JOHANNESBURG - There are fast cars, then there’s the Porsche 911 GT2 RS. I’ve been in fast cars before; Lamborghini’s Huracan Performante springs to mind, as does the latest iteration of the Porsche 911 Turbo S. The 911 GT2 RS, however, pulls harder, goes faster and thrills like no other fast car I’ve ever driven before. Here are five reasons why you need the GT2 RS in your life:
1) Fastest 911 you can buy
Ok, so the latest generation Porsche 911 Turbo might scamper away from the GT2 RS from a dig (all-wheel drive versus rear-wheel drive), but once you’re moving, the RS accelerates with such brute force and pace that it turns the world into a blur. Genuinely, it’s one of those cars that forces the blood to rush from your head, leaving you gasping and quivering with excitement. Porsche says 0-100km/h takes 2.8seconds, 0.1secs more than the Turbo S I mentioned earlier, but it’s the 0-200km/h sprint that takes just 8.2 seconds that will blow your mind the most.
2) Comfortable at any speed
It won’t win any awards for a sumptuous ride, but thanks to its highly-tuned carbon-fibre and rose-jointed suspension system with active magnetic dampers, there’s a genuine sense of comfort and control in the GT2 RS that you don’t get in many super sports cars. Normally in these “handling” cars, there’s a little too much firmness in the ride quality, but not here, and in fact, even when you dial up the shock absorbers into its sportiest setting, the car still rides extremely comfortably. YOu do have to get used to the noise in the cabin, as Porsche has used as a little sound deadening as possible to keep things light, but you’ll quickly get comfortable behind the wheel and you might even find it comfortable rough to take the long road to the coast in it if you live in Gauteng.
3) Racing car technologies
The suspension system isn’t the only racing tech that Porsche has borrowed from the boys in its motorsport programme, as the car also comes with a bespoke water-injection system that sprays a fine mist over the cooling system to keep the intake air charge as cold as possible. You can top up the cooling mist system under the bonnet, using distilled water. When out testing the car in the hot Cradle of Humankind sun earlier this week, with temperatures peaking at 38 degrees celsius, not once did it reduce power or go into any sort of preservation mode. It’s amazing that an engine with this amount of power and torque is able to remain cool and calm even after leaning on the throttle pedal for 30-minute-long stints through the twisties. The brakes on the car is fantastic too, making it easy to stop the car from speeds well over 300km/h yet with a deft enough feel to it that pottering around town is as easy as driving a regular Carerra.
4) Unhinged power on tap
With 515kW and 750Nm at your disposal, it’s difficult to truly describe the performance punch on offer in the 911 GT2 RS. Imagine you’re sitting in the Millenium Falcon, perhaps, and Han asks you to hit the jump to lightspeed. The car simply takes a deep breath and punches you down the road with such ferocity that you’d think you’re hurting the vehicle, but again and again, launch after launch and redline gear pull after redline gear pull, it just kept in ticking like a precision Swiss watch. In fact, when discussing the car amongst ourselves in the motoring team, we decided that the sheer brute power and accelerative force in the GT2 RS is what it must feel like to be Superman. There’s no lag, absolutely no turbo lag. The car just pulls toward the horizon as hard as possible the moment you give it the full beans. Porsche say that at full tilt, the GT2 RS will hit nearly 350km/h, and I can tell you that from the driver’s seat, they are not lying!
5) The last of a dying breed
The Porsche 911 GT2 RS stands resolute as one of the last of its kind of high-performance (non-electrified) super sports cars. There’s no 48V system here to give you torque-fill and there’s no smart-all-wheel-drive with torque vectoring to keep you on the straight and narrow. It’s a drivers car with ultra-sharp steering, superb brakes, amazing aero and an engine that should be classified as a weapon of mass destruction. As more and more carmakers, Porsche included, pursue electrification and cars become bigger, heavier and more insulated, we’ll remember this GT2 RS as one of the finest pieces of automotive engineering ever created. It’s a petrol snorting, fire-breathing monster that begs to be driven hard and if you want a car that will give you a tingle in your soul every time you drive it, this is it. I didn’t expect to like the GT2 RS, as I simply love the GT3 RS and consider that to be the best Porsche car they make, but my oh my, after feeling the rocket-propelled-grenade that is the GT2 RS, it’s the one car I wish I could buy right now and keep forever.
Contact Porsche South Africa if you’re interested in buying a 911 GT2 RS as these cars are not listed on the company’s website any longer.
SPECIFICATIONS
MAKE & MODEL: 2020 Porsche 911 GT2 RS
ENGINE: 3.8-litre flat-six twin-turbo petrol with
POWER: 515kW at 7000rpm
TORQUE: 750Nm at 2500rpm
GEARBOX: 7-speed PDK
DRIVE: Rear-wheels
0-100km/h: 2.8secs
TOP SPEED: 340km/h
PRICE: Price on application
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