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In 1996, I test drove a brand new blue cab 993 with my dad. It was the best car I had ever driven and I fell in love immediately. My dad had always talked about owning a Porsche and that was always part of his "justification for higher education" talks he would give me. He couldn't justify the 80k price tag at that time, but he did finally buy one over 10 years ago(the pic is me in his car). What's crazy is they are still going for exactly what he paid back then...
Six years ago, I was finally in the position to purchase a sports car and I test drove a couple Porsches. But, I also test drove a C6 Z06 and the aggressive look and OMG power convinced me to go that route(don't hate me).
Ever since the GT4 was announced a few weeks ago, I got the Porsche bug again and I've been obsessed with finally becoming a P-car owner. I have deposits in at 3 different dealerships, but I'm not very high on the lists and not sure if I can justify buying brand new and having 2 two-seaters(I'm keeping my Z). I am now looking at getting an 07-09 Turbo and may be close to pulling the trigger.
This forum has been a great reference so far and I thank you all.
Dad raced in the late 50s (Sebring/New Smyrna), always had something decent laying around, liked the Porsches the best...
My personal spiral started with MGs, Triumphs, BMWs, and now Porsches. From cleaning MG Midget heads in my neighbor's mom's dishwasher, to fire breathing M3/5s, three 3 series BMWs, two 535/M5s.
4 cylinder, wire wheels with knock-off hubs, not always synchromesh, buddy was into the VW universe. He started the real rear engined madness.
The wife bought me a great Valentines present last February. An Xtreme Xperience with an MP4, a 458 Italia and last but not least of all a new GT3. The 458 and GT3 made the McLarren feel like a family car. A month later I had my new toy.
I always admired them since I was 13 (James Dean kind of thing) but wasn't until later in life...1994 and driving along Mulholland drive in my dog slow 308 when a 1992 C2 blew by me and I couldn't catch him. Couldn't even keep him in sight. A couple of weeks later I made a nice deal on the Ferrari and drove home in a slightly used '93 RS America. A couple of years after that it was a Mexico Blue 993. Then came a fifteen year draught and now it is back in a 996, which a I like a lot. Though when the market corrects I make take another run at a 993.
I always liked the way they looked and sounded but for some reason I never actually test drove one until the early 90s, there was a Caddy dealer on my way home and they had a black '87 on their used lot. Took it out for a spin. Punishing ride, heavy non-power steering, uncomfortable pedal position, useless A/C, and the interior looked like it belonged in a 20 year old car. Totally cured me of any desire to own one.
Ffwd about 15 years, someone I know had a 997 and when I asked him how he could stand to drive it, he said the new ones were nothing like the ones from the 80s-90s. So I tried again, and this time I loved the car. So eventually I bought one.
Wife wanted to upgrade from an aging Audi S4 cabriolet. We've always preferred German cars, but Beemers and Mercs left us cold. Convertible top a necessity, speed and handling of course needed to be top-notch, and so ... voila! We became a Porsche family. Might end up being two if I replace my AudiQ5 with a Macan (actually my daughter would get the Q5 till off for college; she's a freshman who will start driving in summer of 2017).
Growing up in one of the former USSR countries, children toys... how should i say, didn't have quite the same selection as here in the states. We were a little behind times. So when my mother and granddad visited the states in 1989 they brought back with them a Tyco R/C scaled model of none other than a Porsche 959.
For me, it felt like i was on another planet. I have never seen anything like it. It was the best and most favorite thing in the world. Grownups were jealous.
Such cars, real or R/C, could be seen only in foreign movies and now i had one in my hands.
We were lucky to be able to immigrate to the states when i was 12 and build a new life. I grew up, went to school, college, work and got married to a smart and beautiful woman.
Since i started working when i was 15, by the time i was in college i had a good work ethic and was able to hold decent job. So when my Mitsubishi Eclipse got totaled (not my fault) by extreme chance i found and was able to buy a 2002 Mercedes C230 Kompressor coupe in 6spd and never looked back. By now (12 years later) i had 5 Mercedes and converted my wife from BMW to a Mercedes as well. Love the brand, incredible engineering, comfortable, great options and looks amazing.
Mean while all of these years i always took a second look at any and all Porsche that would go by. Even though by now, i have been able to afford 2 S class Mercedes i still never thought about buying a Porsche for some unknown reason.
Two months ago on July 18th, i was born again. Having a heart attack at 33, opened my eyes wider than they ever have been. I always knew life was short and we need to live it. Don't wait for things to happen, make them happen. But now it hit me even more. I could not understand why this happened to me, I try to be healthy, i work out and i still had this happened. I finally asked my self, what am i waiting for?
So last Tuesday, i traded in an S550 for a beautiful 06 Carrera 4 in seal grey with black interior and chrono package. And i have been enjoying my new life very much.
Its not very fast, but its still faster and way more fun to drive than an S class. I miss nice comfy ride and options up to wazoo, but this thing gets my ticker pumping .
When I was a little kid my family was into muscle cars. My uncles had Camaros and my Dad a Challenger. My high school car was a Monte Carlo SS. My grandfather had a nice original 1970 Datsun 240Z though, and I inherited it for college. That gave me the love of smaller, lower horsepower cars and handling.
Fast forward a few years and it was time to get a more civilized daily driver with an A/C. I drove my first 911. It was probably an 80 or 81 in white. I actually didn't like it. I didn't like the heavy clutch and throttle with the bottom hinges, the AC was anemic, no power steering and it probably was not in the best nick. I also knew I probably could not afford it. I ended up upgrading to a BMW E30 M3 (it was $13K back then) and that started a 20 year journey with BMW...
Fast forward to about 2000 and I picked up a minty 1989 944 Turbo from a buddy. It also was hot, had dim dash lights and headlights, and was not all that reliable, but damn was it fast from 60-100. Had it for a few years, but stuck with BMW M cars...never got the bug out of my system.
On my 40th birthday it was the right time. I was back on Rennlist and found an awesome high-spec, but slightly high mileage, 997S X51 here in the classifieds. It was in Vegas, but I was in Honolulu. A few phone calls and email and I had to have it. I flew up on the redeye on a Thursday night, was at the LV Porsche dealer at 8a.m. and waited thorough the morning for a complete PPI, and did the deal around lunchtime. By the next day I had crossed the desert, did some canyon roads in L.A. with a buddy, and motored down to San Diego to make the boat drop to Hawaii. It was a great weekend! 5 years on, the 997 is still here and in great shape for 80K miles, and we just got a Cayenne Turbo to replace our Cayenne S. We are a Porsche family for life now.
I liked 911s but NEVER thought I'd EVER own one. It wasn't even plausible to me. No one in my family was into cars in the slightest save one of my grandfathers who owned an interesting car or two and liked to tinker.
My family was poor growing up and I was a realist so I only seriously considered an E46 as my halo car that I'd work hard for, one day own, then I'd die and I would have had a good life.
My 'rich' neighbor had an '85.5 944 NA that was in pristine condition that he loaned to me for a few months while my beater Civic was in the shop. I babied the thing, studied it and even detailed it for him before I returned it. THAT's when I knew I really liked Porsches and started to learn more about them. I still never thought I'd own one though.
Well my career took off and now in my early 30s I skipped the Bimmer and went right to my GTS.
Between my wife, condo and 911 life is good.
Growing up in one of the former USSR countries, children toys... how should i say, didn't have quite the same selection as here in the states. We were a little behind times. So when my mother and granddad visited the states in 1989 they brought back with them a Tyco R/C scaled model of none other than a Porsche 959.
For me, it felt like i was on another planet. I have never seen anything like it. It was the best and most favorite thing in the world. Grownups were jealous.
Such cars, real or R/C, could be seen only in foreign movies and now i had one in my hands.
We were lucky to be able to immigrate to the states when i was 12 and build a new life. I grew up, went to school, college, work and got married to a smart and beautiful woman.
Since i started working when i was 15, by the time i was in college i had a good work ethic and was able to hold decent job. So when my Mitsubishi Eclipse got totaled (not my fault) by extreme chance i found and was able to buy a 2002 Mercedes C230 Kompressor coupe in 6spd and never looked back. By now (12 years later) i had 5 Mercedes and converted my wife from BMW to a Mercedes as well. Love the brand, incredible engineering, comfortable, great options and looks amazing.
Mean while all of these years i always took a second look at any and all Porsche that would go by. Even though by now, i have been able to afford 2 S class Mercedes i still never thought about buying a Porsche for some unknown reason.
Two months ago on July 18th, i was born again. Having a heart attack at 33, opened my eyes wider than they ever have been. I always knew life was short and we need to live it. Don't wait for things to happen, make them happen. But now it hit me even more. I could not understand why this happened to me, I try to be healthy, i work out and i still had this happened. I finally asked my self, what am i waiting for?
So last Tuesday, i traded in an S550 for a beautiful 06 Carrera 4 in seal grey with black interior and chrono package. And i have been enjoying my new life very much.
Its not very fast, but its still faster and way more fun to drive than an S class. I miss nice comfy ride and options up to wazoo, but this thing gets my ticker pumping .
That's a great story. Plan for the future but live in the now. Is that the actual RC toy you had from when you were a child?
Dad had a 1962 356B coupe and used to put me to sleep by putting the cradle on the rear deck and going for a drive ... No conscious memories of the car but he always spoke lovingly of his Porsche.
For me, it started in 1978 when I was 14...had a newspaper route (remember those?)
Bought a Tamiya Porsche 935 model for $68 - a TON of money in the day.....always liked the bad assed Porsche race cars and the red whit and blue 935 was the ultimate for me....
How did I become a Porsche person? Like the saying goes: first slowly, then all at once.
As a teenager, quite honestly, I never really cared much for cars. But it made sense to know about them, so I started reading. Mostly R&T.
Gradually I learned there are cars people can afford, which back then were crap. There are really fast cars people can't afford, but which are still crap because they're not much more reliable than the cheap crap, and not really very useful either. And then there are Porsches- or should I say then there is the 911, because back then the 911 was Porsche- the one car in the world that as far as I could tell definitely is not crap. But which you can't have anyway, seeing as they cost as much as a house. (Yes you could buy a house for $20k back then.) But at least I knew if I had to have a dream car, it would probably be the 911.
Probably.
Then one day my best friend's uncle took me out for a ride in his brand new 1975 Porsche Turbo Carrera. We passed 4 cars and a logging truck in a flash, cruised at 135 in stability and comfort, and I knew all at once I am a Porsche person.
03-01-2015, 05:52 PM
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