Porsche 991 Turbo Owner Shares Details of Epic Road Rally Experience

By Brett Foote - August 5, 2019

**Friend of Rennlist Ben Pettis shares details about his awesome Race Rally Media experience and his killer 991-gen Porsche 911 Turbo.**

Road rallies are wildly popular these days, and for good reason. After all, why would you even bother to own an awesome Porsche or other supercar and not drive and enjoy it? Road rallies give us the opportunity to meet up with other folks who own similarly awesome rides and head out to some interesting places. And that’s exactly the purpose of the many events put on by Race Rally Media.

RRM’s latest rally took participants from Philadelphia to New Jersey, New York City, and then on to Atlantic City. The group grew with each passing stop, which included a number of cool and interesting places. We were able to get the inside scoop on what it was like thanks to our friend Ben Pettis, who drove his 991 Porsche 911 Turbo all the way from Baltimore to participate. Pettis was kind enough to take some time out of his busy schedule and reflect on the epic journey, which should only help convince us that we need to get out and participate ourselves.

Rennlist: First off, how did you initially get involved in Race Rally Media’s road rallies?

Ben Pettis: I was invited to join by a friend who owns a Lamborghini. He’s also friends with Steve Waldi, who owns Interstate Motorsports, which is one of the sponsors of the rally. A group called PCNY originally started the rally, and a gentleman named Wayne Schneider organizes the entire thing. They do a bunch of food drives and backpack donations for underprivileged people.

We’re guessing that your Porsche isn’t exactly stock. Can you tell us about the mods you’ve done to it?

My car is a 2014 Porsche 911 Turbo. I consulted with Sam Adhoot of By Design [who is a Rennlist, 6 Speed Online and Team Speed sponsor] for all of my upgrades. Sam supplied me with a Fabspeed exhaust and custom tune.This combination is good for over 100 hp more than stock. Pretty neat. And the car shoots flames now. I’m also a national instructor for PCA and get comments from people I pass all the time about flames coming out of my exhaust on the track.

How did the trip go? Were there a lot of participants?

I live in Baltimore, Maryland, and drove my car from there to Interstate Motorsport just outside of Philadelphia. From there, we had a convoy that included a handful of Lamborghini Aventadors, a Murciélago, a couple of Ferrari 458s, an Audi R8, McLaren 750S, and a huge truck based on the Ford F-550 called the Rhino.

We all drove to an airport outside of Newark, New Jersey, which was the headquarters for Gotham Films. They had a helicopter filming us during the rally. At this point, we had a crew of about 35 cars. This included Bryan Salamone and his chrome-wrapped Aventador SVJ. We all drove to the Gavensport Hotel in New York City, where upon arrival a Pagani Huayra was parked up front with private security. That Friday morning we all met at Pier 81 on Manhattan’s west side and had roughly 130 cars on the pier.

We ended up driving to Newburg, New York, for lunch and met up with some more cars. As we headed up to Bear Mountain, the police presence was heavy and there were a few cars pulled over, including an 812 Superfast Ferrari. Once we left lunch, everyone headed to the Hard Rock Hotel in Atlantic City.

‘I get comments from people I pass all the time about flames coming out of my exhaust on the track.’

In between heavy traffic, we did find a couple of fun places to play. My group was a more reserved group and we weren’t looking to go to jail. Upon arrival in Atlantic City, we attended a banquet with a house DJ and open bar. Everyone had quite a bit of fun. That Saturday morning we proceeded to New Jersey Motorsports Park for an amazing track day. It was incredible sharing the track with Lamborghinis, Ferraris, and McLarens. We even had a McLaren Senna on the track with us.

Was this your first road rally, or have you participated in any others over the years?

I have participated in multiple rallies, including the iDrive and some other local rallies. The one thing that separated this rally from the rest was just the sheer magnitude and number of cars.

It sounds like you had plenty of awesome cars join you on the trip. Did you have any personal favorites from the bunch?

We had two Bugattis that showed up as well as the McLaren Senna. I’m a big fan of the front-engine 12-cylinder Ferraris, and the F12 or the 812 Superfast were probably my favorites.

Having done this particular rally, are you eager to do it again? Do you already have plans to participate in an upcoming rally?

I definitely plan on doing other rallies again in the future. This was just an experience because owning a 911 Turbo, I had one of the least expensive cars in the whole event.

Many thanks to Ben for sharing these memories with Rennlist. And if you want to give him a follow on Facebook, he’s also posting additional photos and video from his rally experience there!

Photos for Rennlist by Ben Pettis