Certain cars can be seen in places and situations where you wouldn’t expect to see them. An old Porsche 911 GT1-98 from the 1990s wouldn’t look as good on a dirt track as it would on Sebring or the Circuit de la Sarthe. Also, it’s not good for racing on ice, but Porsche still needs to change its 1998 Le Mans win by putting on winter tires to make the snow fly in Aspen, which Gran Turismo doesn’t even let you do. Why? What’s the harm? How did this take place? Last weekend, Porsche brought its beautiful car from its museum in Zuffenhausen in Mobil 1 colors to the F.A.T. International ice race in Colorado. Stéphane Ortelli was also in the car. He was one of the three drivers who made the GT1 famous twenty years ago. Engineers at Porsche raised the car’s suspension so that bigger winter tires could fit. Also, the 911 GT1 didn’t come with a pre-heating system at first, and 36 degrees Fahrenheit is a bit cooler than what you’d normally find in northwest France in June, so it borrowed the pre-heating system from a 919 Hybrid. Ortelli had no choice but to go to work at that time. Also, the fact that the 911 GT1 was made to run quickly on Colorado’s ice and powder doesn’t make a difference. “You have to forget about all that!” There is a quote on Porsche’s blog. This feels more like a dance. Because the tires grip the packed snow well, you can feel right away how fast the car can go and follow the race line. But in order to turn, you have to shift your weight. Furthermore, the steering rack is very quick, and the car is very stiff. The GT1 is an endurance road racer with a short lock-to-lock distance. This doesn’t work with the way rally cars’ steering racks are usually made, where precise countersteering control is needed for all those Scandinavian Flicks. Ortelli says that this means that controlling the throttle is much more important to keep the car on its planned path. “We all know that when you go sideways, you need to steer to compensate for the angle of the car, but in the GT1, you have so little lock,” he explained. That’s been the hardest thing for me to get used to. Because it happens so fast, you have to play around with the gas and the left foot brake to see how far you can slide. A lot of work went into the wheel and pedals. But it was almost like a ballet because this car can really dance in the snow. The pictures clearly show that he made it dance. The Porsche 911 GT1 was shown on snow, so why aren’t the Mercedes CLK-GTR, McLaren F1 G.T.R., and Toyota GT-One shown? I want to know right away which prototype of the Golden Time fake street car from the 1990s is the fastest on a bad surface.
