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Porsche 911: Five Decades of Legend in the Making Since 1974, I have had the privilege of driving a wide range of Porsche 911 models. From the raw simplicity of the 3.0-liter Carrera to the track-focused precision of the GT3 RS, each one represents a unique evolution of this legendary sports car. Four decades later, the 911 remains one of the few new cars I would still buy with my own money. Here are five of the most memorable 911s I have ever driven. The Original 930 Turbo (1975) When I first drove the original 930 Turbo, veteran road-test journalists spoke of it in awed tones. They said it demanded utmost respect when driven hard, that its binary boost states made walking the traditional 911 tightrope between corner-entry understeer and corner-exit oversteer a job requiring quick hands and big balls. The 930 Turbo did not forgive mistakes, nor did it tolerate sloppiness. It was, they said, a widowmaker. It took me 35 years to get behind the wheel of an original 930 Turbo and discover the truth. The car was one of the first 30 production Turbos ever built and is now part of Porsche’s mouthwatering classic fleet. Out on the road, aware of its fearsome reputation, I took it very easy at first, playing with the throttle, feeling the boost come in, and watching the tach—trying to build a mental map of the power and torque curves. The engine was remarkably tractable, happy to murmur at 2,000 rpm in top gear as the 930 Turbo trickled along at 45 mph. Once the engine hit 3,500 rpm, though, there was a noticeable acceleration surge as the turbocharger huffed 0.8 bar into the induction system. But the sledgehammer blow between the shoulder blades I expected wasn’t there. I learned the trick to smooth and quick progress in the original 930 Turbo was to keep the 3.0-liter flat-six spinning at 4,000 rpm or more to keep the turbocharger energized. Yes, there is turbo lag—very noticeable by modern standards—but it is manageable. Even today, this 911 is an impressively fast car on the road. First gear runs to 50 mph, second to 90 mph, and third to almost 130 mph, meaning it will destroy most winding two-lanes using only second and third gears. And while it may have only 256 hp, it weighs just 2,513 pounds, allowing it to get in and out of corners readily. Half a century ago, its performance would have seemed otherworldly. The 993-Generation Porsche 911 For Porsche purists, this is the last of the line—the last of the real 911s. It’s the Porsche you drive with your knuckles grazing the dash and the snarling metallic clatter of an air-cooled flat-six behind you. But back in 1994, when I first drove it, the 993 was the 911 of the future, the first to challenge the laws of physics. Oh, sure, the 993 still had the pat-pat-pattery front end that demanded to be loaded on corner entry to hit the apex, and the rear end still rhumbaed through rougher turns, but there was much more simpatico between them. The 993 still performed 911 things, but within a much better margin of error. Key to it all was a new rear suspension that replaced the semi-trailing arms with a new multilink setup that allowed very slight initial toe-out on corner entry and then progressive toe-in as lateral loads increased, all while reducing the camber change that had been the Achilles’ heel of 911s since 1963. This was combined with steering that, at 2.5 turns lock-to-lock, was 16 percent quicker and made the front end feel much more decisive, plus a new six-speed manual transmission that made the most of the 3.6-liter flat-six. It zinged harder to its 268-hp power peak at 6,100 rpm thanks to lighter internals, a Bosch Motronic 2.0 engine management system, and a new dual exhaust system. Compared with the 964 model it replaced, the 993 was a revelation. It wasn’t just the engineering upgrades, done under the leadership of Ulrich Bez, later the head of Aston Martin; the exterior redesign, executed under the direction of design chief Harm Lagaay, corrected visual problems with the 964, a car he thought was too tall at the front and too pulled down at the rear. The interior was cleaner, too, with fewer buttons in random locations. The 993 was a 911 that was faster and more forgiving than ever. And, most importantly, it was more desirable, too. The 996-Generation Porsche 911 At the time, it was heresy. Porsche’s decision to install a water-cooled flat-six in the tail of the 996-series 911 was, to the aficionados, the automotive equivalent of Bob Dylan ditching his six-string acoustic and picking up a Fender Strat at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. But the 996, the first clean-sheet redesign of Porsche’s indefatigable sports car in 34 years, was a hero car to me. It was the 911 that saved Porsche. Engineered and developed under the direction of Porsche R&D chief Horst Marchart, the 996 was a clever 911, not least because it shared 38 percent of its parts with an all-new, less expensive mid-engine roadster the world would come to know as the Boxster. Iconoclastic Porsche boss Wendelin Weideking knew the Boxster was needed to give dealers something else to sell when the aging 928 and 968 models went out of production. “We did two cars for the price of one-and-a-half,” design boss Lagaay said with a smile after the company unveiled the 996. But while media attention focused on its relationship with the Boxster and the water-cooled engine, the 996’s real story ran much deeper. In 1994, it had taken Porsche 130 hours to build a 993-series 911; the 996 took just 60 hours to build. The modern 911 had arrived: roomier and equipped with all the features expected of a late 20th-century sports car, but still recognizably Porsche’s icon. Most important, it still drove like a 911. Only better. Yes, there was a new veneer of sophistication to the way it went about its business, but the 996 retained the delicious tactility and urgent response that had made the 911 a sports car like no other. Along with that original Boxster, it saved Porsche from extinction. The 991.2-Generation Porsche 911 Carrera Of all the 911s I have driven, it was a base 991.2 Carrera that truly stole my heart. It stole everyone else’s too, judging from the feedback I received at the time from colleagues who drove it. Most press fleets tend to be stacked with high-spec vehicles loaded with options, presumably because automotive PRs think we are impressed by such things. So Porsche Cars North America’s decision to include a base 911 Carrera among the roster of then-new 991.2 models available for our 2017 MotorTrend Car of the Year testing seemed a brave one. In truth, though, it was an inspired move. The 991.2 debuted a new 3.4-liter turbocharged engine, available with 370 hp in the base Carrera or 420 hp in the Carrera S. Even in 370-hp trim, it delivered a broad band of torque and impressive efficiency. This Carrera also demonstrated that even on the base wheel/tire combo, the chassis was staggeringly communicative and adjustable. Visually, the 991.2 was a mild refresh of the bigger, skillfully reproportioned 991.1, a superbly executed interpretation of classic 911 themes, modern and beautiful. Inside was a new infotainment interface that looked great and worked well. Porsche’s PDK dual-clutch automatic remains a benchmark transmission in terms of its smooth, precise shifts. But the seven-speed stick shift on the no-frills Carrera delighted with an oily, rifle-bolt action that made us all fall in love with driving again. MotorTrend’s testing director at the time, Kim Reynolds, spoke for all the COTY judges when she summed up the Carrera’s visceral appeal: “When all cars but one are autonomous, please let this be it—the last human-driven car. For posterity’s sake.” It has been 10 years since I drove it, but I vividly remember it: Guards Red over black, it had just one option—red seat belts. Every so often, I scan the ads, looking