Chris Harris Blown Away By the 992 911 GT3 RS

Blown Away

The new Porsche 992 911 GT3 RS is, as we all expected, a pretty amazing machine, one that carries on a long-standing tradition of providing consumers with a pure yet ridiculously quick track weapon that's also totally street-legal. As such, it's truly no surprise that car nut and Top Gear host Chris Harris was a bit blown away after spending some time behind the wheel of one recently.

Photos: Porsche

Massive Drag

As Harris points out right off the bat, the latest GT3 RS is, perhaps, the most extreme road-going car to ever emerge from Porsche, which is really saying something. However, it's not the fastest by any means - in fact, thanks to that massive rear wing, it tops out at 184 mph - a big drop from the non-winged car's 198 mph top speed. But when the road turns curvy, that tradeoff seems well worth it.

Photos: Porsche

Wet Conditions

There was no better place to demonstrate this than Silverstone at this particular time of year, which was predictably wet thanks to non-stop rain. Regardless, the Porsche team on hand wasn't the slightest bit worried that the car's 518 horsepower flat-six would give the tires fits in the wet.

Photos: Porsche

Superb Performance

Once things dry up a bit, however, Harris is able to test the car's true limits, and he walks away rather impressed. "The first thing to note is the stability under braking - it’s just superb," he says. "You can smash the middle pedal from 130mph and fire the car straight over the curbs, it really doesn’t feel much slower than the last GT3 race car I drove here," Harris notes as he observes a 2.4g recorded on the dash at one point.

Photos: Porsche

Close Pace

"To get that slingshot run down the Hangar Straight I dip down to third and there’s a nasty little lump that always tips a car into some understeer, but the RS doesn’t just feel like a racecar through there, it feels better than most," Harris adds. "It’s all a bit mind scrambling. Even on a drying track, it does a 2:14 lap, which is nuts. I think my best on low fuel and fresh slicks in a GT3 racer is just under two minutes. This thing really isn’t so far off that pace."

Photos: Porsche

Good Enough?

Turns out, the new 911 GT3 RS handles and brakes so well that Harris feels as if it needs more power, even in spite of its impressive performance. Sure, the car lags behind the competition by a large margin in that regard, but the numbers speak for themselves, and the latest RS is almost as fast around the track as its racing brethren.

Photos: Porsche

One Big Problem

The only problem, as has always been the case with these cars, is price and availability. In these unprecedented times, the new GT3 RS figures to be more difficult and more expensive to acquire than ever before, meaning that few are likely to actually be used on the track as intended. Regardless, those that do take their new cars there will come away mighty impressed by their physics-defying capability. 

Photos: Porsche

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