A dream...paused

Meine Herran,

The venerable Porsche Carrera GT is now officially at the end of its production run. Porsche AG has rolled out 1,270 CarreraGTs in total. The last CarreraGT was rolled out on the 6th of May.

The screaming all new 5700cc V10 , 605bhp engine was based on a Le Man racer and mated with a 6-speed manual transmission. For me, CarreraGT epitomised the greatest supercar of my generation. There was the Ferrari Enzo, Merc McLaren SLR, Koenigsegg and even the 1001bhp Bugatti Veyron, and I couldn’t care less.
Admittedly the supercar domain is fairly crowded. Almost all of these cars belt out over 600 bhp. All of them do over 300 kph and all of them look like supermodels in very less clothes. But there was something about the Carrera GT that was special. No, it was hardly the fastest car, it was not really the most good looking either. But something about it was a pace-maker.
Porsche could have gone all out and come up with a car to defeat the benchmark, the McLaren F1. But they did not. It would be silly to think Porsche did not have the technology. For some reason they have held back. It is evident in the specifications 605bhp (compared to Enzo’s 625bhp) etc. Porsche seemed to know exactly what they wanted out of the CarreraGT. They did NOT want a straight line world record holder. They wanted a track car. Though the CarreraGT was launched months before the much powerful Ferrari Enzo, Porsche couldn’t care less. They seemed to know what they had made. An epic.
On a track though, the Carerra GT blitzed competition with its razor sharp handling and knife-edge precision. And the fact that Porsche stuck to the good ol’ manual transmission rather than some jargon-loaded auto box was brilliant.
The blood curdling scream of the V10s, the exquisite weave of carbon fibre, the titanium exhausts all added to make a wonderful dream. Always makes me a 4 yr old.
In my extended childhood (also called adulthood), nothing has held my imagination for so long. Every time I saw one on TV I knew I wanted to be a millionaire or gadzillionaire or whatever. I just needed £340,000 double quick. Damn reality was always being rude and interrupted my life when I least wanted it. Damn.

“In the constant battle between god and German engineering, god finishes second”.
- Jeremy Clarkson