Gerhard Küchle

He flies under the radar of even the most ardent of fans, but Gerhard Ktichle brought decades-long success to countless Porsche race cars all over the world, as Total 911 explores...

- Kieron Fennelly

Gerhard Küchle hails from Münchingen in Stuttgart's northwest suburbs where his father had a carpentry business. Rather than following in this father's footsteps, the young Gerhard had a distinctly mechanical bent and joined the local Opel specialist, Auto Staiger, where he completed his three-year technician's certificate.

Yet the pull of Porsche only a couple of miles away proved irresistible and in 1965, at the age of 22, he took himself off to Zuffenhausen. Perhaps an even greater incentive was Porsche's football team, where Gerhard quickly became a regular player. One man he played against was a certain Martin Winterkorn from nearby Leonberg - later boss of VW Group - who also aspired, it seems, to work for Porsche.

Gerhard attracted the attention of Herbert Linge, who recognised that this young fellow's talent and enthusiasm weren't just confined to the football pitch, and put him in the production department.

That lasted only three months, says Gerhard, but at a time when events were moving fast even by Porsche's standards, he says his career seemed to be taking off because he was offered a position in the testing department. Within a year of arriving at Zuffenhausen, he'd been despatched to the Nürburgring where Hans Herrmann was testing Ferdinand Piech's new baby: the 906. Although he didn't know it then, this marked the start of Porsche's assault for outright victory at Le Mans.

The 906 raced first with the Carrera 2.0-litre flat six. Later this was expanded to 2.2 litres and eight cylinders. Gerhard describes how he was trained on both engines and how the young mechanics were split into two groups to work on each engine.