Mike in CA

I had the pleasure of meeting fellow RL'er ChrisF and his beautiful Meteor Gray GT3 for an early Sunday morning drive this AM. There will be no videos of this excursion, just a couple gratuitous "before" pictures.

Great cars, great drive, traffic was minimal and there was only one occasion when we came upon a LEO while doing just a tiny bit above the limit.

This was my first time pushing fairly hard, as I've been pretty conservative breaking the car in, and I saw 8K RPM a couple of times. Honestly, and without being hyperbolic, the car is just magical to drive.

As a side note, I now have almost 800 miles on the clock and the oil level is at one bar below max; exactly where it was at 100 miles after delivery. One bar below max is considered the optimum fill level according the manual. I don't know if this is specified for the 997 GT3 cars but it wasn't defined that way for my old 997.2 Carrera S.

Thanks again to Chris for a great drive.

tradervic

Surprised he didn't give you the door ding free parking spot

Typical ChrisF

24Chromium

Nice! Chris is a great guy.

What route did you take?

Nan P

Great pics Mike...
We need some more adjectives/comments on how the car drives.

Mike in CA

Met in Novato. Stinson Beach exit off 101, Panoramic Highway, One up to Point Reyes, Pt. Reyes-Petaluma Hill Road to Petaluma. We split there and I headed back up north, and he south. A really nice drive......

eilig

Great to see the two generations side by side

Mike in CA

Thanks, Nan.

I don't want to sound like I'm gushing all the time, so I've held off on the superlatives. But here goes...

The engine feels like it wants to rev and rev. There's no hint of strain at any RPM, throttle response is immediate, and the car pulls in any gear. Low end response is much better than I anticipated. The sound is amazing, and the "whump" "whump" whump" from the exhaust as you go up quickly through the gears is intoxicating. Once you become accustomed to the paddles it's as though you can simply think which gear you want to be in and it's there, both on upshifts and downshifts. I honestly can't think of any good reason why you'd want to take your hands off the wheel to shift using the console lever. The difference between PDK-S and PDK is like night and day, IMO. I'm not going to re-hash the MT/PDK debate. TEHO. I'll just say that, taken on it's own merits, PDK-S in this car is a tour-de-force.

The handling is superb. I was concerned about steering feel from the EM rack from all the talk ahead of time; I needn't have been. Excellent weighting and feedback; you can feel everything you need to feel from the front wheels. Much has been made of PTV and RWS. There's no doubt they must be doing what they do under there, but if you got into the car and just drove it hard, and didn't know the electronic stuff was at work, I'd defy 99.9% of drivers to know that there was anything unusual going on. There is no artificial feel; the car just handles.

It's incredibly well planted. The front end goes where you point it, the back end stays in place, and overall the handling is very neutral. I was pushing the car reasonably hard today, through some major switchbacks, and never felt the front end wanting to go away. You can get on the power coming out of a tight turn and the car settles down and goes. Mechanical grip seems endless. You could find the limit on track, but unless you're freakin' crazy and barring some sort of significant miscalculation, your concern for your fellow man and your driving record should never allow you to find it on a public road.

I've got to find something sort of negative to say just for the sake of objectivity. The adaptive sport seats are quite adequate, but additional support in the way of sport buckets would be welcome. That's it. I honestly can't think of anything else negative that would be meaningful. The car is phenomenal....

ChrisF

Nice meeting you today Mike. I had a really great time/drive.

Car looked incredibly planted and it seemed significantly faster than the RS's I've run with at the track (on straights). Thinking between the 7 speed and a conservative power rating, the car is really fast. Car was carrying a fair bit of speed and never looked out of sorts.

Thanks again Mike.

Nan P

Thanks for the comments Mike.
I've been reading as much as I can on the new GT3 & while I re-read the usual Auto journalists reviews, it's the personal owner & their comments I really want to hear.

Thus far all I'm hearing is that this car is a winner & AP was right.
Now I've got to figure a way out to keep my 997.1RS & add this new GT3 to my garage.

0Q991

Love the detailed remarks--thanks @Mike in CA.

sechsgang

You definitely cant get rid of that RS!

silverrules

Stop it guys. making the wait longer for us

That's awesome.

frayed

I bought the cheap seats in anticipation of the buckets being available one day from Gert or Suncoast. Glad I didn't go adaptives.

Thanks for the post Mike.

Is guards all you thought it was going to be?

MaxLTV

+1. I share everything Mike mentions here, including that seats are the not that supportive. Alcantara does it's job really well increasing the grip, and probably to .6G seats hold me in place. They also put back in such a position where it's not strained even on longer drives. I struggle to adjust 18way adjustable seat to the same level of comfort that non-adjustable gives me, just because it's so perfectly shaped. But it's no where near as supportive as I'd need for track... Partially because I'm rather thin, so I do not even touch the side bolsters below chest level. The seat locks my shoulders in place, but lower body is on it's own. Less support than in an M3 for me.

I suspect that after one track day, I'll be looking for any bucket seats I can fit into this car, not waiting for Porsche seat availabilty.

Everything else is mindblowing.

Oh, and let me know when you do another such drive - I'd be happy to join!

Mike in CA

frayed, even though the 4-way seats are lighter and cheaper, I'm glad I got the adaptive seats. For me, the range of adjustments makes them more comfortable on long drives, and by adjusting the bolsters, rake, and height I can get a position that mimics the butt-down locked-in feel I had with my sport buckets. Sort of.

The G-meter in the car saves the highest values you've generated. After today's drive it showed 1.28 G for a left hand turn, and 1.18 G for a right hander and the seats held me pretty well (the alcantera helps), so it's not like they're terrible.

I understand the rationale for getting the cheaper seats but figured if the buckets are just too expensive aftermarket, I'd rather have the 18 way for daily use. If the buckets are reasonable (ha!) I'm out an extra $2600 up front. If I absolutely knew I'd be buying buckets paying that money was stupid. But I don't know, so it's a hedge....

I'm loving the color, I think you will too. After the last 15 years of having a silver 911 in my garage it was a shock for the first week seeing a red one there. I'm getting used to that part. Yesterday I was gassing up and an extremely attractive 40 something woman who was fueling her Harley, of all things, came over and started asking me about the car. She kept walking around it, it was so gorgeous, what is that color called, did I special order it, was the wing optional, etc. I literally thought of your stripper/key story. We talked cars and motorcycles for a good 10 minutes until her 30 something boyfriend pulled up on his Harley (damn) at which point she brought him over to look. He seemed slightly less impressed for some reason.

The reactions from people have been incredibly positive. Some of it is no doubt just the car, but everyone also raves about the color. Who am I to argue with them?

Absolutely!