Porsche is crazy about speed? Here's the best proof!
Why did Porsche put a mahogany gear shift knob in a racing car? Discover the story of the obsession with lightness that changed the rules of the game and left a mark on the brand's DNA to this day.
In the sixties, the goal of all Porsche engineers was to reduce the weight of racing cars. A milestone: the Porsche 908/03 Spyder from 1970, which caused quite a sensation during two races: the mythical Targa Florio in Sicily and the 1000 km competition on the Nürburgring Nordschleife. Spectators at the time milling around the paddock, looking into the interior of the futuristic Gulf-coloured racing car, admired the tubular structure, sports seat and small steering wheel. All made of lightweight materials: aluminium, Plexiglas and leather. The greatest innovation and surprise, however, was an inconspicuous wooden addition – a mahogany gear knob.
Wooden gear shift knob in Porsche / press materialsUntil then, there were three standard options for gear knob materials: aluminum, magnesium, and plastic. Each material has its own weight, which was to be reduced at all costs. The heaviest handle turned out to be the aluminum one, weighing 90 grams. Magnesium saved 1/3 of the weight and weighed 60 grams, and plastic was half of aluminum, weighing 45 grams. This did not satisfy the engineers from Stuttgart.
Collectively, they decided to look to nature for inspiration and chose… mahogany. The beautifully turned ball crowning the gear shift in the aforementioned Porsche 908/03 Spyder weighed only 24 grams, or 70 percent less than its aluminum counterpart.
A brilliant idea from the brilliant mind of Ferdinand PiëchThe obsession with weight was instilled in Porsche by none other than Ferdinand Piëch – the legendary designer and creator of the Volkswagen empire. After being promoted to development director in 1965, Piëch began obsessively searching for efficiency in aerodynamics and weight savings in his designs. A good example is one of his projects, which resulted in an engine with an increased power of 80 hp and a simultaneous reduction in weight of 50 kg. He looked for savings everywhere, even in the least expected places. The pinnacle of this philosophy was the 908/03 racing car, which earned the nickname "Weasel" (German for weasel) due to its agility and ease in changing directions.
Porsche 911 Carrera T 2025 / press materialsIn 1967, the rule on the minimum weight in the Hill Climb competitions was abolished. Engineers, based on the experience gained during the starts in this difficult field of motorsport, began to wonder where to get the extra kilograms from in long-distance cars. The aforementioned Porsche 908/03 Spyder had a three-liter, eight-cylinder boxer engine with 350 hp under the hood, and thanks to all the slimming treatments it weighed only 545 kilograms (the plastic bodywork alone weighed 12 kg). With such parameters, winning the winding Targa Florio and Nürburgring 1000 km was just a formality. Both in Sicily and in Germany they took the two highest places on the podium in sensational style.
Porsche 911 Carrera T 2025 / press materialsIn the following years, a mandatory minimum weight of 650 kg was introduced for the cars, which was over 100 kg more than the Porsche 908/03 Spyder weighed. Wooden gear knobs disappeared from the cars from Stuttgart for many years.
The sentimental return took place only in 2002, when the beautiful knob, no longer made of mahogany, but of walnut, adorned the interior of the Porsche Carrera GT – a wonderful sports car with a centrally located, uniquely sounding V10 engine.
In the current configurators on the Porsche website, we will also find a model with a wooden gear shift knob – this is the Carrera T, which refers to the ascetic models of the past, and is the second lightest 911 (apart from the GT3 RS track model) from the standard offer.
