Bamber guest of honour

Earl Bamber. Photograph by Ted Baghurst

Expat Whanganui driver Earl Bamber will be one of the guests of honour for the New Zealand Festival of Motor Racing at Hampton Downs this month.

Bamber and his fellow Kiwi driver Brendon Hartley were instrumental in Porsche having a stellar 2015 - Hartley winning the FIA WEC Drivers World Championship with Aussie Mark Webber and Germany's Timo Bernhard in Bahrain, while Bamber won June's Le Mans 24 Hour race with Britain's Nick Tandy and German Nico Hulkenberg.

The pair will been seen at Hampton Downs with two special cars from the Porsche Museum in Stuttgart - a 1977 Porsche 935 and 1998 WSC LMP1 Prototype.

Bamber and Hartley will drive the cars for exhibition laps at the festival, before the two cars go on display at other events.

The Porsche Marquee will be on display at the Waikato show.

In addition to the museum cars, also on display will be a 918 Spyder - the latest Porsche super car - and a full-sized model of the Porsche 919 Hybrid LMP1 race car, which is the vehicle Bamber co-drove to glory in June.

The Porsche Club of New Zealand, in partnership with the festival organisers, is also inviting all Porsche owners and any motoring fans to come take part.

On the first Sunday of the festival, January 17, there will be a record attempt to line up the most Porsches ever assembled on a track at one time in New Zealand.