2018 Porsche 911 GT3, at home at the track
2018 Porsche 911 GT3, at home at the track
10:21

2018 Porsche 911 GT3, at home at the track

Cars
[BLANK_AUDIO] [MUSIC] GT3, three little marks on the back of a car can mean so much to so many. In this case, it means the Porsche is updated its track special, made more of an already savage machine. The GT3 is back and it's more GT3 than ever. [MUSIC] [SOUND] [MUSIC] Porsche's GT cars are for the hard core driver. The people that want to get into their cars and have a lot of fun. All the lived long day. And they all hugged back to the 2.7 litre RSS from the 1970s. You see, way about grand Porsche wanted to make a new race car even, get all kinds of [UNKNOWN]. But in order to do so, it had to build a [UNKNOWN] number of road cars for normal human beings to buy. The results in [UNKNOWN] was the now [UNKNOWN] 2.7 l RS. It was lighter, it was harder, it was faster, it was just better than anything that had come before it. If you are in to your 911's really, that is the one to go for. Only problem is, there are very few of them and they very rarely come up for sale and when they do, well- They cost squillions, I digress, the 2.7 RS is a special important car. It's also the blue print for all of the GT Porsches. It was lighter, had more power, fewer creature comforts. It was basically a GT3 before GT3s were a thing. Now the 991.1 911 GT3 was a truly brilliant car. It was absolutely awesome. There were two things about it that stuck in my craw. The first was that many people said yeah you can live with it every single day. You couldn't. The nose was so low any speed bump or slight incline led to grinding noises and lots of wincing and Lots of discomfort and hoping that no one else heard or saw what you'd just done. Then there was the other thing, the thing that everyone loves to mention, the gear box. It was PDK only, and that irked a fair few people, because they wanted to change gears on their own, and have lots of fun pretending to be a racing driver from the old days. And that's perfectly fine. It's an admirable thing to want to do, to be a racing Racecar driver and feel like as king, but in reality the PDK when it makes more sense for better lap times. It's more efficient, it's faster, it's just better than a human doing that particular job. However because so many people complained and moaned, Porsche listened and now this generation GT3, you can have a six speed manual, which is really fantastic news. Because some people, myself included most of the time, well they want the extra engagement. So good on you Porsche. But this one is a PDK, in case you haven't noticed. And I don't mind that because here, the magic lies in the numbers. Nestling somewhere behind my **** is a naturally aspirated four liter [UNKNOWN] with 400 delicious horsepowers and 339 foot. Now, with a stick shift, it will hit 62 in just 3.9 seconds and top out at about 198 miles an hour. If you let the car do the work for you, however, [UNKNOWN] to 62 happens in 3.4 seconds, and you'll manage 197 miles an hour. So quicker, but also slower. The [UNKNOWN] is marginally heavier than the stick shift. The weight difference is negligible. However, to keep the kilos off, Porsche's put this thing ona diet. So the roof is magnesium There's wing and bonnet, boot cover thing at the back that's carbon and of course there are no rear seats and other little bits here and there. Normally diets are really boring but in this it adds up to some 1500 kilos of fun so it's a bit light and promises to be a bit exciting. The new car offers more downforce than the old one as well. That's thanks in part to lessons learned from the 911R. It's new front and rear and moving it's carbon rear wing just a touch. There's 20% more of this stuff than you used to get. What about the engine well? It revs and nears 9000 RPM which is insane and awesome. Porsche says it's actually rather closely related to the engine found in it's 911 cup cars. It's also got rear steer so at low speeds. The rear wheels will turn in the opposite direction to the front [UNKNOWN] slightly so that you can manoeuver back to. But at high speed they turn in the same direction so you get a better aligning. Essentially, this thing is pretty much a freaking race car except It isn't, because it's got number plates and seat belts and sat nav. I wouldn't go the whole hog and say this is a car you can daily. One, because no one really needs to daily 500 horses. And two, this is a toy you should enjoy regularly on a track In fact, the majority of Porsche's GT customers take their rides on a track to do, well, track things. [SOUND] [MUSIC] Track stuff like this. [SOUND] [LAUGH] There's something very special about having a GT3 and an empty racetrack just for you. Especially when you can start pressing buttons that give a little bit of snip and more noise. So let's talk about the basics, the PTK. The gearbox that people were unsure of in the last one, but actually had to be reminded that it's really rather good. Guess what? It's still really rather good, it's so fast and so slick and it's just is bang on. It knows what you want, it reads your mind. Gearbox good, steering also so good. You can feel every little bit of the road through this. It's so communicative. There's no dead spot. There's no delay to it. It's got that Porsche feedback, and my God, I love that Porsche feedback. It makes me feel happy inside. What about the brakes? Well, they're carbon all around. A good thing, not only because they reduce the weight, But also because they don't fade after a day of abuse on the circuit. Now the pedal trouble isn't very long at all. They can be quite sharp. They take a while to get used to as a lot of these things do. There isn't much motion to it so you get not much and then lots of stopping. My they work, they work so well. This thing's partly beast though. That's the engine, this 4 liter engine just sings. I'm going to turn the noise button on and I'm gonna drop it down in second, gonna go up hill at 5,000 RPM, noise. [SOUND] My god it sounds so good, it's the proper 911 howl. It's back. I've missed that noise so much, it's just stunning. You don't get that with the turbo cars, and thank whichever day it is. You pray to that Porsche decided to avoid turbos in this, because it wouldn't sound half as good. Yeah, it might be a bit quicker, but this thing is Fast with a capital F. And that is displayed in the handling. The speed at which you can go round corners, the speed it can carry, it's unbelievable. So much grip and I'm not even exploiting half of what this thing can do, not even half. The suspension set-up on it is simply stunning, the aero and the down force. You put it into a corner You get it little squirt mid-bend. You feel it dig in at the back like all 911's do and then away you go. This is a punishing, punishing car to drive badly. There's not much room for error but when you get everything right it flows beautifully. I know if I had this on the road I Hate it but it's a reason for CG customers stick him on a track so often because here is where it belongs, here is where I can safe. And here is where I wanna live for the rest of my life. [LAUGH] It's savage. This is a savage, fierce beast of a car. [UNKNOWN] no illusions. If you're an idiot and buy one of these and turn everything off and expect to become some kind of racing driver, you are probably gonna do yourself a disservice but learning Learn this thing and you will have the time of your life. [MUSIC] Judging by the excited shiny headed man, I think he rather enjoyed it. In fact, I know he did, but, this is a brand spanking new GT 3. It has to be better than all of those that came Before it. So the question is is it as good as we thought it would be? So then, this car, the car with the three little marks, GT3. Is it worthy of its predecessor's or has Porsche missed the mark? Well having spent a whole day spanking around a race track and giggling like a lunatic, it's just Brilliant, everything about it is well thought out but it does belong here. It would be a little unruly for the day to day, maybe for a b road blast. The 911 GT3 on a racetrack well those two belong together. [MUSIC]

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