Hello fellow Speedster nuts.
I thought now would be a good time to pay homage to one of the all time great backyard Porsche pushers (at least so far as I know,,,,,,,,,) in California, and maybe the whole dang country.
Harald Von Keszycki (Von K).
I had scoured the internet searching for information on Von K, and found scant little. I wanted to find out if the man was still living first of all, and try to make contact with him. You see many years ago, when I was still a teenager, I met him at a Porsche Owners Club Time Trial event at Riverside Raceway, Riverside, CA. He was driving the most badass radical looking, (and sounding) 1958 Porsche Speedster that one could image at that time. Oh, did I mention it had a freakin 904 engine stuffed in it's backside! And 911S disc brakes all around! And 10" wide mags, with Goodyear Slicks inside lightly swelled rear fender wells! Sweet!
I soon came to learn that in the POC, Southern Cal Region in the late 1960s, there were all the other members who owned 356s, and then there was Von K. Von K was an honest to God rocket scientist, whose hobby-passion was tweaking his Speedster to get every last nano-HP out of it, so he could run FTD at every POC Time Trial he entered. And he usually did.
Early in the 1970s, Von K determined that he had reached the limits of his imagination in modifying his Speedster. There just was no bigger engine to pack into the confines of a 356 backend, and Harald wanted to move to a mid-engine setup. So he decided to let someone else enjoy the Speedster, and he stepped up to a 1971 Kremer Bros 914-6 with a proud racing pedigree that he picked up while on vacation in Germany. That car has been chronicled a few places in the web, so I won't dwell on it here.
My intent is to talk about the Speedster, and anything else that comes to mind. You see I was the guy who bought Von K's Speedster, ( and the dumbs**t) who later sold it! Yeah, like many of you, I owned a killer Speedster, and sold it, way back when they weren't worth crap compared to today. Oh yeah, it was my second Speedster, and I had a 1960 Roadster, and a 1965 Cabriolet too. If I had all those soft top bathtub Porsches today I'd have enought money to replenish all the money I lost this year in the stock market!
All I have are some photos of the cars from my youngmanhood, and some great memories. And, the pictures aren't real good, and my memory isn't what it used to be either.
I am hoping some of you out in the world wide web will stumble on this blog, and share some stories with me, and others who love old Speedsters.
Please do,
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