Porsche 959: The Rally Car That Became an Amazing Road Car
Lest we forget, the 959 wasn’t designed to conquer the supercar world. But it did, almost as if by accident.
If there was a supercar hall of fame, you can bet the iconic Porsche 959 would be one of the very first inductees. When it debuted, the 959 was the fastest and most technologically advanced car in history. Porsche designed the 959 to push the envelope of what was possible at the time, while also giving us a preview of the future of sports cars. But lest we forget, the 959 wasn’t originally designed to conquer paved race tracks and public roads. It was built to dominate Group B rally racing.
Sam Fane, the man behind the YouTube channel Seen Through Glass, is happy to remind us of that little forgotten fact in this incredibly interesting video. He was also lucky enough to get to drive one while visiting Luxe Automotive in Salt Lake City. And what better place to test out the ultimate rally car than the vast wild landscapes of Utah? OK, so Fane obviously isn’t going to be slinging up rocks in this $1.5 million plus artifact, but that’s understandable. But he will give us some history on the car.
“Back in the early ’80s, somebody at Porsche decided the next big step in the 911 was four-wheel-drive,” Fane said. “The quickest way to develop an all-wheel-drive system was through motorsport. So Porsche picked Group B rally. However, it never actually entered the Group B rally because Porsche spent so long developing it. When they turned up with the car, Group B was like ‘no, it’s not happening anymore.'”
Thus, Porsche was stuck with a car designed to compete in something that it no longer could. So what to do? Well, they did the next best thing and sought out other rally series. “They did the Paris Dakar rally,” Fane said. “It was pretty successful in that. But it was less successful on track. They went to Le Mans with a sort of race car variant of it and it just didn’t do that well.”
The 959 obviously missed the mark when it came to motorsports fame. Luckily, homologation rules rules stemming from Group B meant that Porsche had to build some street-legal examples. And that, friends, is what cemented the 959’s eternal place in supercar history. “It was such a technologically advanced and just crazy car that I think people didn’t really know what it was,” Fane said. Even today, the 959 is incredibly fast, a testament to how bonkers it was decades ago.
Porsche still lost money on every 959 it sold, but you can’t place a value on how many fans it attracted to the brand. The car’s crazy tech also trickled down to the rest of the Porsche lineup, including of course all-wheel-drive. But above all, the 959 is a car that many of us grew up idolizing. And it’s one that the world will certainly never forget, even if we often forget why it was built in the first place.
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