Joe Williams
Sandbanks, UK @joewilliamsuk Road to Redline
We’re allowed out! It’s official… even Boris says so, so it must be true?!
On hearing the news we grabbed the opportunity, before anyone changed their mind, and our local motley crew all cleared the diary for that first Monday out. After months of not being able to go anywhere you’d think we would have had plenty of time to plan the perfect road trip, but actually sometimes all you want is a bit of familiar routine. So of course we headed to West Bay for a coffee and some of the town’s baked
delights. In hindsight I shouldn’t have had the second almond croissant but hey, I’m sporting two extra cylinders these days in the 964 so my weight saving was less of a concern.
I think there’s something to be said for familiarity. We touched on it in the recent Road to Redline podcast about finance and how easy it is to jump in the next new car. Everyone is so quick to change cars these days and almost as soon as they get the new one they have already got one eye on the next one. I’ve been just as guilty in the past of this. Thinking back to the cars that really made an impression and that I enjoyed the most, they were the ones that I kept the longest. I appreciate that might sound obvious; you enjoyed them so you kept them longer, but I’m not so sure that was the reason. It takes time to appreciate any car and a bit more time to really learn the car and get really comfortable in it. And that’s, I think, when the fun actually starts.
Thinking about my little 912, I liked it from day one but it was only after a year or more than I really loved it and started to understand why that car is special and how to peddle it to really enjoy it too. I know lots of people that have
been in three different Porsches in less than 18 months, they can’t have barely worked out how to use the wipers in that time, let alone built up any connection or engagement with the car. I used to change my cars regularly and I think the only reason was fear of missing out on the next one. The grass is always greener, and the assumption is that the newer/ better model is going to do something magical compared to the current one. In hindsight, if I’d spent a bit more time with each car, I think I would have felt the benefit more, rather than just keeping it warm for the next guy.
Taking that one step further, I think if you want to speed up your appreciation for a new car then you need to turn the clock, back not forward. UK roads aren’t best suited to the breakneck speeds of the 991 or 992, so you never really get to see what they can do. This all seems a bit pointless when you really think about how much time you’d get to drive a new GT3 as intended outside of a trackday. So I think I’ve found the answer: jump into an older 911 and you have an instant feeling of appreciation, the fun factor is turned up to 10 straight away, and they feel just as ‘special’ because they are, after all, exactly that.