Some things in this world are assured. The sun rises in the east. Birds head south for the winter. Donald Trump always will be a tool. And you can get a Porsche with a stick shift.
You can scratch that last one from the list. Porsche has introduced two new 911s – its flagship Turbo and track-focused GT3 – with a glaring omission in the options list: a manual gearbox.
While the decision not to include a row-your-own option on the Turbo is in line with the land rocket's grand touring demeanor, the lack of a manual on the weapons-grade GT3 has enthusiasts up in arms. But it's a trend that's been playing out in the world of high-end sports cars for the better part of a decade. The fact of the matter is, fewer and fewer people are all too happy to have a computer shift gears for them. Case in point: When Ferrari last offered a manual gearbox, on the F430, the take-rate was a measly 1 percent. Today, Maranello's classic chrome-gated shifter is but a memory, as there's not a manual to be found in the fleet.
The company line from Ferrari, as well as other speed-obsessed automakers, is that a manual transmission hampered the abilities of their supercars. In other words, you simply aren't fast enough, or smooth enough, to get the most from your car. Sequential and dual-clutch transmissions change gears faster than any mortal possibly can, which is why guys like Sebastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso squeeze a paddle instead of flick a lever. By sacrificing the manual at the altar of speed, drivers can lap faster and accelerate quicker, while the marketing department eliminates the chances of the nut holding the wheel screwing up the performance tests the glossy magazines live and die by.
This isn't all about performance, though, or even the fact that, yes, some engineer in Germany does know more than you do about getting from Point A to Point B as quickly as possible. It's also about money.
"It used to be about engineering, but today German car companies are all about sales, sales, sales," says Road & Track west coast editor Jason Cammisa. "It stinks, but you can’t blame Porsche: It’s a business, and there are more rich people who want prestige and easy speed than there are true enthusiasts who care about the driving experience."
The massive sales of the Porsche Cayenne SUV and Panamera sedan bear that out.
Cammisa, who snagged an exclusive drive in the all-new GT3, quotes Andreas Preuninger, the engineer behind Porsche's GT cars, saying, "I don't get this Stone Age idea about what a 911 should be." He's speaking about the Porschophiles screaming bloody murder over the lack of a manual option in what is (used to be?) the brand's most hardcore track weapon.
When Cammisa tacitly admitted to Preunigner that he's among the whiners, the Porsche engineer responded, "Just shut up and drive the thing." Cammisa did so and was more than impressed with Porsche's latest speed demon, but still, something was missing.
"Putting an automatic in a GT3 is a sin in my book," Cammisa told Wired. "Sure, it’s faster to 60 mph and it’ll be easier to turn consecutive fast laps on a race track, but in the process it walks away from what made all previous GT3s so brilliant: how much work/fun/excitement they were to drive on the street."
That's a sentiment echoed by driving enthusiasts the world over, but it's not going to stem the rise of the automatic gearbox in high performance machines.
At this year's Geneva Motor Show, where the GT3 debuted, Ferrari, Lamborghini and McLaren all showed off new breeds of hypercars set to go on sale this year. And all of them had some flavor of automated gearbox. But a car like the GT3 is supposed to be the last bastion of the purest driving experience. And now it's gone, and that pains Cammisa, us and thousands of other drivers.
"If the manual ever does die, the GT3 should have been the last 911 to give it up, not the first," says Cammisa. "But without a clutch pedal, it’ll be an easier sell the GT3 to really rich old guys who’ll use it to sit in traffic."
All photos: Porsche
