WHEN WE WERE KINGS

IN THE END, they couldn’t be separated. Three judges plumped for the Nissan GT-R and three cast their votes for the Audi R8 V10. That was MOTOR’s Performance Car of the Year 2009, the first and only occasion that two cars tied for the PCOTY crown. While we might well question the wisdom of an even number of judges, even prior to that event, the Nissan GT-R and the Audi R8 had always been inextricably wedded. Now, as they disappear from sale in Australia, we couldn’t miss the opportunity to take these two performance icons for one final sortie into the high country in order to put an end stop on our own history with them and attempt to place their respective legacies into some sort of context.

I had an unxpectedly early acquaintance with the GT-R. Back in May 2005, somewhere near the Nürburgring, ex-Wheels editor Bill Thomas and I were looking for a place to clean a Nissan 350Z when we chanced upon a country servo with a functioning jetwash. That’s not always easy to find in Rheinland-Pfalz on a Sunday morning due to local noise regulations, so we were a little annoyed to be shooed away by a horde of Nissan employees clearly anxious to hide what was inside the cleaning bay. A glimpse of the headlight unit confirmed that the silver and black mule inside was the new GT-R, months prior to its appearance in Proto Concept guise at the 2005 Tokyo Motor Show. It was like finding a unicorn.

THERE’S A