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Being passed by a 993turbo in 1996 on the Autobahn. Could never get over that rear end. Was 18 at the time.
Managed to buy my first 996gt3mk1 in 2004. Unfortunately sold it. Have been hooked on 911s with big wings ever since that day on the Autobahn.
17. Boss at a ski shop I worked used to loan me his '71 911T (still don't know why). I drove it to high school one day blitzing all of my buddies on buses. That pretty much did it. Ended up buying the car from him when he sold it and drove it as my only car/daily driver for the next eight years. One weekend my brother and I were coming back from skiing and got to a bridge toll only to realize we didn't have 25 cents between us to pay the toll. Two teenagers in a Porsche with two sets of skis on the back and no money. The toll attendant just shook his head and sent us on our way.
Wife likes to remind me of what it was like when we had no money to pay the bills. I just remember the good times. Wish I hadn't sold that 911T, but then I say that about every Porsche I've sold.
Always appreciated cars, but just recently started focusing more on them. I never really cared for porsches to tell you the truth, my taste back then was different, but my cousin knew i was going to be in the market for a new car and told me i should look into the 991 gt3 when it came out back in 2013. I took one look at it and fell in love, started reading up on it, and wanted it badly, unfortunately couldn't move on a car until 2016, and I was new to the whole nice car thing, so didn't know about the allocation process and when i went to the boston auto show back in 2014 i asked a porsche rep about when the gt3 would be coming out, and he gave me a snobby reply and didn't really give me any proper answers (I was 20 so he wrote me off as an improbable buyer) so went in early 2015 to my porsche dealer to see if they had a gt3, they didn't and told me i was behind 10 people on the waitlist, i thought it was gt3 or bust, but i started looking into the gts and got myself to fall in love with it, until i drove a gt3, then it was all bets off on any car but a gt3, finally found an allocation late 2015 and got my car last month, and must say I'm really glad my taste in cars changed, and i went into porsche, the gt3 is like no other car, and I'm glad that i am able to own one! Now I can say i really appreciate all porsches, even the older models I thought were ugly now look like some of the most beautiful cars i have ever seen!
Thought I might like one eventually? 1981, aged 12, went back to England (from whence we had emigrated to Canada some years before) to holiday with my closest childhood friend, and his father had a white Carrera. This was a fine car in which to do some touring of England as a pre-teen!
Had to have one? 2013, aged 45, drove a 997 GT3 quite extensively for some business in SoCal and decided I had to have one. I was truly bowled over by the styling of the 991, and after a good deal of research and thinking, in 2015 when the opportunity arose I got the GT3.
Funny thing: for most of the time in between I had virtually no interest in Porsches, far less 911s. I really liked the 944/968T, which for a long time was the realistic performance benchmark car for me and the one in which I had driven fastest, but I was more interested in Japanese sports cars and the European sports cars they then emulated, mostly front/rear and some mid/rear. After working for about 20 years with and around Italian exotics and getting to know the industry and products well, I moved first to Mercedes, then BMW, and now to Porsche. Working with Italian stuff pretty much ended my desire to own or even be much associated with it. Beauty is skin deep, and transient.
It was in my teens, growing up in the south of Spain in 1974. I recall a few school friends and I were hanging around the parking area of local disco in Marbella when we spotted a gorgeous 911 Turbo. As we drooled over it, none other than James Hunt appears and shoo's us away! We were surprised and dissapointed at his reaction towards us. He starts his car, and drives off. The car was awesome, the driver not so!
That encounter was the spark that ignited my desire to get a 911 and be humble and generous with it.
When interviewen other track junkies in the Pitlane looking for a better track car.
Other brand drivers had a lot of must do mods and knew how many sessions consumables lasted.
GT3 drivers didn't and spoke in seasons instead of sessions. That's when I knew.
My story is very different from most so far. (fire retardant suit on). I spent a lot of time playing Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed. And at some point I crossed the threshold from just trying to go faster and beat my friends to studying and appreciating differences, sometimes very subtle, between cars. I started to get it, like people "get" wine or music. My favorite was Carrera RS. But somehow it got buried in my mind, and I never wanted a Porsche.
After that I never was interested in Porsches for a long time. I was into technology, and it was all in Japanese and some euro hot hatches (convinced my dad to get a JDM car with 4WS early 90s because I've done research and it seemed the way cars should me made). I was into cars but only in theory - too young to drive, too poor as well.
Then one day my dad had a major heart attack while we were in a very remote village. Three years before I could legally get a license, I got him to the hospital 250 miles away in under 3 hours through hills and woods, with roads being 25-40mph speed limit the entire way. My average speed was over 3 times the average speed limit on those roads. I probably saved his life, as it took 9 month in a hospital for him to recover. I was hooked on driving since then. Of course I had to wait 3 more years to get my licence
Once I started working, I quickly made enough money that bribing a cop would be 1/4 of a price of my lunch (it was in Ukraine in 90s), so I just drove as fast as I deemed safe or as fast as my car could go, drifting through almost every turn and other crazy stuff. Surprisingly, I lived and never damaged a car.
When I went to the US I realized it was different there. It took me almost a year to get it, and I almost went to jail twice (somehow I snatched a Toyota Supra for $5K at a foreclosure auction, so it was easy to get going to fast and get noticed as well). I gave up on driving for a few years, until I discovered track days. I got hooked on it right away.
Then, like TRAKCAR, I interviewed everyone in the paddock about what they were driving and why. Two of my most respected drivers were driving porsches and both had the attitude "I do not care what the badge is, it just does the job better than everything else". That was very convincing. So I tried porsches. To be frank, the only new one at the time I truly liked then was boxster spyder. But by the time I had a way to get one (stopped moving to a new country every 1-2 years), I got a rumor of the new GT3, which was supposed to handle more like a mid-engined car. So I placed deposits in the two countries where I might have ended up living by the time it would be available. Two years later I got the car drove it for over two years now, and I'm still very happy with it.
I usually do not tell the long story when asked. And when I keep it short most people just assume from Need for Speed and then PDK-only robotic 991 gt3 - it "makes sense". Which bugs me because I learned to drive and drove for over half of my driving history manual cars only, many without working synchros, and many of those snobs do not even know what it is or how to drive it. Or when people wax poetic about canyon carving in "challenging analog" cars being the real driving and me being too young to understand it, even though they have never experienced driving a non-abs, 4-5 speed, renault or fiat or lada through woods or mountains as fast as it could go for hours any time, planning ahead how many more turns the drum brakes can handle and guessing if you can squeeze a couple more this time, etc... I've done it daily for years, thanks to corrupt police in failed/developing countries, so now when I hear "lower limits" and "enjoy off the track" I just hear ****ty cars and unsafe roads. But that's getting too off topic.
When interviewen other track junkies in the Pitlane looking for a better track car.
Other brand drivers had a lot of must do mods and knew how many sessions consumables lasted.
GT3 drivers didn't and spoke in seasons instead of sessions. That's when I knew.
+1 for me - grew up a big F1 fan and V8 touring cars in Australia. Looking for a good track option lead me to Porsche.
For me it was when my wife was pregnant with our first child. I had a Lotus and had owned a Ferrari. I visited the Porsche dealers in Dallas and back then they were over the top rude. As a result I hated Porsche. All of a sudden I had a son coming and I wanted to be able to take him with us! I looked around and ended up purchasing a new 1988 911 with the wing. Drove to the baby store and tried every seat they had before I found one that fit comfortably. The more I drove it the more I loved it; for the most part I've had a 911 ever since.
I will add that over time I would sell it and buy a Ferrari, then I'd get tired of the Ferrari and buy another 911. I did that over and over and finally figured out that it was cheaper to just keep the damn 911.
Have a 991 Cab and a 991 GT3 now. Really like the new Huracan...
Always loved the cars back to the 356. Bought my 1st. 911SC in '79, 911 Carrera Cabriolet in '83, 911 Turbo in '86, Boxster S in 2000, Cayenne S in '03, Cayenne Turbo in '05, 911 Carrera S Coupe in '05, 911 Carrera S Cabrio. in '07, Panamera S in '10, Panamera Turbo in '12 and '14 GT3 .
The Pana. Turbo and the GT3 are the two best cars I have ever owned together and plan to keep them for awhile.
For me it was in 1966. I had traded in my beloved '63 356B after putting 100,000 faultless miles on it.
My dealer friend owned Foreign Cars of Rockland, NY and gave me a $500 discount on one of the first 912s
into the USA. (MSRP $4,250) It was the WORST Porsche I have ever owned. Nothing on the body fit right. It creaked, squeaked and groaned and had very little more power than my 356B (which is to say hardly enough to keep up with any of the V8 powered U.S. Cars) A few months later, I begged to trade the 912 for the new 1966 911, the first of which had been delivered into the U.S. With a decent trade-in, I finally was able to scrape together the $5,500 MSRP needed for a 911. I fell in love with the 911 the first time I drove it, and owned many 911's ever since. Despite many memorable 911 models, including Turbos, RSA, GT3's and GT2's, IMHO the 991 GT3 / GT3RS are the best and most enjoyable 911's ever!!!
Auto Show 1978, up close to a 928
coveted the brochure ,was transfixed by the odd shape
went thru a couple of sports cars Z/28, 280Z and a C4 Corvette, after
a divorce I bought a full size Cadillac
then about 10 years ago a friend who was in the car business asked me to
do him a favor, take out his mom's 911 for the weekend...a 993 Guards Red Cabrio w/tip
It had maybe 14k on it
he detested the car business and anything to do with cars, he would only buy cars coming off
lease..hated Porsche too
2 days turned into 3, a weekend a month, turned into 2 (summers only)
this went on for about 3 years, she literally never drove the car
preferred her Maybach (they had two) and her husband would only drive MB's
I think I put about 5k on the car before they traded it in on a new MB
I’ve been a car and road racing nut since I was a kid but didn’t appreciate Porsches until 1985ish when I was 31. I was campaigning a Lotus Europa in ASP Autocross living near Asheville, NC. A friend had a 914-6 with an S engine plus other parts. I was always chasing him for FTD. The 914's reliability, balance, and consistency impressed me. He was a great driver as well. But the 914 didn’t turn me on and my wife hated the design. Our small club was part of the start of the North Carolina Autocross Challenge (NCAC) that brought together the major clubs across the state for a series of events hosted by each club. At the Charlotte event I saw my first 911 Carrera RS2.7, white with red “Carrera” on the side. The driver was one with the car and amazingly fast. I loved it, but one baby and a second on the way meant the 911 would have to wait. By 1990, I was living near Watkins Glen doing DEs and Autocross. I got tired of redesigning parts for the Lotus and sold it, saved enough money for a 944Turbo, and never looked back. Although I’ve loved all my Porsches over the years, none have been as close to the intent of that RS as the GT3. I suppose an R...
I grew up riding in the tiny back seats of several 356 models my father owned in the late '50s, early '60s. He was a mechanic while putting himself through college after WWII, and used to build and race flathead roadsters back in the day.
When he became an engineer, he came to admire Porsche designs and started buying used 356s as his daily driver when he could afford them. In 1966, he heard about the new 911S that was coming out with a 160HP six-cylinder engine, and I went along with him to test drive one at the local dealer in Lakeside, CA. He tore up the back side of the Mission Gorge grade and said "finally, they have enough power." He traded in his '65 356SC and bought his first new car ever on the spot off the dealership floor, for $6995 MSRP.
I begged to borrow it on every possible occasion and realized it was a completely different driving experience than the muscle cars my friends owned at the time--Camaros, GTOs, Mustangs, etc. Not as fast in a straight line, but when you had to go around a corner, you didn't have to slow down! I knew I had to have one eventually, but life got in the way--too many other interests and expenses had me driving and fixing $500 cars and trucks for decades. Finally, just before I turned 50 years old, I realized the time had come, and found a '66 911 that had been bastardized and updated to 911S specs by a local chiropractor for $5000. It was even the same color as my dad's old car, Light Ivory. I joined PCA and started the long slide down the slippery slope of performance driving with autocross events, then time trials and track days whenever I could. Eighteen years and seven 911s later, I ended up with a 2015 GT3 and couldn't be happier (well, maybe I could if I was able to get my hands on a GT3RS, but that doesn't look likely).
03-01-2016, 10:57 PM
