Ok — I get it – Print Media is dead. Things that were required back then, or at least expected, when I first Joined PCA in 1971 are just no longer available, Everyone had a subscription to Road and Track and Car and Driver. ( and a dozen others depending on your various passions) Those of us who followed racing and wanted our news that was only 10 days or less old subscribed to a weekly newspaper, Competition Press / Autoweek. On Sundays Cameron Dewer ( yes – as in the Scotch ) had an automotive column in the Boston Globe Automotive section. Most of it is now gone. Who needs 6 week old reports on races like the 24 hours of Le Mans when you can watch them live on TV with things like in car cameras and see more than if you actually attended the race in person. I can personally attest that being a Crew Member for a 935 Team at 3 AM at a cold rainy 24 Hours of Daytona is not really quite as much fun as you might imagine.
But there is Print Media that is still hanging on. Panorama for one, Not quite the same as when Betty-Jo ran it with Len doing the principal Photography, but Pano is now a much more refined and Professional publication that deserves your full attention every month.
All of which brings me to the point of this column. At this years Winter Warmer I picked up a copy of Christophorus. For those of you unfamiliar with Christophorus , It is the official Porsche Publication published quarterly. In ten different Languages. It’s available by subscription. 24 Euros a year payable by credit card on the Porsche web site. Subscription | Porsche Christophorus
…… which is a whole lot easier than when I first subscribed. Then you sent a check payable in Deutschmarks in one those thin Blue overseas airmail envelopes to an address written in German, hopefully spelled and formatted correctly. Somewhere along the line I allowed My subscription to lapse. I just resubscribed.
The current issue ( # 413 Q4 2024) includes a driving report of a trip from Vietnam to Mongolia in a 911 Dakar, a story on 25 years of GT3’s, a fascinating and candid interview with Oliver Blume the Chairman of the Board of Porsche AG. Another road trip story driving 4 difference Taycans 2,700 miles Stuttgart to Istanbul with details on charging times, energy use using the Porsche charging Planner
If you’re not quite ready for the full Christophorus experience in glorious print on premium paper you just go to the web site Porsche Christophorus for the web version of the same content. But, trust me. the print version is the better choice.
More random Things
Here a link to t an interesting You Tube Porsche adventure I Bought a Half Price Used Porsche Taycan and Drove it 2,300 Miles Home In Winter! – TheSmokingTIre . Matt purchases a used Taycan Cross Turismo – a 2 year old – under 20,000 Porsche for 50% off the Original MSRP! In Detroit And then proceeses to immediately drive it home to LA in the middle of Winter. What could possibly Go wrong with that plan as the old saying goes. Well — amazingly nothing did. Instead he spends most of the time praiseing the performance of the Built-in Travel Planner app to minimize recharging times.
And here’s another You Tube series along the Same lines. Racing From Seattle To Boston In The Best Road Tripping EVs! The Cross Country I-90 Surge – Pt. 1/4 A four part series of 8 different EV’s on a cross country Trip. You can probably guess which one came out as the best of the bunch.
Ted Shaw
