Legend Porsche 917 Surfaces at Mecum's

Walking into the main auction arena at Mecum's Indianapolis Auction, the first thing you'll see is the 1968 Lotus Type 56. It's a turbine-powered, Ferguson Formula masterpiece and it looks a good deal like a giant, hyper-orange pinewood derby car. Located just 50 feet away is a Porsche 917/10.
It's a car so perfectly insane that Can-Am more or less banned the damned things. That's notable because at the time, Can-Am was about as close to a no-holds-barred racing series as anyone ever got.

After Mark Donohue won every race of the 1973 season, save for one, in a 1580-hp version of the 917, the SCCA fun police stepped in and introduced a 3-mpg minimum fuel-economy rule. The 917 would see one race in 1974.

This particular car is a 1972 Porsche 917/10. It sports a 5.0-liter, twin-turbo V12 making about 850 hp. It carries the L&M Cigarettes livery, a big No. 6 and Serial No. 917.10.003. That all means that it won the 1972 Can-Am Championship in the hands of George Follmer. Mecum expects that it will set a world record for a porker sold at auction. We'll have to wait until Mecum's Monterey sale in August to find out.

Source:
autoweek.com