Porsche 911 RS Evolution: We Drive Four RS Models to Discover the Secret Sauce

With the introduction of the limited-edition 2023 Porsche 911 Sport Classic , Porsche celebrates the 50th anniversary of one of the most famous 911s, the 1972 Carrera RS 2.7. To connect the dots between the original ducktail and today's Sport Classic, we drove four classic 911 RS models, including both versions of the 1972 car. Ride along and experience the evolution of the RS.

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1972 Porsche 911 Carrera RS 2.7 Sport

I begin like the purist that I am with the 911 Carrera RS Sport, the stripped-down homologation version of the then-new, more powerful and, hopefully, more stable 911. To reduce weight, the RS Sport does away with the rear seats, carpeting, and armrests. The window glass is thinner, the door cards are literally just cards, and the Porsche badge is glued rather than bolted to the hood. My dad bod is largely incompatible with fixed shell seats, but these are surprisingly comfortable, and the cabin has a classy look I didn't expect from a ready-to-race Porsche. My first glance in the rearview mirror reveals the ducktail spoiler just peeking up through the backlight.

We leave the Porsche museum in convoy, and as soon as we hit the back roads, the Cayenne leading us takes off in a game of catch-me-if-you-can. I slide the long shift lever down into second and open the throttle, and the old 911 gives chase in a way you don't expect from an early-'70s museum piece. The 2.7-liter flat-six only has 207 hp, but it delivers its 188 lb-ft of torque in a broad, flat curve. The engine note is magnified by the lack of sound insulation, a marvelous boxer grumble overlaid by an insistent whine. It's one of the best road-trip soundtracks I've ever heard.

But the steering is what really amazes me. No power assist here, yet it's light and precise, responsive but not at all twitchy, with the car turning into corners sharply after a few degrees of steering wheel rotation. There is so much feel, I seem connected psychically to the roadway. I'm concerned about oversteer—old 911, of course—but the steering loads up so progressively, I can tell exactly how close I am to the tires' limits without the need for posterior feedback. Everything I need to know, everything I want to know, is conveyed to my fingers through that thin plastic steering wheel rim. I understand now why my 1970s forebears were so heated in their condemnation of power steering. Who would have thought I'd find the best steering I've ever experienced in a 50-year-old car?

Braking intimidates you, however. The pedal rides so high, I nearly bang my knee on the steering wheel lifting my foot enough to step on it. The brakes feel springy and stiff, but like the steering, they allow an amazing amount of precision and control—and feedback! I can't remember ever having a brake pedal talk to me in such clear language. 

We crank up our speed in the curves, and I soon find the trick to driving this old 911 is to let the car do the work. I hold the steering wheel with light fingertips, and the Porsche glides through the curves, seeming to find the right line all by itself. What word best describes the RS Sport? Find me a portmanteau of heaven and magic, and that's the one I'll use.

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1972 Porsche 911 Carrera RS 2.7 Touring

All too soon it's time to switch cars, and I trade for another '72 RS, this time the daily-driver Touring version, painted sunny yellow. Compared to the Sport, the Touring model is downright posh, with adjustable seats and an armrest on the door. I twist the key, and the engine fires, its thrum muffled by the extravagance of a back seat. 

Back out on the curvy roads, my first thought is, "Who put a Buick in the Porsche museum?" Compared to the Sport, the Touring's softer seats and softer ride make for a significantly softer drive. The shifter is a little less precise; in the Sport, changing gears felt like sliding a knife through a rare steak until it hit the hard, hot stone beneath. The Touring has a dodgy three-four quadrant, which I imagine is a factor of wear rather than design. The connection to the road is still there, but it's a little more gauzy.

What the two versions share is what most modern cars lack: that lovely mechanical feel, a sense you are not merely driving but interacting with the machinery. I can practically feel history through the controls: the 911's roots in the 356 and the 356's roots in Ferdinand Porsche's prewar people's-car prototypes. I signal a turn; as the wheel returns to center, the stalk disengages with a musical pop and clang . No plastic tabs or microswitches here. The 911 uses proper levers and springs, just as God intended.

It takes a little longer, but the yellow 911 and I soon find each other's rhythms, and we gradually meld into one. Speeding through the curves, I feel like I have so much control. Steering, accelerator, and brakes let me meter my inputs with the precision of an artisan. I own an American car of this vintage, an old full-size Dodge sedan, and I think now of its floaty yet rumbly ride, its overboosted steering, its unassisted drum brakes that require the strength of an ox and lock up with abandon. This first-generation 911 is everything the Dodge isn't; no wonder Porsche blew Americans away.

The road winds uphill, and I put the throttle to the mat, getting the weight on those back wheels to keep them planted. It's a pinch-me moment. I'm powering up a curvy German road in a classic Porsche 911, and if there is a finer felicity than this, I have yet to experience it. The car may be my second-favorite here so far, but this old thing knows how to show a driver a good time, that's for damn sure.

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1992 Porsche 911 (964) Carrera RS

We must change partners again, and the serenity I found in the first pair of 911s is shattered by the third, a bright-pinkish-purple 964-generation 911 RS .

This is another racer, lightweighted like the 911 Sport: no armrests, no back bench, and shell seats that greet me with obvious disapproval of the 40 pounds I've packed on since this car was built in 1992. The interior looks completely different, more like what I remember from car magazines of my youth. Yes, the 911 changed a lot in 20 years.

But then I drive, and I realize, no, it didn't. The clutch pedal feels the same as the '72s as I push through its long, stiff arch. The brake pedal no longer requires a long leg lift, but its short, firm travel delivers the same precise feel. The shift lever sprouts from a console instead of the floor, but it moves with the same direct mechanical feel as the older cars. Although the 964 looks different than its ancestor, it feels almost exactly the same.

Its attitude, however, is completely different. This is a very angry car. "No more dinking around," it says. "We're not out for a joy ride; we're going to drive ." The 964 RS is quicker in all of its responses, most noticeably the steering. Still unassisted, it's not just heavy but stiff , and it trades the older 911s' gentle play for an off-center restlessness that makes the car a chore to drive.

More than anything, though, it is hellaciously quick: 260 hp might sound tame, a 0-62 run of 5.4 seconds slightly less so, but neither number conveys what this car is really like. The '72 RSs like to run, but this RS bolts like a mischievous thoroughbred, interpreting the slightest prod on its flanks as permission to go flat-out. You can practically hear the impatience in the harsher engine note. The older 911s are happy at 5/10ths, but this one insistently taunts you to push into the danger zone, which, you need no reminder, is a very real place in an old 911. This is the Carrera that parties like Belushi—you aren't living unless you're living on the edge.

Yet its attitude feels like bravado, the shallow veneer that covers every inferiority complex. It's as if everything this car does is an attempt to rebel against its roots, to make you forget it's not much different under the skin than those friendly little 911 RSs of the early '70s. But just like you can't escape that view of the spoiler in the rear window—even if it is now electrically operated—the 964 RS can't escape its true nature. Every input has the manipulating-the-machine magic of the original, but in the 964, the magic has distinctly dark overtones.

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2000 Porsche 911 (996) GT3 RS

I've escaped the 964's clutches, having barely resisted its siren song to push too hard, and now it's time for a 21st-century take on the underlying idea, in the form of the original GT3 RS . I'm shocked by the modernity: power windows, power steering , and could this be?—oh my goodness, it is!—a stereo .

The GT3 RS feels a little out of place; indeed, it's a substitution for a 993 Carrera RS Clubsport, which had apparently succumbed to mechanical malady. In the 993's stripped-down, track-ready, roll-caged place stands its own successor, the 355-hp water-cooled GT3 version of the 996, itself the first all-new 911 since the original.

Compared to the pre-millennium cars, everything has changed, and I'm not sure it's for the better. The clutch pedal hangs above the floor rather than protruding from it; it's stiff and abrupt in its takeup. The shifter sits too far aft for comfort and has none of the direct mechanical feel of the older Porsches. It is anything but a joy to use, as if Porsche was trying to prepare its drivers for the twin-clutch-automatic future. The steering is hypersensitive, and a good-sized bump can fling the GT3 from one side of its lane to another. Gone is the whine of the air-cooled 911's fan, replaced by a generic, fuming roar.

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The nicest thing I can say about the 996 is that it isn't trying to lull me into a suicidal misstep like the 964 was. This car isn't angry, nor is it happy, sad, or indifferent. It's a machine designed to blindly transport its occupants as quickly as they dare. I cannot blame it for doing its job, but after a few miles my leg aches from the heavy clutch, as does my mind from the intense stream of attention that driving this car requires. I know I should enjoy this moment—driving the most raw and powerful 996 on German roads—but I just can't. If the original Carrera 2.7 RS is heaven, the GT3 is someplace a little warmer and lower in elevation.

Yes, of course, it's a homologated racer, and you'd be perfectly justified in telling me that if I want a comfortable cruiser, I should drive a Toyota Camry. But I'll remind you the '73 911 RS Sport was also a homologation special, and it was pure joy—and, if memory serves, that car and its derivative, the RSR 3.0, did just fine on the track, too. For me, anyway, driving this 911 GT3 is much like eating oysters: It's an experience everyone should have at least once, but once may well be enough.

Past to future: Cycle broken

To be fair to the 911 GT3 , it adequately prepared me for the new Sport Classic, a car that is both intensely powerful and admirably docile, returning to the roots of the original 911 Carrera RS 2.7, a car that concentrates on the joy as much as outright insanity and raw speed. It's intense to drive all these 911s in a single day, but having walked the path the RS models forged, it's easy to understand why the 911 Sport Classic is the way it is.

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Why a Ducktail?

The original 911 Carrera RS is known for two attributes: its larger 207-hp 2.7-liter engine and its distinctive ducktail spoiler. The latter was intended to solve a rear-end stability problem at speeds of 95 mph or so (as low as 75 with a good crosswind). Aerodynamicist Hermann Burst found a straightforward solution: Fit the 911 with a chin spoiler and a kammtail rear end. The former was fine, but the latter clashed with Porsche's mandate that said the 911's recognizable shape could not be changed.

Burst went back to the wind tunnel and discovered a spoiler shaped just so could provide all the same benefits as a kammback. But when designer Harm Lagaay and his colleagues saw Burst's solution, "We were terrified," Lagaay says. "We wanted it smaller, more elegant. "

Burst and Lagaay worked together to find an answer that would look good and still bestow the desired aerodynamic benefits, resulting in the ducktail shape. Not only did it fix the stability issues, but it also improved airflow to the engine and helped keep the taillights clean—a serious concern in 1970s Germany, where massive roadwork and construction projects made for dusty sailing.