Originally Posted by NJ-GT

Very close, I am expecting 3-4 secs faster Ring times.

That should put the RS in the 7:36 range, quite fast for a fairly underpowered car compared to the GTR, ZR1, Viper ACR, GT2, LP560/4, Scuderia. Pretty much the GT3 RS would be crushing all these cars where it matters, in the turns. Being 4 secs behind the Super fast 997 GT2 tells a lot of good things about the new GT3 RS.

Originally Posted by prosper

Porsche is now under control of VW and we know Mr. Ferdinand Piech is the "Alpha" male !

so Mr. Ferdinand Piech should sent a letter to Mr. Carlos Ghosn, officially challenge Nissan to a Race in the Nurburgring.

Porsche and Nissan should both split the cost of renting Nurburgring for 3 days, just in case one day is not enough due to weather.

Porsche and Nissan also should split the cost of independent institution to make sure it will be a FAIR race.
some institution like Deloite Touche or Price WaterHouse Cooper or Ernst and Young.

The rule will be like this:

a Nissan representative will travel with the Independent Consultant to a Porsche dealer which have Brand New GT3 mk2 ready on it's showroom floor. That GT3 mk2 might already been reserved for a customer, but than the Independent Consultant,
would only need to call Porsche HQ to make that dealer release the car to be bought by Nissan representative,
and of course Porsche HQ will give compensation to that dealer and to the customer who is forced to wait a bit longer for his replacement car. That way the car will be randomly picked and from showroom stock condition, so no cheating/secret tuning can be done.

in the same time Porsche representative should also do the same procedure as the above to buy the GT-R from any random Nissan dealer, accompanied by independent consultant of course.

Than both car would be under Quarantine by the independent consultant until Race Day.

when Race day arrive, both car will be delivered to their respective team for further tuning/setting/inspection of the suspension.
but NO ENGINE tuning is allowed, and no Engine checking is allowed too, cause especially Nissan can pretend they are
checking the OBD while instead they download a secret over boost program.

During all this tuning an independent consultant and each factory representative will be watching carefully to make sure
nobody cheat !

after that, both car will go first to Dyno Test just to make sure again that their engine is within the official spec.

and to make it fair, both car should be using the same tyre they equiped from the showroom floor.
I almost forget to add that they also should use the same gasoline/octane spec...

than, both car will be driven in as close time as possible so the weather/track condition will be as similar as possible.

the driver will be Walter Rohrl or any other Porsche best factory driver,
and for Nissan it will be Toshio Suzuki or any other Nissan best factory driver.

The first and second day will be independence timing day,
and if by third day, both driver feel they want to do a duel, than they will race like real race.
and to make it fair it will be a two part race, where in the first race, the Nissan will start from the left lane, and Porsche on right lane,
and on the second race, vice versa !
regarding how many laps for each race... well let's Walter and Suzuki decide for themselves how many round they want to have...

I am sure this will, once and for all silent the controversy and doubt !

FYI,Naturally My money is with Walter Rohrl and GT3 Mk2, of course...

and all the procedure above can be repeated for GTR spec V vs GT3 RS Mk2 or GT2

ok, now did anybody here know, Mr. Ferdinand Piech Mobile Phone or e-mail address ?

Originally Posted by SpeedGeek

I suspect, for the manufacturers, the internet-fired intrigue of who is faster at the 'ring has more value than actually proving a scientific conclusion. I can't see the advantage to building sports cars with the single-minded purpose of beating competitors by a second or two at the 'ring. It won't help sales and it won't make for overall better sports cars. You'll end up with a lot of oranges where many customers would actually prefer the choice of an apple. Or a pear.

Imagine anyone who is trying to decide between say a GT3, F458, GT2, GT-R, ZR-1, Gallardo, etc. No way are a few seconds on the 'ring going to make that decision for them. I challenge any one person on this forum to state that they would decide which sports car to write a check for based on 5 or even 10 'ring seconds.

We all enjoy the intrigue - it makes for fun, if pointless, internet / pub banter. And I suspect the manufacturers like it that way.

There are plenty GT race series around the world. That's where the manufacturers compete and build themselves a reputation.