The X---- Porsche cars

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The 1955 edition of the Le Mans 24 hours will be remembered in the memory as the year where a Mercedes race number 20 driven by Pierre Levegh surprised by the wrong manouver of an Austin Healey wanting to go back to the pitch, lost control of his car and went into the crowd
The Mercedes had a magnesium body who took fire immediately
84 spectators were killed and several hundred injured
Despite the gravity of this crash, the race comitee decided to leave the race continue
Mercedes Benz team immediately retired from the race their 3 remaining cars who were leading
21 cars finish the race out of the 60 starting

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Once again DB the DB team had to suffer of a very fragile engine and only one car finish the race 16th overall and first in class less than 0.750 L
On the below pic Claude Storez congratuled his team mate Louis Cornet

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For Claude it was a pity that he did not compete in the 1955 24 hours race with the official Porsche team
Indeed Porsche KG was there with a very strong team of 6 off 550

Car race number 37 driven by Helmut Polensky/Richard von Frankenberg finish 4th overall and first in class 1.5 L but also won the indice de perforance
Porsche KG also achieved a very good 4th 5th and 6 th overall
On the below pic car race number 37 share the victory with the winning J

aguar of Mike Hawthorn/Igor Bueb

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A week after the Le Mans 24 hours race (June 19th) Claude fly to Tunis for the Tunis GP always to do publicity for Auguste Veuillet
He drove his 550 to the 3rd place overall and 1st in class 1.5 L
I havenot found any Storez pic on this race, only the first row at the start
The race was won by Louis Rosier on a Ferrari 750, in front of another Ferrari

[Porschinelle]

My memory left me down
The Fench pilot Louis Rosier won the Bougie GP not the Tunis one
The 2 Ferrari were drove by 2 Italian pilots (Tunisia is just in front of Italy on the other side of the Mediterranean sea, when Algeria is in front of France and Marocco in front of Spain)
Now more interesting by mid August, Claude Storez always pushed by Auguste Veuillet, obtain the right to drive a factory 550 in the Liege Rome Liege race from August 17th to August 21 st
For the occasion he was teaming with another French pilot Alexandre Gacon
Alexandre Gacon was also a good friend of Auguste Veuillet and was running the Porsche agency for Lyon

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Liege Rome Liege also called "Le Marathon de la route" was raced from 1931 to 1960
From 1961 to 1964 the race became Liege Sofia (Bulgaria) Liege as racing on open roads had become too dangerous in Italy and in France
From 1965 to 1971 the Marathon de la Route was raced on the Nurburgring race track in the form of a 86 hours non stop race on the 22 km long original track


On the above map representing the 1954 path, cars leave Liege to go to Rome via the French Jura and Alps Mountain and then cross the Alps mountain to drive toward Rome along the coast and then go back to Liege by the Mille Miglia road and back to France and finally to Liege
3500 km without any rest ie 3 days minimum on the road with stop only to refuel and maintenance

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What I describe above was the 1955 road according to the map below



The 1954 route was even longer : 5600 km in 4 days
Departure Liege Germany Austria then Italy in the dolomites mountain, road to Rome via Brescia and the Mille Miglia roads, back to Liege via France
Cars were parked inside the "Palais des Princes Eveques de Liege" and were leaving 3 by 3 at 1 minute intervals
The average speed was low from 50 to 70 km per hour but the roads were narrow and the normal traffic was not interupted during the race
In average less than 1/3rd of the staring cars arrived

[Porschinelle]

Due to their legendary fiability the Porsche 356 have always perform well in such a difficult race :
In 1952 Helmut Polensky/Werner Schlutter won for the first time for Porsche
For that race due a shortage of factory cars, they were driving Gilberte Thirion Gmund 356 SL 061, after a complete up grading in the Porsche plant to factory race car level
The below pic represent Gilberte Thirion congratulating both plots after the arrival

1952 final classification


24 cars only

24 cars did arrived
Porsche cars achieved 1-3-9 and 10

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Gilberte Thirion Gmund SL with the famous 1211 plate in action, famous pic who was turn into a Dunlop tyres poster



and also a well known trophee

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Gilberte Thirion Gmund SL with the famous 1211 plate in action, famous pic who was turn into a Dunlop tyres poster



and also a well known trophee

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1954 was again a great year for Porsche with a second victory for Helmut Polensky but this time with Herbert Linge as co pilot



33 cars finish the race
Porsche 1-3-8-9-10-11-18-20-31

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The 1954 classification show a team Storez Chanal as third
I am very surprised as nowhere in Claude Storez biography this 3rd very good place in such a hard race is mentionned
Below Linge Polensky pic who did not show correctly before

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Anyway as said before 1955 is the year where Claude Storez drive a factory bright new 550 ( for all its other races in a 550 it was a personnal Veulliet car)
On this pic already pic Storez Gacon 550 (car race number 6) is seen on the starting line with cars race number 4 and 5 ( a Simca Aronde and a Peugeot 203)


Storez/Gacon in action

It was a very hard race both for the French team and the 550 who was no longer bright new at the arrival

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Overall despite 8 Porsches into the 56 finishing cars 1955 was not a too good year for Porsche with 19-20-26-33 (Storez Gacon)40-47-48 and 50