Why the Porsche 911 GT3 is more important than you think

The new kid and its grandfather

There's features on the 911 GT3 introduced two days ago that imply big changes within Porsche. And that's a good thing.

This week the Porsche 911 992 GT3 was introduced. It has a completely revised front chassis, with double wishbone suspension instead of the standard front strut suspension of the 992 911. That's a huge change to make on a car, because technically it's a completely different setup.

Double wishbone front suspension: a game changer for Porsche?

This was noticed by Jason Cammisa. He rightfully states in his video (see below) that cars thought up by 'bean counters' and marketing divisions, generally make terrible cars. Most of the time it's the polarizing cars, created under the supervision of one visionary, that are most desired by the public. Not because they are the ultimate compromise, but because they're very good at what they are designed for. We're inclined to think he is on to something with that remark. The GT cars of Porsche are all thought up by one person, and one person only: Andreas (or Andy) Preuninger. But he'll listen to 'AP' too.

Porsche 911 992 GT3 and 996 GT3

I've met Andy Preuninger a few times, and he's absolutely got his petrolhead priorities straight. I don't think Jason Cammisa is wrong to imply that the only reason we still have naturally aspirated, manually shifted 4.0 litre engines in new cars, is because he runs the show at Porsche's GT division. If he would have listened to the number crunchers at Porsche, we wouldn't have had a manual option for the 992 GT3. We wouldn't have had a 911R. We wouldn't have had a GT3 RS 4.0 and we wouldn't have had a lot of other nice things. We probably wouldn't have had a new 4.0 N/A engine with a manual gearbox for the Cayman GT4 neither, if it wasn't for Andy.

The thing is, Preuninger has long been forced to keep us happy with the best he could do with the assets given to him. He has always had to develop cars from the parts bin. But he has moved on to give us engines we couldn't have dreamed of, and is now making structural changes to the platform of the most important car Porsche has: the 911.

Replacing the complete front suspension setup of a car is incredibly complicated and therefore incredibly expensive. As Jason rightfully points out in his video, the fact these decisions are being made mean that Andy is keeping petrolhead hope alive, and even more so: he's taking over from the bean counters. Keep doing what you do, Andy. And thanks for a great video, Jason Cammisa!