Porsche's 911 GT3 is perfect

The Porsche 911 GT3 is such a weapon to make the seaside streaky while you see which howls louder: that glorious naturally aspirated 4.0-liter flat six behind your head or you as all 500 horses are uncorked.

Fire up that glorious powerplant and you’ll spend a moment appreciating the throaty idle. Deep and rich, it signifies something far louder and grander is lurking, waiting to be unleashed. Oblige by pushing the tach needle all the way to the 9000-RPM redline and the eargasm is mindblowing. I presume the car has a radio, but when you’ve got 100 decibels of pure engine trumpeting, there’s no need for conventional music. The GT3 deserves a Grammy.

My tester unit wasn’t the manual iteration, but the lightning-quick, dual-clutch PDK transmission leaves you wanting for nothing. Chunky shifts snap the coupe forward through the seven gears, helping you rip to 60 in 3 seconds flat. The short gearing helps you snort through the gearbox, a goofy smile affixed to your face as the 339 lb-ft of twist jackhammers you back into the Recaro seats. And while peak power climaxes at 8250-RPM, the grunt in the low end is absurdly sufficient, supplying satisfying thrust at every stab of the accelerator.

There’s a stretch of road on Route 27, after you depart the once-sleepy, now millennial-encrusted main Montauk drag, that ferries you towards Camp Hero State Park and the Montauk Lighthouse. For six or seven miles, road conditions are optimal, sightlines go on forever, and elevation changes coupled with gentle corners beckon your foot to the floor. The GT3 positively slays on this rather deserted stretch.

The speedo tips into the triple digits surprisingly quick, though the drama and typical twitch of a street-going race steed are absent. Steering is smooth and direct, and you can hold the line on a curve at speed with the minutest of throttle inputs. Likewise, slowing this German missile is a composed affair. Simply bury the brake pedal and let six pistons chomp down like a pit bull on discs the size of a Thanksgiving platter. There’s not even a shudder as the nose plummets and the GT3 yanks to a halt.

Subsequent sprints down the Montauk Straight see every single house guest enjoying the right seat, none of whom have ever experienced a supercar, all of whom were subsequently blown away. “Can we go again?” one wide-eyed gent inquired with the same excitement exuded by toddlers after an amusement park ride.

Reliable, comfortable, and unflinchingly performative, the GT3 is equally at home thrilling house guests as it is during regular daily driving. It’s hard to make a car that’s livable on the daily front that can come alive when caned. While I didn’t touch a Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2-wrapped toe onto an actual track, if our time on public roads together is any indication, there’s no doubt the car would eviscerate any course it encountered.

Perhaps the hardest part about having a GT3 parked in your driveway, especially when you don’t own it and likely never will, is your inability to get anything else done. You’re either too busy scheming where to go drive the thing, or you’re just gazing at it, beholding that glorious wide stance, the ginormous carbon-fiber rear wing-which adds nearly 350 pounds of downforce at speed-and the stunning graphite blue paint job.

For $145,000, the GT3 is a bargain. But most of the general public won’t get to appreciate the brilliance that’s been forged in Flacht. A limited production run means those interested parties who didn’t order eons ago will be forced to tack on many zeroes to that sticker price. That Porsche’s chosen to limit access to arguably the greatest car it’s produced could be viewed as a negative. But spend some time in the GT3 and you’ll be elated at the experience, however fleeting it may be.