, but that's the same dog.
That, okay.
The best analogy I could think of.
It's close to Halloween.
Yeah, maybe it's appropriate.
So the engine they're going to put in there,
obviously they're not going to put the same engine in there.
But Damon pointed out that the engine they probably should put
in there is the hybrid.
And so while Porsche hasn't officially said this,
there's a ton of news outlets that wrote articles saying
that that is truly probably what they're going to do
is put the 911 engine.
If it's the GTS or maybe a model below that,
still it's going to use that hybrid system.
So I think that's pretty exciting.
It'll pack a punch for sure.
How does that mean no manual then?
Well, you know, they can, I mean,
there's nothing in the T hybrid system that says it has to be a,
I've always said from what I've been told
that the manual is the emergency automatic braking
that becomes law in 2029.
Can manufacturers build manuals that will operate
in the emergency braking?
I'm sure they can.
It's a matter of world investment in technology
and parts and whatnot that equal to the take rate.
That's something they got to, I guess, weigh.
Obviously, I'm a big fan of the manual.
I would love to continue because if it doesn't,
that means when I'm buying my Porsche in five years
that's used, I won't have anything select that's manual.
So I would love for them to think it's worthwhile
and be able to make something
that obviously when you put the clutch in,
the car still keeps on running.
That's strange, but we'll see.
That should be easy with speed sensors.
I will give Y-Soc your phone number.
Just think about it, but okay.
All right, I want to remind everyone,
Oonstock 2025, November 16th at Porsche Santa Clarita.
Registration is open.
By the time you listen to this podcast,
it might be kind of tight and might not have room,
but as far as being in the show,
we certainly invite you to come
and enjoy it as a spectator.
We also want to talk a little bit
about one of my favorite cars,
a video that recently dropped,
the 74 Carrera RS 3.0.
Yep, forgot to turn the microphone on there.
And I'm also gonna start this video
so it's playing while we are talking about it.
But yes, so the car you see right now on YouTube
is a 73 RS.
It's actually Bob Miller's,
or at least it was at Bob Miller's shop
when we shot that video.
So this one here, this blue car is a 74 Carrera RS.
Much fewer made.
It's 50-something cars versus in the 1000s, 1500s.
1500 and 80, yeah.
Of the other one.
But yeah, it retains the mechanical fuel injection.
For the most part, the same motor,
maybe a little bit more power.
A lot more power, 300 or 240.
Somebody in the comments said it was 240,
but we had 300 in here.
But yeah, really cool video.
We don't drive on the track,
it was actually raining all day
except for like two hours throughout the whole day.
So we used in the shoot video of the cars,
but we only got a little bit of track footage
and that was in the 904.
So that video still has to come out.
Look for it in the next month or two.
Way cool car, so make sure you check that one out.
Just want to give a plug to PCA SimRacing
if you haven't checked that out
and you want to learn about racing online
with other PCA members, PCAsimracing.com.
We have Insider swag.
We talked about merchandise earlier
and if you're looking for a water bottle,
a mug or a t-shirt to rock the PCA Insider logo,
we appreciate the support there.
If you're just looking for decals,
just send us your address information
to podcast at PCA.org.
Rich, Bob, this has been fun
and I hope you all enjoy this extended version
because there's a lot to take in and a lot to cover
and if you haven't gotten anything from this
is the next one that's close to you
or even far from you, you should definitely check out Lufth.
And into your car, it doesn't have to be perfect.
In fact, if you look at the cars there,
some of the imperfect patina ones
were the ones that got the most photographs.
Absolutely.
But this made Rich actually want to go down
to work for you, you need a million dollars.
Really? Wow.
My truck and my trailer are ready to go.
Very good.
We still haven't gone.
What's the furthest you've driven your 930?
To the open house.
The open house.
Yeah.
The open house, yeah.
It's like 30 miles.
It's not even that.
I have trust issues.
Yeah.
Jeff, Patrick, congratulations on Lufth
and hopefully we'll see you soon.
Everyone, thank you for listening.
Be sure to like, comment and subscribe
and consider sharing our show
with fellow Porsche enthusiasts.
Until next time, stay safe
and we'll catch you down the road.
["Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy"]
About this episode
A lively discussion unfolds as the Porsche Club Insider crew shares their experiences from Luftgekühlt 11, the first East Coast event of its kind. With guests Bob Miller and Richard Bauer, they delve into the unique atmosphere, the stunning air-cooled Porsches on display, and the challenges of parking and navigating the event. The crew reflects on the event's organization, the significance of various cars, and the camaraderie among Porsche enthusiasts. They also touch on upcoming PCA events and the latest Porsche news, making for an engaging and informative episode.
Original notes
On this episode we cover our experiences at this year’s Luft 11. PCAers Bob Miller and Richard Bauer come on the podcast as our special guest. Bob, Richard, and Manny all entered their Porsches and were accepted into the show. Vu came down as well to attend his first Luft. Between the four of us, we’ll give you our thoughts on the show, what it was like getting set up before the show as well as the pre-show activities. Because there was so much to cover, this is an extended episode.
Porsche Club Insider
Porsche Club of America
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75:54