ABOUT 130 UCR MEMBERS attended our Tuesday March 12 social, which was hosted by Porsche Centre North Toronto (PCNT). The event officially began when I shared the following great news with our members about PCNT and Dan Proudfoot’s (13-year UCR member) recent induction into the Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame.
PCNT recently won 2018 Porsche Premier Dealer Award, which was given to three Porsche Centres in Canada that deliver excellence in the areas of sales, service and customer experience. This was an amazing achievement for PCNT, given 2018 was its first full year of operation. John Cappella, Managing Director at PCNT, has been promoted to Vice President of the eastern region at Porsche Cars North America (PCNA), which is the exclusive importer of Porsche vehicles for 189 dealers in the U.S. John spent five years as the Director of Network Development at Porsche Cars Canada before he moved to PCNT in March 2016 to build the team. We wish John all the best in his new role at PCNA which begins on April 15. John and his family will relocate to New York City.
John gave a warm speech to thank UCR members for their support. After his speech, John unveiled the new 2019 GT3 Cup race car which will be PCNT’s entry in 2019 Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge Canada. The first two races of the 12-race series will take place at the Canadian Tire Motorsport Park (aka Mosport) during the Victoria Day SpeedFest weekend on May 17-19, 2019.
Dan Proudfoot was recently inducted into the Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame (CMHF) for his journalism work. Dan was the first motorsport reporter for the Globe and Mail in the early 1970s and moved on to cover racing for the Toronto Sun in the 1980s through to 2001. This is such a prestige award because past inductees include Mario Andretti, Greg Moore and Paul Tracy. Dan has been a regular contributor to our Provinz magazine. Dan brought the book Challenge that Len Coates wrote about the early days of Canadian Road Racing. Len was one of the 10 inductees in the new media category of the CMHF. His book talked about the Player’s 200, which was the first major race at Mosport in 1961 that attracted 40,000 fans. After the race, Ted Reeve’s poem (see next page) appeared at the top of his sports column in the Toronto Telegram. Dan recited a poem from the book Challenge.
Welcoming New Members
Terrence Tong (Vice-President) and I presented Porsche pins to several new members at the event: Ray Hwang, Rob and Angie Luba, Grant and Donna Mandau, Germaine St-Denis and Marc Ouayoun. Marc Ouayoun is the President and CEO of Porsche Cars Canada since January 1, 2018. He was previously the Managing Director of Porsche France SA for six years. Marc is a fan of Porsche classic cars and he told us he bought a 1990 911 C4 Cabriolet. We look forward to seeing Marc at our future UCR events, such as our picnic on Saturday June 8 at the Boyd Conservation Area and the Concours d’Elegance on Sunday, September 1st.
Upcoming Events
Our first signature event of the year is the Open House on Sunday, April 28 at 427 Auto Collision (Etobicoke). This will be the sixth consecutive year that 427 Auto Collision is sponsoring the Open House. Many of our advertisers and event chairs will be present at the event. We plan to have a Show ‘N Shine at the 79,000 sq.ft. indoor facility and feature some our members cars especially the 914s, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the 914.
Rennlist and UCR Cars and Coffee
Rennlist and UCR (led by Terrence Tong, UCR Vice President) will launch an inaugural “Cars and Coffee” event on Saturday May 11 at the Starbucks located at 3050 Vega Blvd in Mississauga. This will be a casual get together for our members, and no advance registration is required. Come and join your fellow Porsche enthusiasts and have a cup of coffee on UCR. This will be a monthly event from May to October.
Lori Schutz’s Inspirational Speech
The highlight of the evening was the speech by Lori Schutz – the daughter of Peter Schutz. Lori is the Zone 4 representative of the Porsche Club of America overseeing 12 regions in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana areas. Peter Schutz was the CEO of Porsche AG from 1981 to 1987 and he was instrumental in turning around Porsche AG during the early 1980s. Peter is best remembered for blocking the plan to end production of the signature 911 model, which remains the quintessential Porsche.
Lori told us two stories from the book The Driving Force: Getting Extraordinary Results with Ordinary People – written by her late father, Peter Schutz:
How Peter Schutz saved the Porsche 911: While Peter was in the office of Helmuth Bott (Chief of Engineering at Porsche AG 1978-1988), he saw a chart that showed the projected production and sales numbers of the 924 and 928 models for the next 20 years, but the line for 911 ended in 1981. Peter used a large black marker to extend the 911’s line to the end of the chart, onto the wall, around the hallway and told Bott to “Make it happen!”
Porsche set a record in the history of Le Mans in 1981: During 1981, the Porsche racing team planned to enter three modified 924s in the 24 Hours of Le Mans but Peter knew these models had no chance of winning. The 24 Hours of Le Mans is the world’s oldest sports car endurance race and one of the most influential in motorsports history. About 61 days prior to the race on June 13/14, Peter asked the engineer to pull a Porsche 936 from the museum display and install an experimental engine that Porsche had developed for Indy Car Racing. They had a whole team of engineers and staff that worked around the clock to build the race car in time for the race.
The line for 911 ended in 1981. Peter used a large black marker to extend the 911’s line to the end of the chart, onto the wall, around the hallway and told Bott to “Make it happen!”
Just a few days after Peter decided to enter the Porsche 936 into 1981 24 Hours of Le Mans, he received phone calls from the best race car drivers in the world – Jacky Ickx, Derek Bell, Jochen Mass, Al Holbert, Hurley Haywood, Vern Schuppan, and Hans Stuck who all told him they would like to drive a Porsche at Le Mans. Later, Peter found out the reason he got these phone calls. Heinz Metzger -one of the Porsche engine designers – had the connection with the race car drivers.
At the 1981 24 Hours of Le Mans, Porsche tested the 2.6L engine which was derived from a never-raced Indianapolis 500 engine and fitted it in a pair of 936 chassis. Jack Ickx shared one of the updated 936s with Derek Bell, Jochen Mass, Vern Schuppan and Hurley Haywood drove the other. The engine test was successful. After the first hour of the race, Ickx and Bell built a large advance and remained in the lead for the rest of the race ( total of 354 laps) and they won by an even greater margin than in 1976 – 14 laps! Porsche also set a record in the history of Le Mans because the winning car ran the whole 24 hours without any issues other than adding engine oil and fuel, and changing the brakes and tires. And it was the first time in 20 years that Professor Porsche went to watch the race.
Lori will be one of the scrutineers at our annual Can/Am Challenge Club Race at Mosport on August 2-4, 2019. We look forward to seeing her again in four months’ time!
The evening finished off with John Cappella giving away raffle prizes to 15 lucky UCR members. The prizes were Porsche Driver’s Selection and Tequipment items, which included: 1:43 Porsche model cars, Porsche coffee mugs, Porsche tire gauge, and Porsche AG calendars. After the prize draw, Lori did the book signing for our members who were eager to purchase the book after listening to her inspiring speech. Jim Kenzie, a 30-year auto journalist with the Toronto Star, also dropped by the event and sold some of his Kenzie calendars to our members. Fifty per cent of the proceeds from the sale of the Kenzie calendar will be donated to Parachute, Canada’s premier injury-prevention organization. Jim Kenzie will be our guest speaker at Tuesday, April 9th social, which will take place at the Islington Golf Club.
We would like to thank John Capella and Adriano Bernaudo (Marketing Manager) for hosting the event for our members. We all enjoyed the delicious menu items at the buffet station which included salad, pasta, sausages, roasted vegetables and pastries.
I would also like to thank Jackie Metcalfe (Director, Club Race Grid Captain and Volunteer Coordinator) for helping me check in members and Eshel Zweig (UCR member and Provinz photographer) for taking pictures at the event. </>
