If you could have the car you drove to high school prom back, would you want it? Would it be as cool as Marco’s 914-6? I drove a rusty 1991 Ford Mustang convertible to my prom, so he’s definitely got me beat. This white mid-engine beauty is an impressive beast of a Porsche, now running a 2.5-liter twin-plug flat-six engine pumping out about 220 horsepower. That’s certainly a lot of fun in the back seat (maybe not the kind you’d normally expect on prom night, but I’ve already said too much).
Marco, who now spends his days working on Porsches at TLG Auto in North Hollywood, California, had this 914 in high school, but sold it a while back. More recently, the person he sold it to offered to sell it back to him without wheels, engine, or interior. He jumped at the chance, being that the 914 still featured the close-ratio gearbox he loved all those years ago. Restarting a car build from a familiar platform essentially as a blank slate must have been a truly exhilarating experience for Marco, and one most of us will never get to experience.
In the below video, Matt Farah of The Smoking Tire, takes Marco’s 914 for a spin north of Los Angeles. The 914’s mid-engine chassis is competent and honestly quite advanced for the early 1970s, beating a number of more expensive cars on the road and the race track. The four-cylinder models are a joy to drive, but if you fit the engine compartment with a hot flat-six, you’re bound to surprise yourself with an incredibly modern driving experience. Aside from the notchy and not-at-all-responsive 901-style gearbox, which Matt has plenty of his own trouble with in the video, these cars are an absolute dream to drive. As Marco says, you could easily daily-drive this car, even in LA traffic, and never get sick of it. Which is why he does just that.