PORSCHE 911 GT3 · GOLF R vs MERC A35 · 508 PHEV
The latest generation of the “world’s best sports car” is here, but can the new 911 GT3 live up to its reputation? Spoiler alert: yes
A thorough first drive of the new Porsche 911 GT3, plus the VW Golf R and Mercedes-AMG A35 go head to head for hot hatch honours
The 911 GT3 is the answer to that question. Every generation since its first iteration appeared in 1999 has been the answer, unless you happen to be one of those strange people who disavows the 911 – like QAnon supporters, they’re out there – when in fact everyone knows it’s the world’s best sports car. The GT3 is the best version, distilled motorsport genius rendered surprisingly biddable on the road.
But these are strange times, and the optics on the highly engineered hedonism that the 911
GT3 has always represented might not have the absolute clarity they once did. One of Porsche’s top brass assured me recently that the mighty work it’s done on the Taycan hasn’t pushed internal combustion into the background. Frankly, he sounded offended that I’d even suggest such a thing. The game’s not up yet.
And here’s the latest 911 GT3 to ram home the point, strafing its 9,000rpm red line with such conviction that it’s enough to erase the memory of the past year, lockdown paranoia obliterated in one lap of primal intake yowl and
“THIS PORSCHE HAS ALWAYS BEEN A BONA FIDE TRACK CAR, UNLIKE PLENTY OF THINGS THAT PRETEND TO BE BUT AREN’T”
wail of exhaust. Then there’s the way that its front end dissects corner entry, apex and exit, always a 911 strong point, but now served up in a manner that’s just cosmically brilliant. In fact, it’s so positive on the front axle that you briefly forget that the 911’s signature is the traction it summons up at the rear. Didn’t see that one coming... The GT3 doesn’t just evolve, its rubber does too, and these latest Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 tyres – 255/35 and 315/30 front/rear – are as good as anything this side of full-blown racing slicks are likely to get. (An ‘R’ spec tyre is an option, and it was on these that the GT3 set a Nürburgring lap time of six minutes 59 seconds, almost a full minute faster than the 996 GT3 managed 22 years ago.) I’m genuinely struggling to think of another car that turns in and grips the way this thing does, that communicates with such vocal intensity in every phase of a fast lap. The McLaren 600LT, perhaps, whose steering and chassis smarts atone for its lack of sonic drama. Not an issue the GT3 suffers from, needless to say.
This Porsche has always been a bona fide track car, unlike plenty of things that pretend to be but aren’t. This has never been truer than now: it uses the same double wishbone front suspension that Porsche’s motorsport people developed for the 911 RSR racing car, which keeps more of the tyre’s contact patch on the road (or track) surface as the lateral forces build. The upper and lower links are rose-jointed, and Porsche claims greater steering precision and improved camber stability. There are rose joints in the active rear axle too, replacing the regular bushes in pursuit of ever greater control and harmony. Firmer spring rates and damping reduce roll, pitch and dive, while toe angle, camber and anti-roll bars are adjustable for track use. Porsche says that its PASM tech has been recalibrated to give the GT3 the necessary amplitude to keep the thing on the island away from billiard table-smooth circuits. That’s important.
So what’s the GT3 made of? Well, you need to know that the engine is a naturally aspirated 4.0-litre, has little in common with the unit found elsewhere in the 992 range and a lot to do with the one used in Porsche’s GT3 Cup racing car. Power is up a modest 10bhp to 503bhp, torque to 347lb ft. Porsche, at least, has realised that horsepower inflation is the road to nowhere, and 500 is surely enough. It is enough. The engine is constructed on the same production line as the competition unit, features six individual throttle butterfly valves, and there’s a new stainless exhaust system. In other words, this is a 911 variant with its own bespoke power unit that deliberately eschews the technology used by its siblings, presumably because that’s what 911 GT3 customers prefer. No forced induction. Similarly, you can have it with a six-speed manual or a seven-speed PDK, the manual proving more popular in the US for some reason than the dual-clutch automatic (it’s 50/50 in the UK). The PDK is 20kg lighter than the one used elsewhere because it has one fewer ratio, and offers torque vectoring via an electronically controlled diff lock. The manual
has a mechanical rear diff lock, and the hardware gives it a weight advantage over the bulkier PDK of some 16.8kg.
Weight saving is one of the obsessions that makes this car what it is. Some examples: the carbon-fibre roof is 1kg lighter than the regular steel one, the full bucket carbon seats are 15kg lighter than the standard four-way sports seats, stripping out some of the 992’s sound deadening material loses another 1.9kg, and if you pony up for the ceramic brakes (£6,498) you’ll save another 17.7kg. I always wonder what difference putting a fat bloke in the passenger seat must make, but the fact is that Porsche is pathological about saving weight whether its clients are as personally fastidious or not. This methodology informs every aspect of the car, and ensures that the GT3 with the PDK that TG is driving here weighs 1,435kg, only 5kg more than the outgoing car (despite the addition of a particulate filter).
Ask any car designer to name the rival product they most admire and they’ll cite the 911. The 992 GT3’s visual makeover is mostly about aerodynamics, mostly borrowed from motorsport. This car’s surfaces, especially the bits you can’t see, are busy hustling air. There’s a four-stage adjustable splitter at the front, a complex fully panelled underbody, a juicy looking rear diffuser, and possibly the most elaborate rear wing ever seen on a road legal Porsche. It sits on a four-way manually adjustable ‘swan neck’ which improves air flow across the underside of the wing. The upshot is a car whose numbers make the old GT3 look about as aerodynamically sharp as the post office van Borat drove across America. At 124mph, with the wing in performance aero setting, it generates 385kg of downforce (an improvement of 150 per cent on the previous car). Its front track width has grown by 48mm, and overall the 911 GT3 is now in mortal danger of losing the wieldiness that is one of its key attributes. Don’t let it get any bigger, Porsche. And I’m not sure about the intakes in the carbon bonnet (the first, says Porsche, to meet pedestrian protection regs). This and Lamborghini’s Aventador SVJ have hints of Hercule Poirot to them.
There’s no mystery to the GT3’s genius, though. The 911 has long nailed the basics: driving position, seats, control weights. This is a car you instantly feel at home in, that you know you can do some proper business with. Few high performance track-oriented cars feel so immediately approachable while being so visceral at the same time. The cabin is regular 992, with a new Track Screen mode (central
“IT’S STILL VIABLE AS A DAILY DRIVER, SURE, BUT IT’S NOT A CAR YOU CAN BE ABSENTMINDED WITH”
rev counter only) and there’s a multi-function wheel that allows you to flick between chassis modes (including Sport and Track). There are also physical buttons to disable ESC and traction control, so there’s no need to arse about with the touchscreen. The PDK gets a normal-looking gearlever, but it is best operated using the steering wheel paddles. Some of the plastics are a little low-rent, but almost immediately you won’t be thinking about any of that.
There are faster, more flamboyant cars out there and I still pine for Ferrari’s longgone 430 Scuderia. But settle into the 911 GT3, dig deeper each lap into the fathomless depths of its chassis, dial up more and more revs, brake later and later (the ceramic composite brakes are 410mm diameter up front, 390mm at the rear and they’re stupendous), and it’s difficult to imagine how much more grip, balance and sheer speed you could conjure. There’s minimal understeer, oversteer only if you go looking determinedly for it, and total transparency in its responses. In fact, it’s difficult to separate the engine and chassis, each co-defining the other in the search for more layers of greatness. What it lacks in lower back-shove turbo thrustiness it makes up for in a swelling tide of torque and mania for high revs.
Yet nobody and nothing is perfect. This 911 GT3 feels like a more track-focused car, and consequently a little less usable on the road. While its low-speed ride over gnarly surfaces is very good, it demands much concentration the faster you go. Still viable as a daily driver, sure, but not a car you can be absent-minded with. Bits of the interior don’t feel rock solid, and I dislike the latest 911’s ignition stub (a start button would be better). Inevitably, you begin pondering where this car fits in the great Porsche scheme of things, where it sits relative to the 997 GT3 RS 4.0 or 911 R. On the other hand, as the car world pivots inexorably towards full digitalisation, electrification and autonomy, anything powered by a nat-asp engine that’s available with a manual gearbox isn’t just raging against the dying of the light, it’s walking on water. The questions might be changing, but the answer remains the same.