“So, who am I? I’m a challenger. I’m an engineer. I’m a sportsman. I’m an organizer. I’m certainly a manager. I’m a people guy. To a certain level, an entrepreneur as well. I’m in love with life, in love with people in general. I think it’s a strength of mine to be able to work with people and to get out of them as much as they’re able and willing to give.”

“It’s the most valuable marketing tool existing because you’re selling, and therefore marketing, your technical know-how, your brand, and, last but not least, depending on what motorsport series it is, what you’re producing and what you want to sell.

Sport in general is marketing. The Americans have known that for ages, and the rest of the world has been following for a long time. As the one being responsible for motorsport, you always have to have in mind why you’re doing it. What that core intention is.”

“Dauer was a happy accident. We definitely didn’t have a car to win Le Mans. We had won Le Mans many, many times before ’94 already, with cars which were the best existing cars to win such a tough and long race. But the world never stands still, right? It’s always going forward.

So, in the financially difficult situation we were in, we had to think about the solution and how to realize it to potentially be able to win this ’94 Le Mans race as the key race of Porsche’s motorsport at the time. It was kind of a lucky punch that Jochen Dauer had the idea to take one of these Porsche superstar cars, which had won Le Mans so many times, and modify it in order to be allowed to drive it on the road. It was a sexy idea, but extremely difficult to realize.

He started all of that with a lot of enthusiasm and energy. He came many times to Porsche and was asking mainly Norbert Singer, who was the chief engineer with regard to the car, whether he could help him get the car through all these technical and legal processes in order to get all the stamps he needed to be allowed to drive the car on the road. We had a lot of strategic meetings at the time where we had to decide what was next for Le Mans. The existing regulation was at the end of its life, and a new regulation was coming. The old regulation was for these kinds of prototypes, which were called Group C, and the top cars were the Group C1 cars. However, there was a new class called GT1, which was more street-car-looking, although still very much a prototype.

We found a solution to take our potential Dauer road car and modify it in such a way that we were able to start as a GT1 car. Our top challenger was Toyota at the time, and they decided to go for one last time with the C1 prototype.

We had a lot of meetings with the ACO, the organizer and promoter of Le Mans, and we had to find a way that they would accept our car as a GT1 car, although it was still looking very similar to the Group C1 car. We had to convince them that this car really was a road legal car and not a prototype. That needed a lot of technical meetings on the car side and engine side with the ICO guys in Le Mans. We went to Weissach to actually control the car and closely watch what was built by Porsche. We started the project only at the end of November '93 to be ready for tests as of March '94 in order to be ready for the race in June. It was tough.

But we won and, amongst a lot of other triggers, the Le Mans win at the time was key for the turnaround. I think that I'm allowed to say that."

“A lot, honestly. Not only because we won this hyper-important race, but because Porsche at the time was in an unbelievably difficult situation financially. We literally had very little money to go and produce that marketing tool, motorsport, at the time. Therefore, we had to be very efficient. In terms of return on investment, we had to be very clever to go for the right sports-strategic setup. We had to work day and night. We had to be very clever from a sports-political perspective with organizations like the FIA or ACO, the promoter of Le Mans.

We were short on time because we had no obvious product to go racing. We really had to reinvent ourselves. We had to think about how to get out of this extremely complex and difficult situation, go motor racing and be successful.

You always have to know that sport is winning, hopefully as much as you can, and losing as well. It’s part of the game. Second best is the first loser. But from time to time, you have to be able to lose in order to be able to win again.”

“Not at all. Challenge is something human beings need. Whether you’re actively fighting for a challenge or you’re a consumer, like a spectator, that has always been like that.

The Greeks, in their Olympic Games thousands of years ago, had that already, and we still have it. It’s in our heritage. And former times were no better than the present. From time to time, you just have to let go and enjoy what’s there.”