2005 Porsche Carrera GT

FIA rule changes cut off Porsche’s plans for a new Le Mans prototype for the 1999 racing season, leaving its new 5.5-liter V-10 engine in search of a home. In Stuttgart, however, a good engineering project is never left on the shelf, and the automaker chose instead to build a car around its ferocious 10-cylinder powertrain. The 68-degree, 5.7-liter production V-10 featured four valves per cylinder, variable valve timing on its intake camshafts, and a screaming 8,400-rpm redline. Output was an astonishing 605 horsepower, while a six-speed manual transmission with a Porsche carbon-ceramic-composite clutch would shuttle power to the rear wheels.

The Carrera GT was more than a race engine and transmission built into a car. The model featured a carbon-fiber monocoque and subframe sourced from Italian firm ATR Composites that was light and strong. Underneath, the suspension was race-ready, with inboard rocker arms protruding between upper and lower wishbones at all four corners. Staggered 19-inch front and 20-inch rear magnesium-alloy center-locking wheels were mounted over massive eight-piston brake calipers up front and four-piston calipers at the rear. The carbon-ceramic brake rotors were ventilated and cross-drilled for optimal high-speed braking. A retractable rear wing automatically extended above 75 mph to add downforce.

The production car that arrived in 2003 after being shown in thinly disguised concept form at the 2000 Paris Motor Show weighed just 2,755 pounds. It could vault to 60 mph in just four seconds when shifted as fast as a driver could possibly handle its wickedly precise manual gearbox. On a closed course, it topped out at around 200 mph. In the expert hands of factory test driver Walter Röhrl in July 2004, a Carrera GT rocketed through the Nürburgring Nordschliefe in a mere 7:28. This record would stand for more than half a decade.

The Carrera GT remained a capable road car, too. Its interior showed extraordinary attention to detail, unlike other cars that might boast similar performance: Power features, airbags, an effective climate-control system, and Bose audio gave it luxury-grade comfort. A beechwood shifter knob, standard on early models, served as a nostalgic nod to the laminated birch wood knob on the Porsche 917 Le Mans racers of the late-Sixties and early-Seventies.

Born as a U.S.-specification example, this particular Carrera GT is finished in attractive Fayence Yellow over a Dark Grey leather interior. It was completed at the factory in November 2004 and delivered to North America in October 2005. According to the accompanying Carfax report, the Carrera GT was registered for the majority of its early history in Florida. In 2012 it was sold in New York, with Carfax entries logging roughly 6,000 miles on the odometer around this time. Now showing 8,758 miles as of cataloguing time, it is offered here on behalf of Blue Chip in Denver, Colorado and includes an invoice confirming a clutch replacement and major service in October 2019.

A mainstay of any serious Porsche collection, the Carrera GT provides an unrivaled, unfiltered driving experience. For the marque enthusiast seeking something more eye-catching than the standard Silver Metallic paint scheme this is a Carrera GT mainstay, this superb, low-mileage example will surely stand out from the crowd with its wonderfully vibrant Fayence Yellow paintwork.

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