Porsche 911 Turbo: Best all round supercar

Here we go, my favourite subject: Porsche 911. Yet, I've been begrudgingly laying off this 997 Turbo feature for days. Why? For one, in protest over the few-hour window in which I was supposed to not only test drive the car, but also trek across town to pick it up, drive to the photoshoot location, stand around tapping my feet until that's taken care of, then drive back and return the car to Porsche.

In pictures: Porsche 911 Turbo

Either way, for the exclusive regional 911 Turbo drive, Porsche politely refused to listen to our pleas. Take it or leave it, they said. Er, yeah, I'll take it!

It's still a Turbo after all.

And now it's reached the Middle East, a long time after the international launch in October last year when I happily packed my bags and jetted off to Portugal to have my first taste of this all-in-one supercar.

Since then I've driven a couple of fairly serious machines from Italy and one from the land of the rising sun, the only one that can compare to the Turbo — Godzilla. But our own long-terming GT-R's keys are still firmly clenched in Amit's hand, so there's no chance of sneaking it out of his parking spot for a one-on-one.

And anyway, I'm under strict orders from him not to preach my lonely opinion of the 911 Turbo's dominance in that duel.

So that's all I'll say on that… For now. What I have on my plate here and now is simply a reunion, a class of 2009 basically. Me and the Turbo. Is it as good as I remember it? Could it be better than the 3.8-litre GT3, a car still as fresh in my mind as the vending machine coffee steaming next to me as I type?

I'll spare you the suspense and unveil the verdict for you right here, actually — the most expensive 911 you can currently buy in the Middle East is… A bargain!

All-in-one

Let's look at the Swiss Army Knife for a moment: a fairly desirable item, I'd say. Back in the day and where I come from, you were a nobody on your block unless your house keys dangled off at least a spartan one with just the bottle opener next to the knife. (Try sneaking a pen knife into school today and it's not the Assembly Hall for you, it's juvie hall.) Fatten it up with the cork screw, wood saw, file and scissors and your status grows along with the bulge in your pocket. The ultimate had to be the little magnifying glass.

Anyway, the 911 Turbo has always been a bit like the Swiss Army Knife: ancient, traditional, evolutionary, desirable, useful, reliable, trustworthy… OK, maybe not that last bit, not with the 3.0-litre Turbo's chronic snap oversteer. But everything else stands correct and you can't say the same about most other supercars. Porsche wants its ultimate 911 to be a daily driver. Only, this 997 MkII Turbo is a bit too Leatherman to be a Swiss Army Knife. The latter is just a tad too finicky, too petite. A Leatherman is the 21st century all-in-one tool. And the best way to simply describe the new 997 Turbo is to liken it to a tool; a cross between a surgical scalpel and a dead blow hammer would do nicely. Basically, there's nothing it can't do.

First of all, to most passersby it looks just like any other 911, so it's not in-your-face like a Ferrari or Lamborghini. Porsche has added fancy titanium rungs in the intakes, LEDs, new wheel designs (the cross-spoke RS Spyder is the one to have), new rear lights, split wing and optimised details like the mirrors for aerodynamic reasons rather than styling.

Inside it's as logical and simple as Porsches always have been. The dash is shallow and straight, the windscreen upright, giving you perfect outward visibility and sense of compactness. Porsche offers three different types of front seats, but the standard items are a great balance between comfortable and body-hugging. The rest is straight-forward, with the usual one-button-one-command layout and an intuitive sat-nav system. Below that are the bits that matter; Sport, Sport Plus, damper adjustment and the ‘PSM off' button. Honestly, you won't be left wanting if you never go anywhere near these buttons, the Turbo is fast enough on its own. But if you do go for the optional Dh13k Sports Chrono package, you get the dynamic engine mounts, an overboost function increasing the maximum torque by 50Nm to 700Nm and a 0-100kph time of 3.4 seconds, according to Porsche. Our own tests confirmed this to be a pretty slow estimate, with 3.3 and even 3.2 more likely.

Once you've got the launch control working and dial in the revs, you're just about ready to obliterate the competition, including the Ferrari 458 Italia (3.4seconds), Lamborghini LP560-4 (3.7 seconds) and even the arch-nemesis, the Nissan GT-R SpecV. And with a top speed of 312kph — which, considering you've opted for the PDK (and all Middle East customers will have), is reached rather alarmingly quickly — it's immediately apparent the 911 Turbo is the fastest car for the money, which is Dh499,000.

And that's the only puzzling bit with this Porsche: why doesn't it cost more? It's fantastically well built, remarkably efficient (variable turbine geometry in the new 3.8-litre flat-six not only increases power by 20 horses and torque by 30Nm, but also returns real-world fuel consumption of 23.5mpg). It's insanely quick, handles brilliantly with its all-wheel drive and wider track and potters about through town unflustered.

Verdict

So why do the 911 Turbo's competitors (apart from the Nissan, which is, well, a Nissan) cost almost twice as much? The Lambo is over 900 grand, the Ferrari will certainly be in the same region. And they are not nearly as easy to manoeuvre around shopping mall parking lots, or half as composed when let loose in the Hajar mountain passes.

The Turbo all-wheel drive system even allows for safe sideways action and clips apexes with the urgency of a front-light rear-wheel drive sportscar.

It will surely prove to be as reliable as its predecessors, if not more so. It's economical to top up with petrol and it doesn't hurt the earth as much either, with 18 per cent less C02 being spewed out of its exhausts than before.

The Turbo's useless rear seats also fold to form a practical shelf and you can put a fair amount of luggage up front too. That even improves the balance. So just like a Leatherman, it does everything.

Now name me one other car that can do all that. Oh, hang on a minute, here comes Amit in a Nissan…

Specs & rating