One to Buy: ex-works 1956 Le Mans 24 Hour class winning Porsche 550A Coupe
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Following its victorious debut at the Nurburgring Eifelrennen in May 1953, the Porsche 550 established itself as the car to beat in the under 1500cc class of international Sports car racing.
Nowhere was this more amply demonstrated than at arguably the toughest event on the calendar: the Le Mans 24 Hours. In just its second competitive outing, the 550 won its class at Le Mans, a feat repeated in 1954 and ‘55. Incredibly, that 1955 outing had seen a trio of 550s place fourth, fifth and sixth overall.
For 1956, Porsche introduced the 550A which most notably featured an even lighter, stiffer chassis. A pair of streamliner 550 A Coupes were entered for that year’s race at la Sarthe, one of which (the example driven by Wolfgang von Trips and Richard von Frankenburg) crossed the line fifth overall to claim yet another win for Porsche in the 1.5-litre Sports category.
That very car driven by von Trips and von Frankenburg, chassis 0104, will be going under the hammer with RM Sotheby’s at their Monterey sale on August 19th.
The sole surviving example of the 1956 Le Mans 550A streamliners, 0104 was converted to lightweight Spyder trim after the race in which configuration von Frankenburg reputedly drove the car to fourth in the Nurburgring Rheinland contest that took place a week later.
0104 subsequently continued its racing career with John Edgar in the USA and in more recent years joined the fabled collection of Julio Palmez. Since then it has been restored back to its 1953 Le Mans trim and is presented in superb condition throughout.
