In my last Total 911 column, I mentioned at the 24 Hours of Daytona in 1969, all five factory Porsche 908 Long Tails were forced to retire from the race. The first problem with the engine at Daytona was the titanium drive shaft connecting the crankshaft to the timing gears broke.
On the Monday morning after Daytona, Rico Steinemann, the Porsche team manager, came to me and said, “Brian, do you wish to be Number 1 in your own car and you choose your co-driver, or will you go as Number 2 to Jo Siffert? I thought about it for quite a bit. I thought boy, if I go as Number 2 to Siffert, I will get none of the press and none of the plaudits… however, I think we will win more races. So, I said yes, I’ll go as Number 2 to Jo Siffert. It proved to be absolutely the right decision as together we won five out of the ten races for Porsche in the International Championship of Makes. Effectively, Jo Siffert and I won the World Championship for Porsche in 1969.