One week after Ferrari launched the 430 Scuderia, Porsche has done the same with this 911 GT2. Like its bitter Italian rival, the GT2 is a highly evolved version of the standard 911 Turbo. The GT2 costs £131,070, some £31,150 more than the Turbo. For that you get an engine icreased by 50 bhp – now 530 bhp – which is achieved by raising the turbo boost pressure of the 3.6-litre flat six and fitting a very clever expansion intake manifold which reduces the temperature of the fuel/air mixture, improving power and cutting fuel consumption by up to 15%. The entire suspension system has also been uprated to cope with the extra power and includes Porsche’s Active Suspension Management system. Also included are Porsche’s ceramic brake discs, reducing weight by another 50kg per corner. Indeed, saving weight forms as much a part of the GT2 strategy as additional power. A substantial number of kilos have also been lost by deleting the Turbo’s all-wheel-drive hardwear and many more by fitting the GT2 with a titanium exhaust silencer weighing half as much as a conventional steel item. More weight shaving comes in the form of fitting thin sports bucket seats in place of the rather thickly padded stock items, while those in the back have been dispensed with altogether. The result of all this is a car weighing 145kg less than the Turbo. Visually you’re unlikely to mistake the GT2, thanks to that vast front air intake and the unique rear wing unless, of course, you’re on an autobahn and one comes past at over 200mph.
If you’re after an ultra-high-performance car but need one that will handle the accrual of a high mileage in a short period of time, then this is the car, Porsche claim. For all its explosive performance and astonishing output, I don’t doubt that the GT2 will prove a thorn in Ferrari’s side. There’s no faulting the construction quality of the GT2, however, the striking similarity between its cabin materials and those of a standard 911 at less than half the price doesn’t help totting up my score board. Around the £60,000 mark the slightly gloomy and unimaginative cabin with its substantial plastic content may be acceptable, but up here in the thin air above £130,000 it’s probably not. If you’re ever lucky enough to get your hands on a GT2 – and Porsche will probably only sell 50 or so in the UK over the next two years – please take a moment and think about your passengers. They will see the car and probably take a deep gulp especially at all of those wings, scoops and slats, but the moment they settle down in the cabin they will be lulled into an entirely false sense of security. The engine doesn’t thunder into life, but gently fires up and settles down to a nice even idle that’s probably quieter than that of a standard 911 Carrera – thanks to the noise-reducing nature of turbochargers. As you pull away, instead of the car pinging off every bump in the road you’ll discover that it rides with great composure and even some comfort. As speeds gently rise you’ll look around the near enough standard cabin and conclude that there’s nothing to worry about at all.
But then the devil in you will not be able to avoid burying the throttle and clinging on for dear life. And it’s only then that you will find this is a 911 like no other ever built. The GT2 – without the traction advantage of the Turbo’s four-wheel drive – will get to 100mph in 7.4 seconds and to 62mph in exactly half that time. So if you’re lolloping along the motorway at the legal limit and fancy giving your GT2 a bit of stick, you are never less than three seconds away from a driving ban. Find yourself a stretch of road (or, ideally, track) long and legal enough to really stretch its legs and the GT2 is car whose rate of acceleration only slows above 190mph. Given the space it will do 204 mph according to Porsche. Leave the wide open spaces and find some tight, twisty roads and the GT2 continues to impress with impressive levels of grip (in the dry at least) and brakes so strong that to stop any faster you’d have to find a wall to drive into. It steers with the utmost precision and is also unreasonably accommodating if you switch off the stability systems and tread too hard in a corner. If the back does start to swing round (and it is pretty violent in these situations) then you can correct the slide with a lot of balls and an armful of steering. Note to yourself; I must obey the first rule of 911 driving and must not snap shut the throttle. But while the GT2 impresses in all these ways, still it fails to crawl under your skin and infect you with its enthusiasm in the way you might expect of a car costing more than a Ferrari F430. For all its power, the engine has an unremarkable voice and, because it’s turbocharged, a very soft reaction to the accelerator. There’s always a pause before the thrust is delivered, and that wonderful delicacy of feel as you balance the throttle and the steering through a corner, as found in the naturally aspirated 911 GT3, is notable only by its absence. Truth is, the GT2 is a considerably more blunt instrument than its relentlessly enthusiastic stablemate, which is £50,410 cheaper.
This may be the most powerful 911 of all time, but it doesn’t mean it’s a car you can drive without an element of fear. With stability and traction control on, the GT2 will look after you long after you’ve forgotten what’s good for your health. It’s only when you turn everything off that things start to get hairy. Thankfully there’s plenty of safety features at hand. It has the usual plethora of airbags as standard and, while Euro NCAP has yet to get around to testing this sort of car, 911s are known to crash very well. You also get a Porsche Driving Experience day as part of the purchase price, which is well worth every penny. As far as security is concerned, over and above the standard alarm and immobiliser, the GT2 comes with a Thatcham 5-standard tracking system. Porsche’s claim that the GT2 will do 22.6mpg in the combined cycle seems impressive, not least because that makes it more frugal than either the Turbo or the GT3. The reality is that it will be an expensive car to fuel, tax, insure, re-tyre and repair. Given the nature of the beast, the GT2 is an eerily refined and comfortable car. And while this might detract somewhat from the sheer tactile thrills it might otherwise have been able to offer, it also offers the owner an opportunity to use the car for purposes that might otherwise have left it in the garage. For this is a car as at home in the urban crawl as on a race track. You could drive it for 10 hours and emerge still fresh and relaxed.
Although I thoroughly enjoyed a full five hours with the GT2, I do have some doubts. On the positive side, however, every Porsche I seem to test is impeccably constructed, and unlike a Ferrari, won’t be permanently in the garage for repair. Although the interior should be something special, I suppose with a tried and tested formula, and one that functions extremely well, there’s no real need to change it. Nevertheless, the GT2 is a seruously scary car especially if you push it too far. During my test, thinking I could slide it around a curved corner with the traction aids turned off, it bit me straight in the arse resulting in a complete 180 degree spin. Having learnt my lesson and tinkered with my driving style, the GT2 still continued to bite back, and this I fear may get a lot of owners into a serious problem, even with some driver training from Porsche. Even with my racing experience, it still needs a lot of respect if you want to play around, or even push hard on a track day. Having driven the GT3 RS only a week prior to this test, I have to say that the RS is a more useable machine even at the limit. It seems that the GT2 is an all-out balls-machine and a showcase as to what Porsche is really capable of when they put everything into a road car. I have no doubt that as an everyday car it will fulfill every type of driving pleasure and then some, but I would reserve the looney antics for a race track. This I’m sure isn’t going to put the very luck owners who have placed their orders off trying their luck. As the most powerful 911 to date, boy, is it a masterpiece. For yet another kick-in-the-nuts 911, it’s a bit over the top and not one of Porsche’s ultimtate driving machines. But then, that’s probably the point, the GT2 appealing to a handful of drivers who like their 911s old-school feisty.
source: www.autoreview-online.com
