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Blog Viper Club to Nissan and Porsche : Shut up and let us show you how is it done.
| Viper Club to Nissan and Porsche : Shut up and let us show you how is it done. |
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| Written by autoindustrie | |
| Tuesday, 21 October 2008 | |
 This whole Porsche vs Nissan argument over their respective pride and joy's lap times around the Nurburgring Nordschleife is getting really childish. Stop it boys. It makes these otherwise respectable men look like 12-year old kids. In case you lived somewhere in space where microwaves take 18 months to reach you, Nissan launched its GT-R with much fanfare about its 7:29 lap time set by Toshio Suzuki around the original Norhern Loop part of the Nurburgring circuit (a different section not used by F1 cars). Porsche, probably due to some sense of national pride could not standby and let a Japanese manufacturer beat its 911 GT-2's lap time of 7:32:02 set my its resident "Ring Meister" Walter Rohl on its home ground. So Porsche bought one unit of GT-R State side and have it shipped across the Atlantic back to Deutscheland and let one of its test drivers (not Walter Rohl) to have a go at it. Porsche's 911 product manager August Achleitner would later reveal to the press that they could not even get within 25 seconds of Nissan's claimed 7:29 time, implying that the GT-R used for the lap record is not a stock standard car but is running on racing specs semi slick tires. Nissan would later offer to give "free driver training" to Porsche test drivers on how to flog the GT-R around The Ring, and also released another video of its record breaking attempt which clearly shows standard Dunlop SP Sport 600 DSST CTT tires were used. But seriously does it really matter what time does a car do around The Ring? Because my bet is that you can never replicate that time and regular racers of The Ring will lap you in a VW Polo or even a Toyota Aygo like you are going in reverse. It's not just a matter of skill. The Nordschleife is a 20 plus km circuit with 73 corners, so long and so many turns that remembering which part of the circuit you are in is already a challenge in itself. ____________________________ "AutoIndustrie" is a part time project of an auto industry professional based in Asia. He can be contacted at autoindustrie[at]gmail[dot]com        |
