"Get up off your knees!" comes the command from the bullhorn.
Usually they're telling me to get down on them, I think as the Long Beach patrolman proceeds to run our IDs. Our crime? Photographing this 911 Turbo on a watercraft loading dock.
It may have been easier to go unnoticed at our location if this hadn't been one of Ferdinand's finest, or in this case one of the finest modified 997 Porsches with more attitude than Gary Busey at a road block.
Put simply, Vorsteiner does to Porsches what Mickey did for the Italian Stallion, make them look more aggressive and lose weight at the same time. While Rocky Balboa's program consisted of sit-ups and egg yolks, Vorsteiner's consists of replacing various elements of the body with lighter and potentially more aerodynamic parts.
Porsche cognoscenti will immediately notice the absence of the front fog lights in the front bumper, a nod to the factory 997 GT2. Sure, you can't see the school bus in front of you on that murky night but just go around it, and run into the deer, Porsche style.
While the rear bumper, which is of course carbon fiber like the front, has its technical merits like a wider stance with enlarged intercooler extraction vents, the money shot is the carbon-fiber rear diffuser with twin aero fins that encompass the exhaust tips perfectly.
The über-cool techno material is only exposed at lower levels though. The carbon composite rear decklid is painted white, only barely disguising the twin-ram air scoops feeding air into the Porsche's powerplant.
While the aero kit that you see is obviously formed this way for a reason, the biggest enhancement to this Porsche's performance is one you can't see. Well you could if it was there and you wanted to pretend you were in a convertible and open the sunroof.
That's right, the sunroof and stock roof panel have been removed and replaced with a V-RT dry carbon-fiber roof panel. We could tell you how they attached it to the stock body but then we'd have to explain the process.
Metallurgical alchemy aside, this addendum, or subtraction as it would be, shaves around 50 pounds off the weight of the roof according to Vorsteiner. Take into account the matter of polar inertia and center of gravity and we're talking about a stealth mod comparative to cluster bombs in a scooter, or Ducatis that shoot out from robot legs in Terminator 4.
Like Marion Jones after a workout session, this sprinter's legs have been put on a barely undetectable program of steroids. KW coilovers must have a vested interest in the dry carbon front spoiler lip as they have managed to implement a 45mm lift in their hydraulic cylinder system to clear those steep driveways in the Hollywood Hills. You don't want to scrape when you show up to Dennis Hopper's house for Fondu. Like nuclear destruction, this adjustment is available at the press of a button.
Destruction of the engine however is not. The extra power is made available through bolt-on components such as the mufflers, throttle-bodies, exhaust manifolds and intercoolers. All of which are less restrictive, high-capacity units.
It may have been the combination of the Vorsteiner-enhanced Porsche's growling motor, the shoot-to-kill appearance including the directional 20 inch rims, or the fact that we rolled somewhat brazenly onto the watercraft loading area in the company of this menacing piece of German engineering with not only a still camera but video too. All of this is bound to make the haters call the police. They live on the coast of Long Beach and they don't have a Porsche like this? This might be why the officer approached our shoot in his Ford Escape like he was storming Normandy. Luckily, Peter and his "insistent" friend distracted the officer long enough for yours truly to get our shots. This is a hardcore, functionally modified example of what happens when a high dollar company sticks it out to not only provide the ultimate in upgrades, but distracts the Man while we document the result of their fastidious work.