Joe Williams
Sandbanks, UK @joewilliamsuk Model 912 Year 1967 Acquired APR 2017
A track day in late February?! Statistically that should be a miserable day out. By some miracle we had the only break in the weather for weeks and Silverstone dished up an almost perfect blue sky day! With an early start a few of us headed Up North (to be fair everywhere is north from here on the south coast). Sign-on was busy and the mix of cars was strong. It was mostly all regular drivers, which definitely added some confidence out on track – the pace was fast and pretty unforgiving! The day was run by Open Track, so it was a complete mix of track-only and high-performance road cars. The Porsche turnout was very good and we all held our own.
One of my personal favourite cars of the day was a white 997 ex-cup racer that was being driven really hard and fast. The full cage, GT engine, sequential box, slicks and those distinctive knock-on wheels is such a menacing look, especially when it flies past you only centimetres away!
I know the track day was in my little 987 Cayman, which is frowned upon in this magazine, but Porsche chat soon got us mulling over what you’d actually need to put together a budget track weapon, and we reckoned a £10-12K 996 combined with a set of coilovers, new pads and discs up front plus a set of Nankangs and you’d be out there hustling with the pack. Friend and fellow columnist Phil Farrell took his lovely 996.2 C4 X51 Coupe round after having worked through a load of suspension, steering and bushes, and out the box it went round the track really well. There’s some food for thought for those not wanting to take their newer high-ticket cars on track.
Our Porsche podcast is looking good for an April kick-off and we’re hoping to put on a launch event on the south coast with a gathering of all things Porsche. The plan is a cars and coffee style meet, but with the added option to part with a minute of your own Porsche wisdom which we’ll drop on the show! There’s already a few special 911s lined up to attend, so keep an eye out for the details and follow us on the social stuff, which for the podcast is @road.to.redline.