Jerry Seinfeld’s Porsche collection
is phenomenal ( from gq)
Comedian Jerry Seinfeld likes coffee, puffy shirts and Porsches… not necessarily in that order. Here are ten of his best (Porsches, not shirts)
By Paul Henderson 29 April 2020
Rather than talk about his car collection, we could easily have celebrated Jerry Seinfeld’s birthday by talking about the garage in which he keeps his automobiles. Back in 1999, a year after the two-part “finale” of the Seinfeld show, Jerry shelled out more than $1 million for a New York brownstone at 183 West 83rd Street with the intention of turning the former plumbing business into the home of his prized
Porsches.
Close to his Central Park West home and spread over three floors, it took five years to transform the building that includes subterranean parking for some (although not all) of his collection, as well as 850 square feet of living space so he can eat and sleep next to his favourite ones. He even has a small support team to keep all the cars ticking over and ready to roll just in case he gets the urge to nip out for a coffee with his comedian pals (you’ve seen that show, right?).
However, despite the odd caffeine fix with his funny friends, Jerry likes to keep the details of his collection on the down-low. There is plenty of speculation as to what he has – and his decision to auction off 18 cars back in 2016 (the final price tag was $22m. “Thank you, insane car people,” was Seinfeld’s response) confirmed quite a few of them – but one thing we definitely do know is that he is mad about Porsches. Old ones, new ones, police ones… you name it, Jerry probably owns (or has owned) it. So to celebrate his 66th birthday, we picked out ten of the best from his collection.
Because in the words of Tom Cruise, from the movie Risky Business, inspired by the old advert, “Porsche… there is no substitute.”
1949 Porsche 356/2 Gmünd
Of the 52 “356” factory cars produced by Porsche over two years in an old sawmill in the Austrian town of Gmünd, number 40 belongs to Jerry Seinfeld. Hand-built and hand-hammered into shape out of aluminium, the 356 was made using mostly VW parts and Jerry’s is completely original. Yes, really. Rear-engined and rear-wheel drive (it’s a Porsche, so get used to that detail), it is in essence ground zero for the 911. “I love it because, to me, it looks like a little alien flying saucer,” Jerry explained.
1955 Porsche 550 Spyder
Although this car has the rather macabre claim to fame that it was the same model James Dean was driving when he was killed, the Porsche 550 Spyder is a special car. One of only 75 ever made, this 1.5-litre mid-engined machine produced 110bhp, had a top speed of 140mph and was Porsche’s first purpose-built race car where it earned the nickname the “giant killer” for its on-track heroics. Jerry’s 550, which he sold at auction for $5.3m in 2016, is considered to be one of the finest examples still in existence because it was only raced a handful of times and was never involved in any serious accidents. “You can’t drive a sonnet by Shakespeare or a symphony by Beethoven,” Seinfeld said before parting with it. “But this would be the automotive equivalent.”
1958 Porsche 356A 1500 GS/GT Carrera Speedster
This is a version of the very first classic car Jerry got and it was all because of Jay Leno. “I bought my first Speedster in 1991, after looking through a Hemmings magazine in your kitchen,” he told Leno. “I bought it because I thought it was pretty.” Built for racing, GS/GT Carrera Speedsters didn’t come with any onboard luxuries – not even a heater, hence its nickname “the icebox” – or even sound proofing. They were simple, stripped-back, lightweight machines made to go fast. “If I could only have one sports car it would be a Speedster,” Jerry continued. “Steve McQueen had one of these, James Dean raced one… it is minimalist, the essence of sports car perfection.”
1964 Porsche 911
The very first production 911, Jerry owns the version that was built for Ferry Porsche (the son of Porsche’s founder) himself, who specified a sunroof, leather seats and metallic paint. It was the first 911 imported to the United States and, having bought the car in 1996 for a whopping $400,000, Seinfeld sent it to the Porsche factory in Zuffenhausen for a full restoration using original parts and after nearly two years and a bill for $250,000, he got it back. It was definitely worth the wait.
1966 Porsche 356 SC Cabriolet (Polizei)
Courtesy of Netflix
“Who do you think you are… Jerry Seinfeld?” One of only ten Porsche Cabs built for the Dutch police force (which is slightly weird because on the front of Jerry’s car it says “Polizie”, as opposed to the Dutch “Rijkspolitie”, but maybe we’re overthinking it), just imagine if you were a bank robber in Holland in 1966 and during your getaway you saw this car in your review mirror. You wouldn’t bother, would you? The Dutch police drivers who used these cars in high-speed pursuits were well trained, had to be very fit, have excellent driving skills, be at least 25 years old and married. Presumably so they didn’t get carried away and upset their wives by crashing. Jerry’s Polizei version was the last of the 356s produced and featured in an episode of Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee when he picked up Barry Marder (he was later released without charge).
1970 Targa Florio-winning Porsche 908/03 (chassis number 008)
Jamie Pham Photography / Alamy Stock Photo
Designed by Porsche to specifically compete in two World Sportscar Championship endurance races on two tracks (how very Porsche!) – the Targa Florio and the Nürburgring Nordschleife – it was lightweight, featured perfect weight distribution (45-55) and a radical 30cm overhand on the front. In its prototype days it was dubbed the “VW bus” because of the driver’s upright sitting position and the pedals being so close to the front of the car, and some of the test pilots complained… until they saw their lap times. After that, they stopped grumbling. With its iconic Gulf colours and racing pedigree, no wonder Jerry described the 908 as his most treasured possession.
1973 Porsche 911 Carrera RS
“Ask anyone who has ever driven one of these and they will tell you the same thing,” Seinfeld explained. “There is something about this car that feels perfect.” Taking its name from the 356 Carreras of the 1950s, Porsche developed it as a pure racing car, but, to legitimise its production, the FIA insisted the German manufacturer had to mass- produce at least 500 for the road. So 1,580 were made, featuring a 2.7- litre horizontally opposed, six-cylinder engine with 210bhp, complete with that design defining “ducktail” spoiler, flared arches and uprated brakes and suspension. It is a work of art, a driver’s dream, and impossible not to notice… unless you happen to be driving a BMW in the Hamptons and you are trying to parallel park. “I was sitting on a bench, having coffee with a friend,” Seinfeld told a New York newspaper in 2014. “We watched as a middle-aged woman in a new, white BMW put her car in reverse and drove straight back into my car, smashing and damaging it. We could hear the sound of metal
crunching – rare, classic, expensive, vintage metal, by the way – from across the street. A sickening sound to a car person.
“I was furious. I ran across the street, out of my mind, and yelled at her, ‘You just crashed into my car!’ Her reply was, ‘Well, I couldn’t see it.’ She didn’t seem to understand why I would be upset… so I went home and put my head under the covers.” Like Sue Ellen from Seinfeld, who walked around in just a bra, the BMW driver was clearly a menace to society.
1986 Porsche 959
culture-images GmbH / Alamy Stock Photo
The story of the Porsche 959 is a curious one. Development began in 1981 using the ubiquitous 911 as the base as the company’s chief engineer, Helmuth Bott, pushed for an all-wheel driver “super 911” to see just how far Porsche could take its legendary sports car with a view
to it competing in Group B rallies. After years of development and technological boundary pushing, the much-hyped supercar was finally released in 1986 with a 444bhp flat-six turbocharged engine and a street-legal top speed of 197mph. On any street, that is, except those in the United States, where the car was forbidden from driving on public roads. Only 337 were ever made and when Jerry snapped his white model up it cost him around $700,000… a snip for a car he can’t drive on the road. It is lovely to look at, though.
2000 Porsche Carrera GT Prototype
Although Jerry tried (and failed) to sell his Carrera GT prototype at his auction in 2016, that doesn’t mean it’s a dud. Far from it. Porsche produced 1,270 of these mid-engined hypercars between 2004 and 2007, but Jerry’s is one of only two fully functioning prototypes built in 2000. He also had a 2004 GT, but sold it in 2011. Sadly, the Carrera GT is also infamous for being the car Fast & Furious star Paul Walker died
behind the wheel of in 2013.
2014 Porsche 918 Spyder
Sean Gallup
When Porsche magazine asked Jerry in 2018 what three things he would take with him to a desert island, he replied, “A 356 Speedster, a 964 Carrera RS and a 918 Spyder.” So we thought we’d finish with that. A mid-engined hybrid hypercar, it has a 4.6-litre V8 engine, backed up with two electric motors, that can produce 874bhp and carry the car from 0-62mph in 2.6 seconds, before reaching a top speed of 214mph. As Jeremy Clarkson said when he reviewed it for the Sunday Times the year it came out, “All I can tell you is this: this Porsche is one of the three fastest cars in the world. It has satnav and air-con and carpets. And driven carefully it can do 94 miles to the gallon.” Presumably Jerry has an EV plug in that Manhattan garage of his…
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