1979 Porsche 935/77A #40 (LM24)

Kyosho 1/64

Series: 1979 Le Mans 24 Hours
Class: Gr.5+2.0
Team: Porsche Kremer Racing
Drivers: Laurent Ferrier, Francois Servanin, Francois Trisconi
Result: 3rd overall, 2nd in Gr.5+2.0

Now I am not really super familiar with the differences of most of the Porsche 935 versions. The actual #40 car that raced in the 1979 Le Mans was a 935/77A while this casting seems to be just a regular 935 which I think is also called as the 935/76. The 1979 Le Mans was actually kind of unique in that there were practically no factory entries other than a couple of Porsche 936's. This made the cars the favorites to win the race and this actually reminds me a little of the 2006 Le Mans where the Audi returned as a factory team with their diesel Audi R10's and they faced no other factory teams. Back to the 1979 race, the 936's qualified first and second but after a few hours, both cars would face issues that would lose them a significant amount of time in the pits. Other Group 6 cars like the Mirage-Fords would also face some issues.

With the Group 6 cars pretty much out of the equation, the Porsche 935's would start fighting for the lead. Eventually, the Porsche 936's were able to recover and one of them actually got to 3rd place. It was then the turn of the 935's to face issues. 2 of the top 5 running cars, both from the Gelo Sportswear team I believe, would retire due to some engine issues. This meant that the still running Porsche 936 would move up to 2nd. This wouldn't last too long however as the car would once again have issues and this time, it had to retire for good. This would mean that the leading car was now comfortably ahead of the 2nd place car, in fact, I believe it was ahead by more than 10 laps. It wasn't all smooth-sailing though as they would also face issues that lost them a huge amount of time which almost let the 2nd place Dick Barbour 935 to pass them. Unfortunately for the Barbour team, they would also face issues which pretty much made them concede the victory to the Kremer 935 K3. The #40 car was never really a factor in this race but it pretty much had a trouble-free run and it would finish 3rd.