A few minutes behind the wheels of these extraordinary cars made the lonely, not-a-good-cup-of-coffee-to-be-had miles on the Northeast Extension of the Pennsylvania Turnpike worth it. With the GT3, Porsche has come up with a brilliant throwback to a simpler, two-wheel-drive, naturally aspirated time. There's a distinct change in demeanor as the revs climb and the engine hits the sweet spot in the powerband.
The black-and-orange GT3 RS and white GT3 are owned by Dr. Joseph Scojna, who also owns and pilots a small but impressive collection of WWII fighters, including a P-51 Mustang and a Spitfire (and there's always the T-6 when he needs an extra seat). So he knows a bit about performance machinery.
Scojna left his first PCA drivers-ed event, at Pocono Raceway, enamored with the GT3 and awestruck at the performance potential his instructors had demonstrated.
For now, his RS remains stock, except for some special paintwork and Fabspeed exhaust work. All the factory silver interior trim has been repainted black-with the exception of some strategically placed orange accents and a roll cage. There are limits, though. Scojna had the wing endplates painted black, as he felt orange there was a bit too much.
The silver GT3, whose owner requested his name remain unpublished, left the factory with a custom interior-black leather with silver stitching covers every surface possible-and the amazing Porsche Ceramic Composite Brake package.
"I like a car with razor-sharp handling and a high-strung motor," he says. "Fabspeed made the car even more to my taste. I don't like to leave anything stock."
On all the cars, Fabspeed replaced the stock headers with proprietary units, which feature a cast stainless steel three-into-one merge collector and changed to 200-cell race cats. The four-inch tips incorporated with the twin Fabspeed MaxFlo performance mufflers (replacing the OE rear muffler) look menacing next to the smaller factory tips. The GT3s also have side mufflers filling each of the rear fenders. The Silver GT3's owner went a step further and replaced those side mufflers with Fabspeed's bypass pipes. A Fabspeed high-performance air intake with a BMC filter and ECU upgrade were included.
"I'm thrilled with the results," he says. "I've thought about quieting it down a little-a friend called the other night, wondering if a pack of caf bikes were out racing or if I had just driven by. And it really rattles them at school when I pick up the kids. Its hard-edged wail makes it absolutely the best-sounding car I've ever heard."
The real payoff comes from the weight savings: around 90 pounds between the CF brakes and exhaust work, with much of that at or behind the rear axle. Blasting through the same turns, back-to-back, the silver car is even more confident than the others. The massive 305/30 rear tires no longer seem a safety measure guarding against long polar moment rotations, but feel incredibly confident, begging to be pushed through the corners.
As its owner says: "The car rotates quicker and feels more centered. The weight is not so far back. You can lift off the throttle more aggressively, trail-brake harder going into a corner and get on the gas a little bit sooner coming out. But I'm not willing to ditch the A/C yet." Although he does plan to find a carbon fiber RS tail and will soon be conspiring with Fabspeed to find even more power.