Jaroslav Juhan’s book ” Life Without Brakes, The man that brought Porsche to Carrera” is written by Jan Králík in Czech and published by Grada Publishing

The translations (with help from Google), narration and video were done by myself (Duncan Fraser). The views are my own and any the use of the book as a reference is with the permission of Frankie Juhan, Jaroslav’s nephew. Frankie loaned me use his hard copy of the book to augment the PDF draft Jaroslav had sent me from Geneva before he passed away.

The four videos that compromise this revue are “Franta Juhan”, “The Pre-War Years, “The war years and imprisonment by the Nazis” and “Life with Porsche, Lotus and Ferrari”. They roughly follow the chorological order of Jaroslav’s Book.

#1 : Franta Juhan, Czechoslovakian Speedway champion and Jaroslav’s older brother.

#2: The pre-war years Life was good!

#3: The war years and imprisonment by the Nazis

#4: Porsche 550 and Jaroslav Juhan The man who brought Porsche to the Carrera. Freedom from Communism

Life with Porsche, Lotus and Ferrari

Jaroslav Juhan played a significant role in bringing Porsche to the forefront of motorsport. In the early 1950s, he raced a Porsche 550 Spyder in several endurance events, including the legendary Carrera Panamericana race in Mexico.

Juhan’s success in the Panamericana race in 1953, where he finished third overall and first in his class, Porsche’s management invited Juhan to join its works racing team, and he continued to compete in endurance races around the world, including the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the Mille Miglia. Juhan’s success on the track helped to establish Porsche as a formidable competitor in international motorsport.

His contributions to the development of the Porsche 550 Spyder also helped to shape the future of sports car racing, with the lightweight, mid-engined design becoming a template for future Porsche race cars.

Juhan’s achievements in motorsport were not limited to racing for Porsche. He also won several Czechoslovakian national championships and competed in raced in Le Man

Overall, Jaroslav Juhan’s career as a racing driver helped to shape the course of motorsport history, and his legacy continues to inspire fans and competitors alike. His brother was the famous Speedway star Franta Juhan so the family was influential on four and two wheels.

The process I used to do these included my writing notes as I read the book to give me a reference point. This wee clip was to show my best friend Frankie Juhan and Jaroslav’s nephew peek at my process.

Jasolav was the former husband of the actress Jiřina Steimarová, and grandfather of Czech film stars Anna Polívková and Vendula Prager-Rytířová. Jaroslav Juhan died on Wednesday, 28 September 2011. He was 89-year-old. His long and varied vivid story was described in the book “Jaroslav Juhan – Život bez brzd” (“Jaroslav Juhan – Life without brakes”) by Jan Králík, published in 2011.

His granddaughter Anna Polívková participated in the same race sixty years later in 2014 as the patroness of the Czech team.

When you read Jaroslav’s book the years he spent with Colin Chapman at Lotus could probably rate a higher focus in in other persons career, he was after all with that legendary figure for a while and was the Lotus Distributer in Switzerland .