Does anyone find it ironic Porsche is a main sponsor of F1 on Speed?

All the teams including Ferrari should be glad Porsche's no longer in F1. The last time Porsche entered F1 with TAG, they won both the Drivers and Constructors Championship their very first year! Porsche left F1 after that claiming it was too easy and that they wanted to concentrate in a competitive race series with cars more like the ones they built for the consumer.

 

Your F1 history is a bit off. The last time Porsche entered F1 was in 91 suppliying their V12 engines to Arrows/Footworks and the engine was so pathetic that half way through the season Arrows switched to a Cosworth.

Porsche doesn't want ot race at the top rung anymore. While it makes no sense for them as an independant company to enter F1, why do they not run in the top class at LeMans anymore.

Porsche doesn't spend any money of factory racing anymore. All their cars are sold to customers at a profit. They have no in-house racing effort anymore so they can focus more on building much needed SUV's for soccer moms and neat/cute little Boxsters for hair dressers.

Thank God they still build some decent cars (GT3, GT3RS, GT2, 996 TT).

Regards,

Jon P. Kofod
www.flatoutracing.net

 

^ Yeah I laughed too... haha.

 

Can't claim it as original material. Jeremy Clarkson of the UK car magazine scene had a list of cars that fit certain stereotypes and one of his sub-categories was "The hair dresser's car".

The Miata, Z3 and the Boxster were at the top of the list.

Regards,

Jon

 

I wouldn't mind so much if they were creative commercials but these are some of the WORST I've ever seen and they're usually for the Cayenne.

The moron revving up his $95,000 SUV over the phone... aw crikey I just want to puke.

 

They ruined Teo Fabi's career with the Indy car effort also.

But it made a good video. I still have the poster of the car, too!
Sure was beautiful!

Actually, thinking back, I walked into the Pcar dealership with the wife's Audi 5000, and when I expressed an interest in racing, the salesgirl loaded me down with posters of the Audi sedan effort and the Indy Car.

I don't EVER recall that happening at the Ferrari dealer!!!!

 

Alan,

I was at the Mid-Ohio race when Derek Walker and Porsche won their first and only race in CART.

I am not sure if it ruined Fabio's career, but it sure didn't help. It also didn't help John Andretti's career.

I think part of the problem was that CART didn't want Porsche to win. This was just after, as Frank pointed out, Porsche powered McLaren's destroyed the F1 field and CART was weary of this and also having a German car win the 500 (this was way before Mercedes, Honda and Toyota were in the series).

Porsche might have become a successful competitor, but CART made sure this would never happen.

Regards,

Jon

 

Ryan, it called $$$$$$. F1 has a real problem in that there is only team that have the $$$$$ to win. Porsche is a very small company that has to play its cards very carefully. One slip and....

 

No no no. You see, when you're burning through 300 million / year on a "race" team v. building another man. plant to build the uber-soccer mom vagon then you can't be the most profitable car co. on the plant. Which, by default, is a moniker Porsche refuse to give up. Porsche promised a return to enduracne racing in '04, then '06 and now it's postponed indefinatly. Porsche, may still stand for some of the most maginificent sports/race cars built today, but their corporate outlook has as much to do with factory backed racing as my choice of boxer shorts. Porsche's current sponsorship ofthe F1 airtime has everything to do with maintaining the perception of being linked to motorsport, and it's prestigious heritage. @ Daytona, there's a row of garages with Porsche, outright, victories... that row of garages has gotten longer, but Porsche hasn't adorned any of the new additions. The same mentality is behind the release of the 550 spyder commerative edition Boxster; they're banking on the 550 spyders legendary carrera panamerica and targa floria victories to sell. Well, there was all that, and some guy named James Dean drove on too.
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Hubert, while I share your sentiment, you answered your own question. Ferrari makes money racing in F1, apparently more money than it makes selling cars. This is not the case with Porsche. Some of us, not including me, may not like the Pepper car. But, don't forget that Porsche almost bit the dust in the early 90s. I don't think they want to go there again.

Dr "Who'd love to see Porsche in F1 and Ferrari at Le Mans" Tax

 

Dale: there's no way Porsche could, or even should, make an attempt in F1. There's NO WAY they could bankroll that effort, even though there are a lot of hairdressers in the world...
Anyway, while I may seem emphatic about Porsche actually being in racing, as a factory effort, I have to admit that I am happy with them having stayed in business--something which Toyota had a lot to do with.
I don't mind the pepper (and I think we've been down this road before), and understand its place in the niche market that Porsche has made for it, but it just so weird. I suppose in answering Ryalex's question, I couldn't help but smack of the cynic who misses the lore of 917's.
By the way, it (ze Pepper) has also managed to give Porsche the worst JD Power rating thanks to all the bugs inherant in its production. Maybe they shouldn't let VW assemble it?(See attachment below.)
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i thought that commercial was pretty funny. porsche always has cool commercials. like the one where the girl intentionally misses the school bus so her dad can drive her to school in the 911.

the first day i got my motorcycle i took it home, called up my friend and revved it up for him over the phone. it was a creative way of letting him know i finally got my bike.

 

Watch out, bubba. Cause I'll send Bill Rose to come whup yo butt!

 

I like the Porsche mag commercials better, it takes a lot of skill being able to catch a perfect moment which matches your theme and message as perfectly as Porsches Marketing manages to do it everytime I look at their ads.

What's even cooler is that they are specific to the cars that they are trying to promote, you can't just alter a few words to fit it to another car because it just doesn't seem to work out!

 

Dear Ferraristi,

I hate to admit it but Porsche is just of joke....a shell of its former self. I currently belong to the Porsche club of America and have been for about 15 years. So....I'm not a Porsche basher but.....I want a car that is more than transportation. I want passion, exclusivity, and something to get excited about. (racing heritage ) Why do we root for a football or baseball team? It's something to get excited about and be part of the action. When "our" team wins, we all jump up scream. Same thing for " our " cars. Sorry, I can't get excited about trucks and "dime-a-dozen" boxters. Even I can't tell the difference between the 986 and 911 at distance. That's why I drive a Ferrari Testarossa. " Freeze, Miami Vice" ! And....I never see another one on the road !

 

the simple answer to the question is, because it makes sense to be associated with racing, given their heritage, and paying for adds is cheap compared to the actual participation. plus, the number one most attainable european sportscar for the average guy is still a porsche.

given that this is a ferrari chat site, this love/hate discussion was to be expected.
for most of ferrari's racing history, porsche was a major nemesis. and with justification during the 60's, 70's, 80's and in the hands of privateers up to the present. still today at le mans, ferrari doesn't really care too much where the saleen or the bentley came in, what they want to know is where the prodrive 550 stacked up against the same classed porsche.

however, porsche had a near-death experience 15-20 years ago, and doesn't ever want a repeat (or more precisely the family doesn't want a repeat). so they sell lots of cars at good profit margins. this is a bit of eat-cake-and-have-it-too scenario. normally you can either make a small number of profitable cars (ferrari), or a large number of only very marginally profitable cars (vw, gm). so for a company to achieve both is pretty great.

but that leads to an enthusiast problem that other have mentioned. i have owned porsches, my father is a dedicated porsche nut, and has had one or more since 1967. but i also did not want to see myself coming and going everywhere, nor did i want to be riding in something from the same factory as the hairdresser's car. call me snobbish, but thats the truth.

i am pretty sure though that since porsche has made so much money on the cayenne and boxster, and that all seems very much under control at zuffenhausen, that we will see a resurgence of porsche in racing. where, when, and in what discipline is harder to say. they won't join cart because its future is uncertain. they will not join irl or nascar either. i am pretty sure they won't get involved in f1 in the near future, unless there is a bargain opportunity if one of the smaller teams falls away, and they probably also don't want to throw any money at f1 until the concorde agreement renewal for 2007 is clarified.
my guess is they let the privateers continue to carry the flag in sports and endurance racing in general, with maybe a little more help than has been given lately. and maybe they put together another le mans effort on the back of the carrera gt.

 

The only way Porsche gets into the top rungs of motorsport is when they know they have a built-in competitive advantage with regard to the rules packages.

Porsche actually built a LMP900 prototype, had the late Bob Wollek test it and then just as quickly, turned right around and pulled the plug on the project when they found out that their rules-tweaking contraption was outside the spirit of the rules of the ACO and, of course, they could not match the F-1
type budget which Audi was spending to win at Le Mans.

Their excuse for not participating with the LMP900 car was that they wanted
to concentrate on building and selling Ceyenes.

BHW

 

Dear Ferraristi,

I think Porsche is just resting on it's past. It will keep making Cayennes until it sees a market in pick-up trucks. When racing is just in it's past, it will just become another corporation making another high quality product....nothing to get excited about. If Porsche goes go racing, it will be it's favorite cup series....hey no real competition there.

Again, I only say this because I've owned Porsches for years and I'm really angry the way the company has headed. Ferrari makes money going the way it does...no one is saying not to make big money. You just don't see Cartier sold at Walmart.

 

There are rumblings that Porsche may be following the lead of Toyota and could possibly be headed towards NASCAR.

Their tongues are certainly in the right places with the ISC and if there is a builtin perception that Porsche may market their product via NASCAR and not have to go head to head with their direct market competition on the race tracks, it actually makes sense.

Before this is scoffed at, just ask if ten years ago anyone would have predicted Toyota would be coming to NASCAR (and spending over a billion
dollars on the program) and they would be welcomed with open arms.

BHW

 

Holy Crap a Kia has less problems than a Porsche???????? Now that is ironic

 

It seems as if both Porsche and BMW use the same advertising agency as both of there commercial campains durring F1 races are as lame as you can get. To me they seem to be targeting the dumb a$$ part time real estate agents that are looking for nothing more than a tax write off at the end of the year.

If you wonder how i can qualify that statement i will introduce you to a co-worker of mine. Teacher by day. Realtor by night he both has a BMW and P-car, and takes no pride in ownership. On top of that he is up to his eye balls in debt paying for them.

Thank god he does not own a Ferrari or i would have to kick his sorry butt into the ground