It is our pleasure to present this exceedingly rare 1986 Porsche 944 Turbo Cup finished in Guards Red. Available through Porsche’s Sonderwunsche Special Wishes Department by only a few select dealers, the M752 944 Turbo, “Club Sport” or “Turbo Cup”, was the very first Porsche built at Weissach with the intentions of Cup racing. While visually similar to its standard road-going counterpart, the 944 Turbo Cup was anything but, featuring a larger KKK K26-8 turbocharger, a magnesium intake manifold and oil pan, a reinforced transmission, upgraded suspension, larger brakes, and a special lightweight interior. Campaigned across France, Germany, South Africa, and North America, the Turbo Cup cars represent a very special and important piece in Porsche's illustrious motorsport history.
One of the first of what would eventually become a total of 200 examples ever produced, this PMNA/ Al Holbert delivered M752 Turbo Cup was originally slated for use in the 1986 SCCA SSGT and SCCA Pro Playboy/ World Challenge. Later a participant in the IMSA Firestone Firehawk Challenge, this Turbo Cup lays claim to back-to-back wins at the 12 Hours of Sebring in 1992-93. It was sold to renowned Porsche enthusiast Lloyd Hawkins in 1988 and campaigned until its last racing season in 1994. Following its decommission from motorsport, the car was meticulously restored to factory road-going specification in 1995. This Turbo Cup was later acquired by Matthew Drendel in 2008 as an integral part of a world-class Porsche Motorsports collection. It was acquired by our seller in 2021 and benefits from extensive recent servicing including replacement of the timing belt, balance shaft belt, tensioners, and spark plugs. Among the finest and undoubtedly most successful examples of these racers surviving today, this authentic, road-legal, and registered 944 Turbo Cup is being offered for auction out of Connecticut with just under 21k miles showing on the odometer.
This Turbo Cup is finished in Guards Red and shares the external appearance of the standard 944 Turbo with revisions including a fiberglass hood with hood pins, Cup-specific manually operated mirrors, a sunroof delete, and additional seam-welds throughout the length of the unibody chassis. A restoration of the car to its stock configuration in 1995, detailed images are provided in the photo gallery. Factory staggered-width 16" Fuchs forged alloy wheels come dressed in a set of Pirelli Cinturato P7 tires with approximately 80% tread remaining.
The cabin is upholstered in black and fitted with a bolted-in multi-point Matter roll cage and a single fixed position Recaro hardback racing seat with a six-point safety harness. The air conditioning, power windows, power mirrors, central locking system, and sound system are omitted from the cabin for the purpose of weight savings. Special lightweight carpeting, basic door panels, and a fully manual standard passenger seat are unique interior attributes of the 944 Turbo Cup. The condition of the interior is described to be in excellent condition with limited wear. The seller reports all instrumentation, lights, and electrical features to be working properly.
The 944 Turbo Cup derives approximately 300 HP from a Weissach-tuned M44/51 2.5L engine. The motor’s internals are hand-selected by Weissach technicians and feature a magnesium intake and sump, a K26-8 turbocharger, and remapped ECU. Power is fed to the rear wheels through a special close-ratio G01 manual transmission, with reinforced synchros and a limited-slip differential. Compared with the standard model, the Turbo Cup utilizes adjustable front struts and rear sway bars, strengthened rear torsion arms and strut towers, hard rubber suspension mounts, special rear shocks with extra springs and a front strut cross-brace over the engine. The brakes are of a unique design using calipers similar to that used on the 928 S4, larger rotors, and 959-specification brake pads. Weighing in at just over 2,580 lbs., the Turbo Cup can accelerate from 0-60 MPH in approximately 4.5 seconds. Recent service by Vantage Motorsports included replacement of the timing belt, balance shaft belt, roller, tensioners, thermostat seal ring, spark plugs, an oil change, coolant flush, and thorough inspection. A corresponding invoice is provided in the gallery along with additional maintenance records. Drivers of this Turbo Cup throughout the years are said to have included:
This sale will include historical correspondence and photographs, previous title documents, and a Porsche Certificate of Authenticity. A coveted Weissach-built car with a long and illustrious heritage, the 944 Turbo Cup is one of the finest expressions of Porsche’s four-cylinder designs. Suitable for HSR, Historic Racing, Porsche Invitational events, PCA events as well as casual weekend drives, this titled-from-new factory racer with pedigree is not to be overlooked.
*We encourage any interested parties to use this time for arranging pre-sale inspections or viewings.
Comments (30)
Sold for $125,000
Offer in the amount of $125,000
Offer in the amount of $95,000
@Schwik its active in the DEALTANK, may end in 10 days though
Confused by the listing. It has ended? Or ends in 10 days?
Hi gblue
Please get in touch with me. Best
Street legal factory built race cars and not many made.
This is gonna be very good at the end! Everyone better be ready!
Bid in the amount of $82,250
@Silver930 and very few of these Cup cars retain their matching numbers engine.
Photos of this vehicle's engine number have been added to the listing gallery.
@jcbfff We can confirm that the car is numbers matching. We have submitted pictures to the site that confirm that it matches with the CoA
Bid in the amount of $82,000
CultivatedCollector sorry if I missed it in another thread but is the engine block original and if not what number is in it? Thanks
The 8" and 9" x 16 Fuchs are probably worth about $9000 to $10,000 alone these days.
@Ferry Please feel free to shoot us a PM!
Bid in the amount of $80,000
@CultivatedCollector If the new owner is interested, he can contact me. I have an original Cup exhaust system incl. catalysator.
With just under one day remaining, we appreciate the productive discourse relating to the history of the Turbo Cup - clearly some informed enthusiasts out there following these great cars and their subtle nuances!
As noted in the listing description, the car is equipped with the K26-8 turbocharger, as well as additional factory modifications for the Turbo Cup including, but not limited to, both a magnesium intake manifold as well as the magnesium oil sump & pan.
@jcbfff - The exhaust system is present with a central resonator and rear muffler, a catalytic converter is not present on the car as it sits. We encourage checking with your local DMV to confirm smog compliance and additional inspection. That said, we believe the car will be legal within most jurisdictions within the United States. The car has a valid US title in the state of Louisiana and will be sold on the Louisiana title with a valid CT-Q1 from our dealership.
@Ferry I am talking about Turbo Cups as well. The 1987 North American Turbo Cups are the Rarest only 11 made.
The
@Silver930 When I´m talking about rarest, I mean 944 Turbo Cup cars. And those late 1989 models, which was builed only for the French Cup, are the rarest.
@Ferry You make some good point on the later 87 and later Turbo Cups not sure on on the magnesium intakes for 1986 I think they may have also had them ?
With regards to the rarest I think the 1987 Escort Turbo Cups for North America are the rarest with only 9 sent to USA and 2 to Canada for 1987 for a total of 11 North America cars.
ABS brakes are fast I bet and the 87 and up cars yes had ABS that you can turn on or off in cabin dash switch. As far a collectable all these Cup cars are and with the "Race history" this particular Turbo Cup has it for sure. Good luck with the sale.
Hi
This is a nice 1986 944 TC. There are a lot of upgrates from the later model biginning in 1987.
One one hand it´s usefull if you want to race the car. But on the other hand, for a collector, the car is in some point not as original.
Only from 1987 on the 944 TC had, magnesium mainfold, lager turbo chager with 250 HP, cooling system for the transmission, fibergals hood and the rollcage changed from alloy to steel. Also non of the cup cars was delivered with powersteering! But the most important differenc between 1986 and the following years, until 1989, is the race ABS with large brake calipers, bigger, thicker and cross drilled brake discs. Also significant for cars from 1987 on are the 8 and 9" white magnesium wheels. The 944 Turbo Cup was the first race car equiepped with ABS. Peter Oberndorfer won the first ever race with ABS at Bruenn (former Czechoslovakia). ABS equiepped cars are up to 8 sec. faster! So this car is for a collector. But if you want to beat the 964 Cup cars, you need a model from 1987 until the last production year for 944 TC in 1989. Only those cars in 1989, delivered to the French Cup, had 290 HP. It is well known that this French 944 Cup cars are the rarest and most appreciated. Good luck and the lucky winner should keep this restored car in the garage.
Is it street legal in all 50?
Beautiful car.
Bid in the amount of $60,944
Bid in the amount of $55,000
Hello all! We are thrilled to be offering this incredibly special and important part of Porsche's deep motorsport history during PCar Market's Virtual Amelia Island. As the auction goes, we are happy to answer any and all questions that might arise.
@coastalview - thanks for catching that, we have reached out to the PCar Market team to have them update the listing accordingly to note it is a full bolt-in Matter roll cage.
@Silver930 - We've seen some sources note 250HP as well as 300HP. Our butt dyno leads us to believe that Chassis 154076 is closer to the 300HP mark - it is no slouch!
May want to confirm “ fitted with a fully welded-in multi-point Matter roll cage”
Photo 103 clearly shows nut and bolt construction. Best regards
Special car here and nicely presented. I do not think the early Turbo Cups had 300hp out of the gates but around 225 but with a different chip 300hp was easy to get out of them.
The Fuchs wheels are 8" x 16 in Front with 951 part #s and the Rear are off a 930 and should be 9 x 16" everything about these cars are unique.