Porsche GT2 vs. Nissan GT-R at the ‘Ring Explained

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12 Comments on “Porsche GT2 vs. Nissan GT-R at the ‘Ring Explained...”

• 	WhatTheHel November 27th, 2008 at 10:08 am
  Oh dear God in heaven. People are still going on about this bullsh*t? Who cares. Besides… didn’t a ZR-1, or a Viper, or a Kia, or something else beat them BOTH already?
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• 	psarhjinian November 27th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
  I blame Porsche. No, really. Nissan set the record, but Porsche’s the one who’s collective ego hasn’t been able to stand the comparison of their glorified VW Beetle to a glorified Datsun 510.
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• 	Stephan Wilkinson November 27th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
  Has everyone discovered Drivers Republic, a Brit on-line magazine that did this test and published extensive photography, video and text about it? DR makes Winding Road look like something David E and his son publish in the garage. I think Farago should have credited them a bit more extensively…
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• 	tom November 27th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
  Nissan set the record And the Drivers Republic shoot out more than ever casts doubt on that claim…not that it matters… Although Porsche was stupid to dignify Nissan with an official statement. That just propelled the GT-R to a serious Porsche rival.
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• 	rpm November 27th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
  Porsche should have just sat back and let the blogger/journalist world come to the conclusion reached by the extensive Drivers Republic article. By making it an issue, they played into Nissan’s hands. If the cars are roughly even (which seems the most likely reality), then isn’t price the real issue? Based on that you might conclude that the Nissan is the better car – and I think you would be wrong. Who actually believes that Nissan is selling this car at or above cost? The R&D and all that nice carbon fiber have to cost more than the asking price. Nissan is just absorbing the loss to push a flagship vehicle. On the other hand, I bet Porsche makes a profit on each and every GT2 and GT3 they sell…
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• 	Stephan Wilkinson November 27th, 2008 at 5:29 pm
  I’m sure I’ve said it too many times already, but when I see GT-Rs racing in private and professional hands, day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year to the degree that thousands of GT2s, GT3s and Cup cars are doing so, I’ll maybe begin to wonder which is the better car. Until then, the GT-R is to me a one-trick pony. “Oh, wow, a lap of the ‘Ring!” How about ten thousand laps of the ‘Ring? I still remember, years ago, a BMW exec in Munich saying to me, “Our engineers drive the Autobahn to work. In Japan, they take the tube.”
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• 	niky November 28th, 2008 at 3:28 am
  # tom : November 27th, 2008 at 1:55 pm Nissan set the record And the Drivers Republic shoot out more than ever casts doubt on that claim…not that it matters… Although Porsche was stupid to dignify Nissan with an official statement. That just propelled the GT-R to a serious Porsche rival. And if you actually read Driver’s Republic (I’ve been a subscriber for months… these guys are fantastic), you’ll know that they tested in cold weather, in the wet, on the slower tires and with a non-professional racer (but very capable… yes, capable, Chris Harris is) driver. Take a six second difference between the two cars… factor in four or five seconds due to the Bridgestone tires versus the stickier Dunlops, and factor in an additional few seconds for a racing driver and warmer weather, and both cars should be bang around 7:30… note that Nissan also did its lap with VDC off, which DR could not do, in deference to the fact that this was a privately owned GT-R and slewing off the track sideways in a privately-owned vehicle isn’t as forgiveable as doing it in a manufacturer’s mule (like the GT2 they had, was) Which means that Nissan’s amazing 7:29 lap was more a testament to their driver’s insanely committed driving, than anything else… which is what all Nurb laps are, really… Porsche is just pissed because they haven’t had any luck doing a “hero” lap with the GT2… everyone knows the GT2 is faster than the GT-R (all the independent tests confirm it), but Porsche has never been able to get theirs below 7:32. I don’t doubt that it could go under 7:30… they’ve just got to keep trying.
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• 	niky November 28th, 2008 at 3:43 am
  I’ve been a subscriber of DR for months… these guys are fantastic. But the article doesn’t so much cast doubt on the laptimes as demonstrate how close the two cars actually are… They tested in cold weather, in the wet, on the slower tires and with a non-professional racer (but very capable… yes, capable, Chris Harris is) driver. Take a six second difference between the two cars… factor in four or five seconds due to the Bridgestone tires versus the stickier Dunlops, and factor in an additional few seconds for a racing driver and warmer weather, and both cars should be bang around 7:30… note that Nissan also did its lap with VDC off, which DR could not do, in deference to the fact that this was a privately owned GT-R and slewing off the track sideways in a privately-owned vehicle isn’t as forgiveable as doing it in a manufacturer’s mule (like the GT2 they had, was)… still, six seconds difference is a world away from Porsche’s claim that the GT-R is about twenty seconds slower. Porsche is just pissed because they haven’t had any luck doing a “hero” lap with the GT2… everyone knows the GT2 is faster than the GT-R (all the independent tests confirm it), but Porsche has never been able to get theirs below 7:32. I don’t doubt that it could go under 7:30… they’ve just got to keep trying.
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• 	Brian Tiemann November 28th, 2008 at 9:36 am
  note that Nissan also did its lap with VDC off, which DR could not do, in deference to the fact that this was a privately owned GT-R and slewing off the track sideways in a privately-owned vehicle isn’t as forgiveable as doing it in a manufacturer’s mule (like the GT2 they had, was) Yeah, that, and also probably that turning off VDC would have voided the warranty, right…?
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• 	John R November 28th, 2008 at 10:58 am
  “Yeah, that, and also probably that turning off VDC would have voided the warranty, right…?” Alright, can we think of some other GT-Rs jokes now? I’ve must heard this chestnut at least 300 times this month.
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• 	tom November 28th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
  @niki: I’ve read the entire article and they said that they were close to the perfect lap in the GT-R, while they were far from it in the GT2. No matter what magic tricks Nissan did with the GT-R, the 7:25 min claim still sounds incredible in the light of its weight and power and DR basically said the same thing.
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• 	niky November 28th, 2008 at 9:36 pm
  That’s opinion, and as he was on the “wrong” tires and with VDC, I can’t take it as final, yet… still, it adds more fuel to the fire… being halfway between Nissan’s and Porsche’s estimates of the abilities of these two cars. Turning VDC off is a marker for warranty voiding, but the only time it has been cited as such, Nissan of America actually flew in two Japanese mechanics to review the case before denying it… (20 hard launches in the first six weeks of ownership would cause any manufacturer to run screaming…) meaning that such voiding isn’t automatic, but there to dissuade people from turning it off. VDC off, some cars have survived up to 100 hard launches before breaking. One current theory at NAGTROC is that the transmission fluid is inefficient when cold, so press drag-launches done in uncontrolled conditions (turn the car on and whale on it) or random launches by customers with no prep-time may cause premature failure. So far, only one or two customer cars have died of this, the others have been press. Guys who regularly drag their cars have been unaffected so far… one aftermarket company has broken a gearbox on a modified car, others are still going fine. Another aftermarket company has confirmed that the transmission juice is pretty pathetic. I’ve been seeing a lot said about the GT-R online, and it’s sickening the amount of disinformation about it… it’s simply a heavy car with a great AWD system, more torque than horsepower and some extremely sticky (stock) tires. Newer performance cars with similar grip and less weight have shown it up on track, and many testers and owners have said that the price you pay for that ability is that it simply doesn’t hold on to that advantage for very many laps before the Dunlop tires lose performance.
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