When I first saw Bob Marx’ 914 in some pics of a gathering at Danville, CA and then again in snaps from a meet at EASY Porsche in Emeryville, San Francisco, I knew it was something different: it just had that air about it. I spoke to my buddy John Gray, who I knew would have been at EASY. John told me it was a V8-motored home brew, built by a new Grupper up in Pleasanton. I’m always interested in hybrids (Porsche with non-Porsche power), so I had to find out more. I did some detective work and tracked the owner down.
Once I’d found Bob, we had a good chat about the car. It sounded great and he was well up for a magazine feature. I had already pitched something on a V8 engined GT1 replica to 911 & Porsche World and they weren’t keen on anything that wasn’t 100% Stuttgart, so I ran the idea past Simon Davidson at Retro Cars magazine and he loved it. We were in business. Turned out Mister Marx was a Retro reader too!
Shooting the car in California was pretty cool. I mean both stylish and chilly! Looking at the previews in Jamie’s camera along the way, it was obvious we had something good. Afterwards we headed down to WEVO and spent the rest of the day with our good friends Hayden and Tracy, picking up some 8″ Fuchs and stopping by a proper American bodyshop on the way. That was a very good day.
Jamie wasn’t convinced the US shoots would make the cover, but I thought he might be selling himself short. He sent me this pic yesterday. Excellent!
If you like your P-car features, then buy the magazine. James Lipman’s pics are perfect, Simon’s guys have done a great job on layout and Bob’s car is a whole lot of fun.
