This 1963 Porsche 356 Carrera sold for $249,652 at the Artcurial Briest Poulain Le Fur auction in Paris, France, on February 15, 2004.
The Carrera 2 GS/GT is unique as it is a car that can do it all. A further evolution of the Carerra 2 GS (which was itself a higher-spec 356B) the GT was as successful in rallies and circuit races as it is a pleasure to drive on the road. It is quite rare to see one come up for sale and it does not surprise me that this one was quickly snapped up by a passionate Porsche collector.
I am quite familiar with this particular car, as during the past 20-plus years, it was owned by the noted Porsche collector Hans Dieter Blatzheim of Bonn, Germany. He passed away in a racing accident at the Nürburgring, while driving a 917, and his widow Ellen loaned the car to my good friend Peter Kaus for display in his Rosso Bianco museum in Aschaffenburg, Germany. Later, Ellen’s son used the car and saw to its race preparation.
The GT was a full-blown streetable race car based on the production 356B T-6 chassis, but built by the Porsche factory competition department to be lighter, more nimble, and more powerful. It’s just another example of why Porsche is famous for the strong link between its racing exploits and production cars.
The body used aluminum for both doors and the front and rear deck lids. The rear deck lid had louvers for extra engine cooling. The body shell had a special lower weld bead added to give the chassis more rigidity. The door window frames were also made of aluminum and the side windows were Plexiglas. All unnecessary exterior trim was deleted, from bumper guards to the windscreen surround. The interior was as spartan as could be, with lightweight aluminum seat shells and a wooden steering wheel.
For performance, a 2,000-cc version of Porsche’s famous four-camshaft Carrera racing engine was installed and fitted with two Weber 46 IDM-2 carburetors enabling it to produce 155 hp. This was mated to a close-ratio, four-speed gearbox with four sets of available gear ratios. The 356 Carrera had a 7.31 final drive ratio and a limited-slip differential. A large 110-liter fuel tank with an external center hood fill was used. Wheels were steel and aluminum two-piece units with venting for the brand new disc brakes, the first to be fitted to a 356. With these unique components taken from Porsche’s famous racing Spyders, the Carrera GT was indeed a very special 356.
To find one of just 14 produced, as this car is, with a terrific history and its original mechanical components intact, well restored, and with proper documentation including current FIA historic identity papers, is even more special.
The car carried a whole host of documentation: the original Porsche factory build certificate (which also shows its first owner), original road registration (necessary for rallying at that time), record of its restoration from Porsche, and documentation from its recent professional race preparation. Besides all this, the car was also featured in Jurgen Barth’s The Porsche Book, and its entire ownership is known. It doesn’t really get much better from a paperwork standpoint.
When one considers that this Carrera 2 GS/GT is a turnkey entry into most every exciting historic race and rally, including the Monte Carlo Historic Rally, the Tour Auto in France, the Tour of Spain, and the Rallye des Alpes, its appeal to the new owner is simple to understand.
When compared with a nice Carrera 2 GS selling around $150,000-$160,000, a Carrera GTL Abarth worth over $500,000, or even a good competition Alfa Romeo GTZ-1 at $250,000, this car offers a great bang for the buck. And that’s even with the current currency weakness that has inflated the value of the American dollar. For the European buyer in Paris, this was an even better buy.-Mark B. Leonard
(Photos, historical and descriptive information courtesy of the auction company.)
