duPont REGISTRY Talks: Reimagining Porsche Legends With Labeleven Backdated Builds

Discover the world of Labeleven backdated Porsches with Speedart Motorsports' James Hondros on duPont REGISTRY Talks. Explore craftsmanship, design, and legacy. Listen now!

Episode Transcript

(00:03):
Welcome to DuPont Registry Talks,
a new podcast from the homeof driving luxury since 1985.
Hello everyone and welcome to DuPontRegistry Talks presented by Petrolicious.
Joining me today is another eminentguest from our world of luxury,
exotic and classic cars.

(00:25):
Joining me today is James Hondros,
the CEO and founder of Speed ArtMotorsports and the American Importer
for Lab 11. How are you doing?
Hello. Good morning Charles.Thank you for having me.
Oh, thank you forjoining me. First of all,
just tell us a little bit about yourself,
your company speed up motor sports andthe cars and the racing that's been

(00:48):
a passion of your life fromthe start. It sounds like.
Wow,
allow me to answer the second part ofthe question in order to get to the first
one.
I belonged to a generationthat kids that were aspiring,
at least the ones with moreadventurers that were aspiring to be
footballers,

(01:09):
military EVAs or pilotsand race car drivers
without discountingtoday's youth. Actually,
I remember I had a conversation witha kid that came with his father in the
showroom. He was right around14 years old and I asked him,
what do you want to be when you growup? He told me an investment banker,

(01:30):
so I think that this newgener, this current generation,
they're smarter than us. Definitely.
I remember vividly myfather's disappointment when
I announced him that I would abandon myacademic studies to pursue more sports
as a driver. Unfortunately,

(01:50):
my ambitions, they exceededmy talents and my pocketbook,
but somehow I had to be around cars and
find a way supporting myself By doing so.
Fast forward after three decadesand representing ultra luxury
manufacturers and whatnot, I decidedto open SpeedArt rt Motorsports

(02:14):
March of 2018 and it is a dealership,
but my ambition was to create alittle hub for enthusiasts and
conures that we couldshare our passion and so
on. Unfortunately, the carbusiness is a customery business,
so we do have to sellcars. It is a business,

(02:38):
but we try to do that in a manner
in such a way that it,
it's really a labor of love what we do and
we try to
do manage very substantial collections.

(03:00):
We do buy and we sell cars.
And also Lab 11.
And also lab 11.
Tell us a little bit aboutthis amazing project.
Obviously it's a very German car.We can see it's right behind us,
but as an Italian flare angle to it,
tell us a little bit about thebackground behind the Lab 11 project.

(03:21):
Sure. Lab 11,
it's rather a young company. Itwas established in 2019 by Pinosa,
the founder of Lab 11.
Very passionate sistaLike they would say in Italy,
although he's Italian,
his love affair with Porsche and again the

(03:44):
infatuation usually with cars. As youknow, Charles starts at a very early age.
Of course you don't acquire that later on,
but Lab 11,
it is a project, a Lab 11 project that

(04:05):
it was started,
as I said before in 2019by Pinosa and his staff,
his daughter obviously, and
they are located. Lab 11 islocated outside Milan, about
20 kilometers outside Milanin the city of Pavia in the

(04:27):
countryside there was an allstate that has been transformed
to the Lab 11 workshop.
There is a showroom at theclassic STAD in Germany in
Frankfurt and there are obviously
different workshops that they help of

(04:51):
creating what you see in the background.
Because the Restomod industryhas really taken off,
hasn't it in the last couple of decades.
Yes, it have and
I think we should examine a littlebit talk about the rest remote
business. A lot of people, theythink that restomod is something new.

(05:13):
It's not restomod business is going on,
people are rest promotingcars for at least 50 years.
It started with a hot rod movement,
American cars later on with a muscle cars.
There was a lot of restalprojects and so on,
and as far as Porsche goes,

(05:34):
Rory started Omo in 356s that
you have the outlaw movement, thenyou have the art group P or so on,
but it was not done on, it willnot done on a manufacturing level.
Obviously technology has evolvedquite a bit from the seventies and the
eighties and now there is

(05:56):
more parts of availability, moreresources in order to do those cars.
But other than the rest mode,
which I would like inour case to call that
remanufacturing otherthan the Remo business,
what is very interesting

(06:18):
is the backdate aspect of thatand I would like to go back again
In the late seventies and the eightiesbefore the backdate we had post dating
for example cars from,
especially with Porsche carsfrom the seventies, the F series,
there were kids that you could buyand transform the cars To the G body

(06:42):
with the impact bumpers orso on and the flares and
I remember very well a couple of 73 RS
that they were transformedwith the impact bumpers
and the whale tail, whichI'm sure by now those cars,
they still survive due to thesignificance they have been taken back to

(07:04):
their original form. Butso you had post date.
Before.
Backdate and
if we take a look at itfor a moment, what happened
with a new millennium?
The design language so far wasalways forward and more istic.

(07:25):
As a matter of fact, we allthought in the eighties,
by the year 2000 we're going to haveflying cars with very photo touristic
designs or so on.
Hovering.
And it was the exact opposite effect and
backdating or retro designdid not really start

(07:46):
on an individual basis.They were manufacturers that they were doing if here,
especially here in the UnitedStates to be more exact.
In 2007 we had the Plymouth ProwlerThat it looked
like a hot road from the thirtiesand on mainstream we had Volkswagen
which did the Beatleand it was a design at

(08:08):
least the proportions of the car,
the design languageresembled the original bele.
Then in the year 2000,
we had BMW that it was more of
a retro futuristic, the Z eight,
which it was inspiredby the legendary 5 0 7,

(08:30):
but the best example,
it was the four GT in the year 2004,
which was the exact replica,
I mean exact replica within from thedesign standpoint of view inside and
outside of the original CT 40. Soit was really the manufacturers
and what we had, we hadwith a new millennium,

(08:53):
we start having severalnostalgia about the glory days of
motorsports,
the original designs ofsports cars or so on,
and a little bit in between
2000, 2005 I would say, and on

(09:13):
we had people start on again workshops,
start backdating cars.
Throwing it.
Back as the air movement
started becoming very popular andwas what I call the air craze.
They start backdatingPorsches, the nine elevens,

(09:37):
and it happened mostly with a
964. There are a couple,
I would say that there are a coupleof reasons for that. Number one,
obviously the iconic status of the car.
Who.
Would argue that nine 11is the longest design,
although the cars, they grew muchlarger and much heavier or so on,

(10:01):
but the design is there,
so number one,
it was obviously thedemand and appreciation
for the Oracle cars,
especially after Porschetook the water cooler
out in 1999 and it was very ripe

(10:23):
also because of the availablecars or what we call
the donor cars, the ninesix four series for example,
they were produced rightaround 64,000 cars between
1989 and 1994.
Then you have the 9 9 3 series witha total production of just about

(10:45):
68,000 cars,
which half of them they were the carratwos or the Carra fours variables
or so on,
and those are usually the donor cars
used to backdate and rest them mode or
remanufacture those cars.So we had the availability.

(11:09):
There's still a lot of cars.
Porsche claims that 70% of their cars,
they're still road worthy.I don't know exactly the analogy and
whatnot, but there
were quite honest cars that

(11:31):
talented engineers and designers that
could take upon backdating and rest,
mowing a car with Ferrarion the other hand,
and now we have
the restaurant market isgetting very saturated.

(11:52):
Let's be frank that, and it's notjust Porsche, I mean even Ferrari,
that Ferrari is supposedto be the sacrosanct.
There are stories that if someonewould modify their Ferrari,
Ferrari would not sell them theother car in UK or out of all places,
there is a new project that theirresting mowing three 50 fives.

(12:14):
We have a new projectby Lamborghini Diablo,
esto Mowing, so there are that, andobviously in Italy we have the Lancia,
the Alpha Romeos.
In UK you have Eagle that makes the type A
very tasteful, actuallymodification or so on. So

(12:38):
rest mowing and backdatingdefinitely has taken off and
we'll see what's goingto happen in the future.
I guess there's differentlevels of rest mod isn't there?
I think Lab 11 shoots forartisanal kind of perfection.
I guess tell us a little bit about justhow much effort goes into one of these

(12:58):
amazing creations.
We want to believe thatyes, the main thing about
Lab 11 obviously,
and again we're notthe only ones that lets
Amos paid the paid, we're not the onlyones that were passionate about the cars.
There are some very,

(13:19):
very gifted fabricators thatthey do some great great
cars and we all know
the singers and many other
engineers or manufacturers ifyou may say that they built

(13:39):
excellent cars.
Our main difference,
everything starts actually weuse while as I said before,
most of the backdate rest orderingof the nine 11 is based on the
9 64
During the initial conception we took into

(14:01):
consideration and at that timeactually pin and his team took
into serious consideration the 993 and
they could not avoid to
see the advantages of the 993 platform,

(14:23):
the 993,
it is more expensive tobackdate to begin with and
more complex.
The main advantages of the 993 platformbeing the last evolution of the are
called nine elevens. It would bethe rare multilink suspension,
obviously the original gear boxbeing the G 56 speed versus the

(14:46):
five speed on the 9 6 4 series and another
thing also a more precise steering,
many other details and anotherthing was the wider truck.
So we were able to accomplishthis wide loop. Our cars,
they're supposed to resemblethe F series specifically the

(15:07):
legendary ST of 1972
with a wide wing flaresfront and back, and so
that was also the wider track on the 993 was an advantage without altering the
geometry,
the overall geometry of the carAnd the characteristics of the car.

(15:28):
Obviously the US marketis absolutely huge.
Obviously very important for lab 11 toget involved and obviously did it with
you guys. How is thatlooking at the moment,
how's the landscape let's say ofthe American market for Lab 11?
Well, first of all, talkingabout the American market,

(15:50):
another thing and another differencethat I would like based on your question,
I would like to differentiateour cars without describing
anybody. Obviously itis that arrest modes.
They're only not onlyin the United States,
there are a lot of Remos in Europe andelsewhere now in Asia we see a little bit

(16:12):
of a movement, but in Europe,
the compliance, it isquite different while here,
especially on a car thatis 25 years or older,
other than EPA and right now notthat many states are left with
smoke control. For example,
in sunny FloridaThere is not smoke control anymore,

(16:35):
especially for vintage cars of 25 years or
older. So those cars,
they would not be eligiblefor road registration.
Most of the estimates that theyhappen in the United States,
they would not be eligibleto be driven in Europe
being a Brit that you have MOT, which is

(16:59):
a tough legislation battery and in
Germany you have two forwhat we call here TUV, and
it's not only theemissions, it is the safety.
It is the quality and evenif you change an engine,
when you modify cars youneed in Germany especially,

(17:23):
you need to do an extra inspection.
So it is much more difficult forthose cars to be legally driven on the
street.
So United States is more lenient
and obviously the demand in UnitedStates, let's not be kidding,
the demand is much greater than the restof the world, at least for the moment.

(17:47):
Of course. How does Lab 11balance that sort of ethos of the
heritage of a classic Porschewith the modern engineering
that goes into it?
Yes, this is,
I would like to make thata twofold answer of it.

(18:08):
We are trying to celebrateobviously the glory days of
nine 11,
especially the F seriesbetween 1964 with a famous
9 0 1 all the way to 73 with a
swung song of the 2.7. So

(18:32):
what we're trying to achieve,
we're trying to achieve a harmonybetween precision engineering,
a bold driving characteristics,
nostalgia and craftmanship, and
our main goal is to preserve

(18:52):
that ethos of the original design. Now,
I would be lying if I would tellyou it is an original, it's not,
and what we do,
we're selling or we're manufacturingrather than trying to sell a
certain filling,
We do not manufacture numbers,performance top speed,

(19:15):
zero to 60 RPMs and allof that stuff. However,
in order to create that feeling, yes,
you do need technology, youdo need performance, you do need all of that stuff.
So
sometimes what we seewith a lot of Omo cars,

(19:35):
and again, there is notright or wrong, there are
different taste and there isquite a variety of offerings out
there, but sometimes we seecars to being a little bit,
I would call over imagined
and although every car thatwe make it is a one-off,

(19:59):
either we make the caraccording to our fancy
or we have a client, a special commission,
but for the most part we do not deviate.
We do not deviate froma certain design aspect.
We have obviously numerousoptions from power

(20:20):
plant to the interiors to thecolors and all of that stuff,
but we're looking more fora more cohesive design and
I would like to say that there is,
I find certain carriage in simplicity
and it's sometimes we all get,

(20:41):
especially in the automobilebusiness, designing cars,
we all get a bit too creative and
we want to,
our formula it is to preserve
that particular feeling that willappeal to the modern driver with

(21:02):
few creature comfortsand of course better road
manners than the original cars.
Yeah. How about your originalconnection to Porsche?
Do you have a favorite model out ofthe range across all the years or a
particular build thatyou've delivered to really.

(21:23):
I can say this, I'm anequal opportunity offender
and guilty as charge. I like them all and
I would like to confess,
I was never a fan of Porschewhen I was growing up and again,
I did not have access to Ferraris,Lamborghinis or Maseratis,
but we mostly starteddoing hill climbing with

(21:47):
out of Yankee A Birds and
Veloza and few CIA fulviaor so on and back then,
especially on the
underground car scene in Italy, Porsche,
it was with the air ine. I mean itresembled too much a Volkswagen.

(22:12):
It was not, I wouldn't callthat as sexy as an Italian car,
at least that was the thing,and I had the opportunity,
I had an opportunity to drive a nine
11 around Misano in themid eighties, I'm sorry,
and I fell in love with that.

(22:33):
I mean considering that froman engineering aspect, it is
the most imperfect engineering withthe engine hanging behind there,
there axle, all that over steer or so on.
But once you drive the car,obviously you start appreciating

(22:53):
either imperfections by design orthe way that the car is put together
and obviously the quality and so on.
And I'm a big fan of Porsche 3 56,The early
cars, but I like them. I like them all.
I was talking to Patrick Dempsey, theactor the other day, and he's got a 3, 5,

(23:14):
6 first car he bought withthe first paycheck and his
first movie and he says it's just thebest car because every time he drives it,
people wave at him, honktheir horns, say hi,
and it's not because he's a Hollywoodactor, it's because of the car.
Yeah,
there is a special feeling and ifyou consider that a lot of flat
for cylinderCs car 1500 or

(23:38):
1600 and we will excludethe carras or so on,
driving that car at 60 miles an hour,
it feels much faster.
A thrill.
And there is an old saying it's more funto drive a slow car at its limits than
driving a fast car well belowits limits. But then at the time,

(23:59):
actually 3 56 was not a slow car,
but if you consider the Corvettesof the day and the other
American cars or European cars,
it was a little ugly duckling quite slow,
but you drive that car and youstart getting the essence of that.
It is a wonderful driving machine.

(24:23):
Just going onto your customer base,
do you see a typical Lab 11 customeror do you see them from very different
walks of life?
Obviously there's a lot of tailoring youcan do amazing stuff of luggage here as
well and accessories.
Do you see that people love tohave all that sort of choice of

(24:45):
different aspects about the brand togo with their car or do you think that
there's a typical kind of person who buys.
'Em? Well, we are focusing,
first of all,
lab 11 has been in UnitedStates for almost six months
and this is,

(25:07):
we are trying to establishLab 11 and create the
awareness about our productjust like everybody else,
our audience, we would liketo be the true Porsche iono,
someone that when you see, in other words,when you see a lab 11 on the street,

(25:28):
you know that it's something special,
but it's more of an unassuming car.
It's not this wild super wide
cars or so on.
So we try to focus on theaudience that they have.
Obviously a great appreciationfor precision engineering

(25:52):
and craftsmanship down to the
most minutia.
It is a car actually to be driven,Driven by a lady or be driven by a
gt, and
I want to believe that ourforter, it is reliability.

(26:14):
It is a car that can be driven.
It'll show great in a private collectionand it'll show even better and put a
lot of smiles. It is the car,it is almost 90% Porsche.
All the parts are OEMparts or not all the parts,
at least most of them two certified.

(26:36):
And it is a car thatcan be serviced at any
Porsche center authorizedcenter throughout United States or anywhere else in
the world for that matter. And
it is a usable car. It'snot a slow car by no means.
It's a very fast car, a very exciting car.

(26:58):
But as I said before, in the carbusiness, we love hyper ball.
I see a very
great manufacturer,
a great fabricator in UK thatmakes that nine 11 or 11,000

(27:18):
RPM.
I know Williams used to make enginesthe are called dungeons or so
forth. There are a lotof offerings out there,
but when you're talking about hyper poly,
once you start getting to chasingclaims or bragging rights or so
on, reliability,

(27:38):
it gives away a little bit.We want a car to be enjoyed.
Our cars,
they make anywhere between300 to well over 400 brake
horsepower on an atmospheric versions, and
as a matter of fact,
the power to weight ratioof our more spirited

(28:03):
variant, it is equal to a modern GT three.
So they're not slow by no meansand they're going to put a
lot of smiles,
but we want happy smilesfor a lot of miles,
not the car that become the ownership.

(28:26):
It will become a challenge.
Yeah, yeah. We want tosee them on the roads.
Yes.
Definitely. Tell us a littlebit about, obviously the colors,
it's quite fantastic.
We've got the penicillin color Ibelieve here or the car here and the
interiors as well. What canthe customers, obviously,
is it everything bespoke?
Yes, everything. Everythingis bespoke, obviously.

(28:49):
Starting with the exterior, we
have almost an entire Porschecolor palette of 110 colors.
The cars that we have made, a lot ofthem, just like this car, as you said,
the penicillin, it datesback on the fifties
from the 3 56 era.

(29:11):
Obviously we have about 110different colors and another 200
formulations. Wow, okay.We can do anything.
The paint that we use isglossary in some instances,
PPG and so on. The qualityof the paint, other,
obviously on the colors andthe very vast selection.

(29:34):
We take a lot of pride on
the general assembly of the exteriorand the paint process and so
forth. As far as the interior goes,
the interior as well is very bespoke.

(29:55):
We try to source the best materialslike European blue heights and
apple leather, full grain nabu,
all our fabrics otherthan Alcantara, obviously,
which is a synthetic fabric,
we use natural fabrics, Hagarbooklet carpets, German carpets,

(30:18):
a lot of seed inserts,
pepita or what we call or houndstooth here in the United States
or tartan, handwoven leathers.
It is really the choices of
fitting those cars accordingto the customer's wishes.

(30:38):
They're pretty much unlimited.
Yeah, it's quite beautiful craftsmanshipfrom, I can see. It really is.
Just going back to that whole restomarket and the backdated aspect to it,
do you think it will ever evolve into,
obviously we've got alot of hybrid these days,
the automotive markets moving towardsfull electrification and there's a lot of
government mandatestowards that direction.

(31:00):
Do you think those powertrains canbe fit into a car with shaped like
this?
Actually, Charles, there already are.
There are some fabricators that they do.
There are some offerings out thereOf the nine 11,
either backdated or not,

(31:22):
and that they're electrified.
This is definitely a road that we'renot even entertaining on taking
this is, I'm not going to, obviously,I'm not in a position to criticize
why they should do that sometimes, that

(31:43):
we have to be open-minded. I mean,
we're talking about a luxury item that
is designed and built to fitsomebody's needs or aspirations.
So sometimes the automotive inte,
they're very, very adamant about certainthings, about originality, about this,

(32:06):
that, or so on. I'm notgoing to be the one,
but definitely this is an avenuewe're not willing to explore
and
other than the visual part to makinga nine 11, again, as I said before,
we want to pass along that specialfilling to be able to transport

(32:27):
yourself back in timeand drive and are cool,
but with some contemporarytechnology and so forth.
And confidence in the reliability.Yes. Well, let's ask a fun one here.
If you had to design one ofthese cars for any historical
figure or a celebrity living or past,

(32:51):
who would it be? Who would it be and why?
Who would you like to seebehind the wheel of that car?
Who would be your ideal historical figure.
As far as the celebrity, and
that's the first time that I will say so.

(33:12):
We will be announcing mostlikely by the end of next
month, January of next year,
a collaboration with formerformula one World Champion,
and we're planning on making alimited series of cars celebrating his
championship and hisachievements in motor sports.

(33:35):
Who would I like to seebehind the wheel? Well,
since we're into the retro mode, I wouldlike to see Jim Clark behind the wheel.
Wow, that would.
Be such Now he would drive it quickly.Well, even James Hunt. James Hunt,
absolutely. James would loveto drive that to a party.
And Jim, yeah, I think hishill climbing roots maybe.

(33:55):
I think he'd love to take one ofthese up. One of those Scottish.
Definitely.
Fantastic. So how can our viewersand listeners of the podcast,
Porsche enthusiasts rest mods experts,
how can they learn more about Lab 11 andwhat can they do to maybe go and visit
your studio?
Thank you for the question. As you know,

(34:18):
we have a beautiful showroom right inbetween the design district and the
art district in Miami,
and one thing is that we do have cars
that they can be driven,
that they're already and availablefor immediate delivery and they
can be experienced. The car,

(34:38):
obviously we are very much into virtualprototyping when we design cars,
but we do have right now inthe United States for cars with
more cars coming that they'reavailable and we invite
someone that would be interestedon experiencing Lab 11.
We invite them to experiencethat behind the steering wheel.

(35:02):
We also have our firstofficial center in New York,
so now in the United States asPeter Motorsports and myself,
we are the official importer forthe Americas and the retailer,
but we also have Porsche ofGold Coast in Long Island,
so someone in the northeast can visit

(35:26):
our dear partners at Porsche Gold Coast,
and which is at the same hand,
it is the only in the state ofNew York is the only authorized
official classic center, andthey're very familiar with the car.
We have a beautiful slate gray
car on display and

(35:51):
that's pretty much, I mean, right now
we have plans for future expansion, butright now between New York and Miami,
we try to cover at leastthe entire eastern seaboard
with plans expanding to theWest coast in the near future.
Sounds really good. And obviouslythe speed art motor sports website,
lots of good stuff onthere as well. Of course.

(36:11):
Speed Art motor speedartmotorsports.comand we have a special menu
with information.
Also people they can visit Labeleven.it,
which is the Italian,but I believe there is
an English translation versionof that and we're in the process

(36:32):
actually, we have a digital configurator,
which is in better modeand we are in the process.
Our partners in Italy,
they're in the process ofmaking a wonderful configurator
that people, they can go andexplore at least the digital,
but the most important thing isthat we want to invite anybody that

(36:56):
would be interested on
becoming an owner of our cars.
We want to invite them and putthem behind the steering wheel.
James, thank you so muchfor coming in today.
Thank you for sharing the story aboutLab 11 and sSpeedArt Motorsports.
Sports. Thank you so much for havingme, Charles. It's a real pleasure.
I appreciate your time.

(37:17):
Make sure you check out DuPont Registry'swebsite where you'll find the best
exotic and luxury car listingsand all the latest automotive
news. That's all for today.
We'll see you for the next episodeand remember, drive safely.