Mike in CA

Amen.....

simsgw

What gives me a chuckle is the amount of tooth enamel they will lose from clenching their jaws when the GT3 is released and they find themselves in the position of driving their grandpa's Porsche. An old 'slow' GT3 RS that pokes along waving a new model past on the straights and watching another overhaul them in the next twisty bit.

Absolutely nothing wrong with owning and tracking a classic Porsche. One of my good friends has a 1976 911 Targa and he can post a mean time. In his class. But when we took the track together with a camera mounted in my rear window to shoot some video, I had to hold down my 997 with a damp blanket to keep it that slow. When the three video laps were complete, my 997 walked away as if it had JATO assist and we put 400 yards on him in half a lap. David loves his '76 and I would too, but time wounds all.

These guys swearing we'll have to pry their manual-shift-Metzger-engined GT3 from their cold dead garages... well, they are not the type to own and enjoy classics. At least not on track days.

They will absolutely hate it when a 'simple' 991S w/powerkit embarrasses them, and when the new GT3 sucks their seatbelts off, they will hie themselves to a dealer.

Gary

Mike in CA

I wish I had something clever to add to that post, Gary, but nothing comes to mind. Perfectly stated.

chuckbdc

I though it would all depend on how the cars are broken in.

M3EvoBR

I would love to see that happening, specially if they can keep the fun and feel of 997.2 GT3 RS into the next one.
PDK only ??? hum ... not so much. The modern 911s are already easy enough to drive fast ... maybe not the last tenth, but all electronics and nannies will def make a less capable driver a faster one ... sad !

simsgw

Oh yes. I should have noted that if they break it in by driving like they stole it, then a 987 will put a GT3 to shame.

G

simsgw

I hear this a lot, so please think of me as answering all the ways this has been said, and not your own very courteous post, M3EvoBR.

Fast driving engages several of our emotions because it uses several different skill sets. I suppose a psychologist would say it engages both sides of the upper brain, while stressing the limbic brain as well. In my own language, you have to be analytic in the pits, intuitive on track, and deal with being scared ****less on a recurring basis. Elevating all three aspects gives us a great deal of gratification.

I occasionally teach novices because an event organizer is short of instructors, but mostly they use me for advanced driving instruction. One of the early questions is usually "can you help me improve my heel and toe braking?" Well, sure, probably. If you insist. But normally I teach them how to be quicker through critical segments of the track, and to analyse a track so they know which those are. Meanwhile, even with very advanced drivers, we understand that what we're really doing is finding a way to feel more secure, more in control of particular evolutions. Why? So we can go even faster on the next lap, put more energy into the car, and take ourselves closer to the point of forgetting to breathe. Closer to a state of complete terror for the entire lap.

Okay, we call it other things. Exhilaration, being in the zone, even getting closer to God in the case of a couple of drivers who were famous enough to say that out loud without blushing. It's the same thing however we say it. We want to take ourselves and the car to the edge of disaster and prove to ourselves that we can control it and ourselves in that situation. Did you really have any practical reason for going 150 feet per second toward that stone wall last weekend?

This discussion of computer aids is both trivial and vital. From an engineering perspective, going from analog solutions to hybrids of computer and analog solutions is predictably more efficient and also predictably makes us nostalgic for the simple life. Why can't I just use my Keuffel and Esser or even a Pickett? Do I really need Mathcad to solve this problem? Well, no. If using a sliderule is intrinsically satisfying, then have at it. Mathcad will get the right answer in fourteen milliseconds and you'll be slip-sliding away for the next fourteen years, but that's okay if the fiddling is the essence. But if you want an answer now, and some confidence that it's right, then you go to the computer.

If the essence is the pleasure of rolling into a corner on cross-ply tires and feeling the car struggle to find a balance between taking that corner and running for home, then that's the gratification and classic cars are your best bet. In racing, we ask how fast can you afford? Classic car racing asks "how old can you afford?" A Mercedes SSK on one end, a Spridget on the other, and a seventies Lotus in the middle, but all a source of joy. And motivation for that heated garage you've been considering. Mild joy, granted, but joy of an esthetic ethereal sort.

That's fine if the technique is its own reward. For most of us, learning the techniques will be enough joy for about one season, if that. After that introduction, we want better technique only to get ourselves closer to the edge. We want to go faster. We want to find out our own limits and a Spridget won't plumb that emotional depth. Okay, the first time I laid one sideways at 95 mph, it was fun. But the second time, it was "damn, there's a tenth lost." We start looking for that combination of analysis and intuitive driving that will find tenths in every corner.

Not because it matters how quick we get round the track. We could use the escape road at turn five, skip two corners, and shave ten entire seconds. But we wouldn't care, now would we? The satisfaction lies in setting a challenge and meeting it. Every corner, every lap, as quick as it can be done. The visible part of the challenge lies in analyzing how a particular car will best negotiate a track, and then showing that we have the intuitive control to make it happen. The unspoken challenge is doing that while scared so bad our mouth goes dry.

That last one is what distinguishes the real thing from a video game. Anyone with decent reflexes can 'drive' a video game. Using a race track is the only way to engage your limbic system, to rouse the lizard brain from the torpor of sitting in an office.

The skill set changes with each generation of car design. We no longer need to coordinate spark advance with air flow and adjust the mixture while watching for potholes, but going around the Brickyard in a car like that was enough to frighten your offspring unto the ninth generation. I have driven cars with unsynchronized transmissions and a clutch that called for enough force to require special seat mounts. Big deal. I also have driven cars with suspension that could decide to jack the wheels into a position where the contact patch was a mythological construct. They were physically demanding and exciting respectively. But I cheerfully passed both of them by to get in a car that had been race-prepped with strapped down suspension and enough tire to leave both of those behind. Why? Because I could go closer to eternity in the faster car. It required less muscle and less adroit handling of the odd kink between turns three and four, but it went faster into turn nine and I quit breathing until we got to the track-out point without going off course. On every lap.

It's all about dry mouth and bated breath. PDK is faster. PASM with PTV and PDCC lets me start to accelerate out of turn five 150 milliseconds sooner, and that lets me catch a little air going over turn six, and that means I'll be 10 mph faster starting turns seven/eight, and that means I'll be going 130 mph into turn nine instead of 120. When I cross the dip/slap at the apex of nine, eternity will stare me in the face for about 400 milliseconds. That is the point.

If John Doe thinks he can beat me through that complex because PSM will save his neck, then he's welcome to try following me some day. We'll see who has the better limbic system.

Gary

JohnnyBahamas

My limbic system goes to 11.

chuckbdc

To summarize Garry: "and a faster one faster ... not sad!"

M3EvoBR

For some ... If wanted just more speed I would still be driving my GT2, which was faster in all aspects compared to the RS.
That's the biggest debate that a lot of people go thru.
Not to say that speed for speed a GTR is also faster, but not as fun as a RS.

Mike in CA

Fair point. I'd suggest, though, that part of the frustration with the debate you say people are going through and expressing in these forums, is that their arguments are often based on assumptions. No one complaining about the missing "fun factor" has driven the 991 GT3, for example, and very, very few have taken a 991S with PDK and/or PDCC down a great road, much less on track.

So how would they know that these cars aren't fun, or, god forbid, maybe even more fun than the previous iterations exactly because they allow the driver to explore even higher limits with greater control than before? At the very least, withhold judgement until you've actually been able to make an honest comparison, as someone like Gary has been able to do. After all, we all know what happens when you *** - u - me........

M3EvoBR

I partially agree with you, and I'll try to explain in plain and simple words why I believe people keep on those debates.
A lot of us drove a PDK either 997.2 or 991 S, the car is a great car, no questions about it. I personally love the interior.
The steering wheel feel is not the same for sure, and going a little further, being a GTR owner, even when driven with all the nannies off, you can feel the car interfering and acting to try to keep the car in shape, and also help into turn in.
A lot of the RS guys like me do a fair amount of track events with those cars, and really enjoy the analog feeling of the car, which only a Porsche can give to you.
That's why I hope the car have the same feeling, and doesn't have the electric steering or at least a hydraulic system powered by an electric motor, just like the new 991 Cup.
Also in the past we had a BIG difference between a Carrera and a GT3, basically only body and interior were the same, and now looks like we won't have that kind of difference anymore, but we won't know until it happens.
I know that I won't be the one jumping to the 991 GT3, maybe if the RS is a super car, but specially when I see a Carrera with a 100K + price tag, doesn't add up to me, specially having an RS and driven the 991.
Hoping for the best !

Mike in CA

Maybe you've seen the Definitive 991 GT3 Part 2 thread in the 997 GT2/GT3 forum. If the reports are true we are going to see a new and exclusive motorsport derived motor in the 991 GT3 which will differentiate it from the "normal" 991, just as the 997.2 GT3 was differentiated from the 997.2. There also will be exculsive tweeks to the transmission and suspension and no doubt other aspects of the car. It seems that fears of a watered down GT3 model might be very much premature. Like you, I'm also hoping for the best, and I actually believe we're going to get it.