Expectations exceeded (August 21, 2023)
I've been taking a few notes along the way as we make our way through Europe in these glorious machines, so why not share a bit?That's it then. Europe done and dusted.
What an epic adventure, and I'm not using that (rather overused these days) word trivially. This trip had it all, and after so many YEARS of waiting (roughly 37 months in all), it lived up to every bit of its billing.
The exact same can be said for the car.
I'd pored over every review out there. Watched every video. Studied photos from every angle, to the point that I felt I really knew all there is to know about the GTS save for the feeling of actually driving it. What that (somewhat obsessive at times) studying of the car virtually didn't convey was just how I would feel in it. I mean, it couldn't really, could it?
I had very, very high expectations, obviously, as 99.9% all of the punditry out there extolled the virtues of every facet of the car. The seats, the steering, the engine note, the power, the refinement, the quality. All of it. I headed across the Atlantic with all those elements in mind, and with the expectations bar set up there thanks to all that media consumption.But I wasn't prepared for just how it exceeded those expectations in every way. It's one thing to read stuff. See stuff. Even hear stuff. But plonking your butt down into that Racetex™seat, cranking the key, and bringing the whole thing to life under your fingertips and feet? Well, it defies description as to how it all felt. How the printed page is a tough place to capture the sensations. How a YouTube video sounds thin and looks pale in comparison to the reality. How it takes a better writer than me to put the feelings into words.
It's like turning the focus ring on a lens and suddenly having the subject come into tack-sharp focus. Like everything up to that point on July 19, and all the days following suddenly crystallized those now-distant, 'fuzzy' words and images, and made them irrelevant really. Like next-level clarity.
Anyone fortunate enough to experience cars like this will know what I'm talking about. I can't wait to share it with my friends and family. Seeing and feeling it in person, some of them will 'get it' right away. Like me, now. They'll just know.I always thought it was a rather cliché tagline, but it definitely sounds way less so now than before. It's got some real credibility in my mind:
PORSCHE. THERE IS NO SUBSTITUTE.
I couldn't be happier.
~ Luke
