CHERRY-TINTED GLASSES

We all love fondly looking back on days gone by, reminiscing about things we can no longer have. It’s why all those talking heads shows endure on the tellybox. You know the sort — programmes named The Top 30 Hits of 1994 or Why I Love Only Fools and Horses, where faces from yesteryear and radio deejays (often too young to have been around when what they’re talking about was current) wax lyrical about the pop culture of yore. Nostalgia also explains the strangely enduring appeal of 74-75, a song by one-hit wonder, The Connells, encapsulating tearfully sentimental feelings driven by the inexorable passage of time. Hold up a minute! Are we right to wallow in self-indulgent retrospection? Shouldn’t we be looking to the future and focusing on what we can change and influence, rather than fixating on what’s been and gone? If so, with all this in mind, isn’t the semi-open-top 911 on the pages before you something of a bizarre addition to the 992 line-up?

Underneath the eye-catching livery is a regular 992 Targa 4S. In other words, it’s powered by a twin-turbocharged, three-litre flat-six pumping out 444bhp and 391lb-ft, driving all four wheels through Porsche Traction Management (PTM) and an eight-speed PDK dual-clutch transmission. No, sadly, this isn’t one of those hyper-rare 992s fitted with a sevenspeed manual