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Porsche recommits to Le Mans through 2018

Porsche is back at the forefront of sports endurance racing, and it has no intention of leaving anytime soon. The German automaker announced that it will stay in the LMP1 class of both the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the FIA World Endurance Championship through the end of 2018. So its rivals can look forward to a good three more years of heated competition at least. After winning at Le Mans a record 16 times, Porsche dropped out of competition for top honors in 1998. It returned to the front of the grid last year with the 919 Hybrid, winning the 6 Hours of Sao Paulo at the end of its debut season. Its greater victory, however, came earlier this summer when the revised version took a dominant 1-2 finish in the famous French endurance race. That put the team from Weissach in the lead for the World Endurance Championship, which it (spoiler alert!) further extended this weekend with another 1-2 finish in the inaugural 6 Hours of Nurburgring. "Motorsport is an important part of Porsche's brand identity – but not an end in itself. Racing has got to help the technology of future road going sports cars," said Porsche chief Matthias Muller in the statement below. "It was the revolutionary efficiency regulations that convinced us to return to top-level motorsport for the 2014 season. That we have managed to take the crown jewels of endurance racing in only our second year, with a one-two result in Le Mans in 2015 with our highly innovative and complex 919, is an outstanding testimony to the people in the Weissach research and development centre. The competition bears fruits and we see further potential for future synergy between the racing and road car programmes. This is why we have extended the programme." FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) and 24-Hours of Le Mans Porsche confirms LMP1 programme up to end of 2018 Stuttgart. Porsche continues racing into the future with the 919 Hybrid: The board of Porsche AG has decided to extend the Le Mans prototype programme until the end of the 2018 season. With its ground-breaking concept – a downsizing turbo engine and powerful energy recovery systems, combined with an extreme lightweight design – the racing car with a performance of around 1,000 hp serves as a research laboratory for future sports car technology. Matthias Muller, Chairman of the Executive Board of Porsche AG, said: "Motorsport is an important part of Porsche's brand identity – but not an end in itself.

Magnus Walker soliloquizes in his Porsche 911 at night

Magnus Walker, a prolific Los Angeles clothing designer who has also carved out a respected spot for himself in Porsche world, has had yet another video made about him and his sizable Porsche collection. In this latest video, Hong Kong-based Obscura magazine focuses its video cameras on Walker and his 1971 Porsche 911 track car (yes, the one that appeared on Jay Leno's Garage) as he speeds around Downtown LA and Little Tokyo late at night.
We've heard Walker's story many times before. He's not like the average Porsche owner, perhaps a tad more passionate than most, and he builds 911s like he designs clothes: his way. Sure, we might be a little envious, but can you blame us? View this very slick and entertaining nighttime video entitled Disturbing The Peace below.

2015 Porsche Cayman GTS

The Porsche Boxster and Cayman will forever nip at the heels of their big brother, the 911 Carrera, and perpetuating this tradition are the latest GTS variants, which add yet another arrow to the quiver of the plucky mid-engined platform.
The GTS' performance enhancements boost horsepower by a mere 15 and shave a tenth from 0 to 60, but Porsche's clever product planners and engineers have stuck to their familiar formula in making the Cayman GTS more desirable than the Boxster for dyed-in-the-wool performance enthusiasts. More on that shortly.
Laps around Spain's Circuito Mallorca RennArena and the nearby Serra de Tramuntana mountain range would shed further light on how the GTS differentiates itself from lesser Caymans.