Porsche GT Boss Wants the Horsepower Wars to End
Porsche’s New 911 GT3 RS
Last month, while on a tour of the Porsche’s long-awaited 911 GT3 RS, Porsche GT Bossman, Andreas Preuninger had an interesting opinion to share with CAR Magazine. When talking about future 911 GT’s, Preuninger said “I’m not a believer in this horsepower monster, up, up, up, more, more, more. For my personal tastes, around 500bhp is enough, because 700-800bhp calls for bigger brakes, sturdier suspension, it gets heavier and heavier logically.”
What Preuninger does say makes a lot of sense. Porsche was one of the first car manufactures to prove that a small, lightweight car could beat a large, heavy car, and they have been using the same basic 911 for the past 50 years. Even with same formula, the 911 continues to be a threat on the track and on the street to this day. The can match their much more powerful rivals in just about every form of Motorsport. However, can there actually be an end to the horsepower war?
Typical Rescars readers will know that I am a fan of muscle cars. I am in love with the idea of owning a car that can liquefy tires in a matter of seconds. There is nothing that I would like more than to own a 1969 Dodge Charger R/T, and the 2015 Charger SRT Hellcat. Yes, I mean owning both at the same time; I have high, slightly unrealistic goals. While this is very much the American stereotype, you can not deny the appeal.
I really want like to own one of these monsters.
Personally, I do not think that the horsepower war will end anytime soon because of one reason alone. There are many people that will agree with this opinion about the trill of horsepower. People spend thousands of dollars on building cars that can go down the quarter-mile in times that are faster than most one million to two million dollar cars. YouTube and other forms of social media are full of people running their crazy creations that were built to be as fast in a straight line as possible down the track at ridiculous speeds. The horsepower wars will never end for these drag-car builders.
With so many car enthusiasts, and customers looking for more and more horsepower, auto makers will continue to supply them with a lot of horsepower. Look, for instance, at the new Koengisegg Regera that has a total output of 1,500 hp, and Porsche’s own entrance into the hybrid supercar market, the 918, that has a total output of 887 hp. These are way higher than Preuninger’s ideal 500 bhp. Auto makers have been trying to “one-up” each other for decades when it came to horsepower. Since none of this competition is probably not going to end anytime soon, the horsepower wars will continue whether Preuninger likes it or not.