Track experience so far with 996

Hi fellow Rennlisters, I�ve been tracking my 996 since my ownership in Dec 2020, and wanted to share my experiences so far as a resource for those who may be interested, but more importantly continue to contribute to the forums that have helped me many times on my Porsche journey. The main goal here is to provide insight into my experiences and costs, and not to focus on optimal lap time setups. Car: 2003 996 911 Carerra, ABS, No PSM Year 1: 2021 Track days: 7 Original parts: GT3 suspension Tarett droplinks OEM wheels 18x9, 18x10 Parts: Recaro SPG XL Seat Continental Extreme Contact 340TW Shortshifter + Greddy **** Mobil 1 0w40 Rennline Brake pedals Custom track number magnets Stainless steel brake lines DT 5w-40 Castro SRF Brake Fluid Rennline Front Tow Hook When I bought the car, it was in okay shape with about 150,000 miles, so first things were to replace any parts and refresh consumables so it was ready for the track. It came with GT3 suspension and a replaced engine, so I wasn�t too concerned about the IMS. Prior to my first track day, I flushed the brake fluid with Castrol SRF and installed SS brake lines for braking reliability, as well as changed oil with Mobil 1. I also installed new tires (Continentals) to replace the worn cheap tires the car came with. The previous owner gave me a short shifter which I installed and added my favorite shift ****. Took the car for my first track experience at Thunderhill East with an instructor and immediately got hooked. Spinning the car on Turn 2 was a quick lesson on how RR cars behave and how lifting off the accelerator is not the right move when losing grip. Overall, the car performed well and no unexpected wear or damage to the vehicle. The only issue I had was the car not starting immediately after the turn 2 spin, which my instructor assured was normal and that waiting a few seconds then restarting would resolve it. Due to bracing myself on every turn, I ended up buying a Recaro SPG XL (comfortable for daily IMO). I also replaced the cheap aftermarket brake pedals that came with the car with Rennline ones to provide more confidence when heel-toeing. Second day was at Thunderhill West with Tracknight in America (highly recommend if just starting off due to the organized novice experience, likely not if you are advanced). Knowing that there will be many future track days, I ended up buying magnet number cards, which I have had no issues with using over the last three years. Plus magnets look better in the pictures than tape. I returned to Thunderhill East and West for wet track days, which I feel expedited my understanding of car control and understanding grip. No off-track excursions that day, mainly due to me driving very much within my limits, and the continental tires performed well in the wet. My next day was at Sonoma Raceway which really lent me a new appreciation to racecar drivers and the nerves needed to drive on a track with close walls. I got moved to an intermediate open passing group for the eight session day, which I only ran half the sessions due to me being mentally drained while driving. Luckily no wall incidents and the car behaved as well as it should. After reading more information online about preventative maintenance for tracked 996s, I ended up switching to DT40 oil. However, this was a one time purchase as I ended switching back to Mobil 1 due to availability and cost. I finished the year with two days at my dream track of Laguna Seca, which was everything I expected it to be after first driving it virtually on Gran Turismo 5 almost over a decade prior. I started tracking my times more with the TrackAddict app and got into the logging tire pressures to see how it affected my lap times and driving feel. Year 2: 2022 Track days: 7 Parts: Works Meister S1 18x9, 18x10.5 Muteki Monster lug nuts Falken RT660 Hankook RS4 Cup decklid + Cup wing Demonspeed extended uprights Demonspeed GT3 front lip Camshaft plug Mobil 1 0w-40 OEM Textar brake pads OEM Sebro rotors Elephant racing adjustable control arms (not installed) Opened the new year at Laguna Seca, and was excited to tackle the corkscrew again. Being much more comfortable with the car, I was able to correct slides and improve my shifting to improve times. Times were around 1:51ish, which was a few seconds improvement, but wouldn�t be able to improve upon that until the next year due to the repave. Due to my love of modifying cars, I ended up installing a cup wing and GT3 front lip. At the same time, I added wider wheels with grippier RT660s to compensate for the aero. While aero isn�t the best addition to improving my skillset, it was for fun and setting up the car to eventually how I dreamed for it to be. The car proved to be much faster at Thunderhill East, West, and Sonoma through the year, combined with my improving driving ability able to get times down to roughly 2:15, 1:29, and 2:02 respectively. However, combined with the daily driving wear and about 5 days, the RT660s started to cycle out. I ended up installing Hankook RS4s due to their reputation to wear like iron and that the less grip would help me learn to utilize more of the tire, since I felt I really wasn�t using any of the potential of the RT660s. I quickly realized how much less grip when I swapped them on Thunderhill East and proceeded to spin on high speed Turn 1. Immediately saw a drop of oil pressure which corrected and car felt like it was gonna stall at low RPMs. I limped it in and found that the slide ended up spilling oil all over the left side of the engine bay and prompted a trip to the shop where it was diagnosed as a missing camshaft plug. This was the first time the car was in the shop for a track related incident. I finished the year going back to Sonoma a few times and improving to a 2:00 but unable to break that 2 min barrier. Overall was pretty happy with my choice to go with RS4s, the grip was predictable, wear was decent, and I felt like I was making improvements on how to utilize tire grip. Year 3: 2023 Track days: 2 + 1 Autox Parts: Pagid Yellows New magnaflow Cats New AOS Fabspeed Xpipe with 200 cell cats Not much track time this year since the car was out early in the year getting the cats replaced for smog and personal events that took priority over track time. Cats were very expensive and I ended up buying a used fabspeed xpipe with cats to reduce wear on my cats later (haven�t tracked yet with xpipe yet). I had sent the car back into the shop to find an oil leak which I couldn�t diagnose, which resulted in the AOS and a hose being replaced. Started the year in April at Thunderhill amidst the Spring greenery and spent the time giving rides to friends but was able to get time down to 2:10 just due to better driving. I then took the car to its first autocross, which was a refreshing experience compared to track driving. It was a good learning ground to experiment with grip since a cone is less damaging than a wall at Sonoma. I felt that a limitation to the next limitation I wanted to address with the car was the braking ability so I opted for Pagid Yellows to get that needed stopping power. I do not recommend them for the street as they have extremely loud squealing, which may have just been a poor bedding job on my behalf, but would prove to be what I wanted on track. I journeyed back to Laguna Seca in July with my new setup, as I was very excited to see how my improvements translated to track times. Spent the first session getting a good feel of the new brakes and pavement, then focused on adding pace into the second session (got a comfortable 1:47) before letting it rip in the third. Unfortunately, I noticed an uncomfortable amount of oil drips on the ground post session two, which I decided to call it for the day. Sent the car back into the shop to get diagnose which resulted in a need to further diagnose via dropping the engine, which was out of budget for now with no guarantee of end cost of the fix. Also discovered the rear wheel bearing is going out, so will need to address that before getting the car back onto the track too. I ended up tracking my ugly miata at the PCA CCCR at Laguna afterwards, so may have saw a few of you there. Currently the car is only on daily duty for the foreseeable future until I have time to address the above concerns. She currently sits on OEM wheels again with the continentals (still a decent amount of life on them due to not really using them as a novice) as the worn RS4s had led to some uncomfortable encounters with rain, and the pagids being shelved for textars for the street. Overall, no significant issues with the car outside of the camshaft and oil incidents. With the downtime this year, I�ll likely be replacing more of the worn suspension bits and general engine maintenance so will keep this updated with that. I hope this has provided a glimpse of what it is like to take a 996 to the track, it definitely is an experience that expands the appreciation for our ugly duckling 911s. I�ll add to this post more when I return to the track, but if you are interested in getting on the track, happy to answer any questions and also have been recording my experiences and learnings at trackmanual.com , to help those get their cars on track.

Thank you for sharing the details, but where are all the awesome track pics!?

Congrats man. It's an addictive blast. Now that you are getting faster, what are you doing to protect the engine from oil starvation and oil pressure instability?

Good info. I've done ~5 PCA HPDE events (Chuckwalla & Streets of Willow) & 2 AX since getting the car in 2020. Never been on a track before that. My aim is to learn to handle the car at its (or my) limits while trying to keep it stock and relatively un-marred . I've done a few spin-outs. I ended up with half the desert in my car on one of them! When I played with trailing throttle oversteer in an empty parking lot I noticed that the front end starts to understeer first. I didn't find the same thing on the track, things just happen too fast for that. Lift a little too much and there it goes! I think I'm starting to get the hang of catching them earlier. I'm also getting better at the "both feet in" thing & managing the car when I do. My car has the same issue where it doesn't want to start for a minute or so too. The only component I've gotten for the track has been a deep sump for more oil. I considered DT-40 but I'm just using my street oil at this point. I'm still one of the slowest people in the yellow group so I'm not stressing the car too much yet. Where did you get your magnets? I made my own by buying 18" magnetic signs, having numbers printed out on tabloid size paper and covering them with laminating sheets. I was trying to find some oval custom signs on the web where I could get a dark background & green numbers but wasn't able to find anything that fit the PCA size standards. Magnetic signs sure beat dicking around with painters tape every morning though!

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Spinnywhoosh made mine. I'm sure there are hundreds of other good vendors for something this simple, but at least this one company gets it right. Nice thick material and has never fallen off despite me being one of the most abusive drivers I know (six engines in six years, sent off every single corner at Buttonwillow trying to Sub-2 a 525i). You guys have huge guts sticking Super200's and aero on these M96 cars. I'd be paying @Porschetech3 out the nose for his dual-pickup sump before I risk a $20k engine on track.

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Of course, a few of my favorites over the years:

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Looking into the extended sump with baffles. I still drive the car enough around San Francisco that I am concerned with cracking an extended sump since the engine already sits so low. Once I buy another car later this year, I'll be adding the sump. Potentially will upgrade the AOS as well.

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Can relate to dirt/dust all over the interior after a good spin! How big of a sump did you go with? Ultimately would want the biggest sump I can but don't want to risk cracking it on the street. Catching the car is one of the fun unique parts of the 911 experience. Learning the dance to lift to rotate then gas for grip took a bit for me to gain confidence (and still learning!). Autox helped but it doesn't compare to doing it at much faster speeds on the track. I bought my magnets from black flag decals. Mainly because it let me choose 4 digits, and then I cut it in half to have two sets of numbers in case my preferred number got chosen.

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Normal size guts here, huge ***** though... they shrunk immediately when I put an LS in. Totally worth it. Plenty of people tracking the M96's, an extreme few running a dual pickup sump. 11 3/4i'sh QTS of XP9 changed every 6 hours or so of track time did a a reasonable job making the oil pressure less terrible for me.

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The M96 engine needs lots of high quality, high viscosity oil to survive the track. At the very least... I would go with the UAOS track version so you can run an extra 1 quart of oil over full. Oem AOS is a liability on the track. This is +1qt of oil over full. Then I would consider adding a sump with baffle. Worst case a 0.5 quart sump, next best case a 2qt sump. Counting the UAOS Track version, this is +1.5 to +3 extra quart of oil over full. If you want to go all the way, you can add the UIDS as a sump with the UAOS. You learn to live with a sump hanging out the back with the car lowered as you drive around town. Its no big deal. Key is to get as much oil in the engine as possible.

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Just saw this. I went with the LN 2 QT sump. It's been about 9 months and I haven't scraped it on anything yet. But I don't live in SF. I'll take a look at some of those vendors. The 2 or 3 I did look at didn't seem to do what I wanted. PCA seems to want the numbers to be bigger than standard. Not sure how much they really care though.

How do you like the GT3 Suspension for track & road use? OEM Rates & Valving?

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Well any gt3 factory c/o would probably not be a good choice as they would most likely be worn out. If u r asking about the ohlins....i find them to be very good but opinions differ. They r a good compromise. I turn them down about 10 clicks for the street. I also have all heim/uniball links so its not a stock ride. On the track i like the stiffness but the valving is lacking. It doesnt handle the larger aprons all that well. Its a good set up but not optimal for either.

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It's OEM, and I find it decent for dual duty but not necessary excellent at either. Tire choice greatly affects the ride quality for road use. Track leaves more to be desired in terms of adjustability but are fine for my current driving level/goals. I will likely replace them in the upcoming years due to age and wanting something I can adjust as needed.

Thank you for sharing your track experiences with the car. I�ll do something similar at some point when I can gather together all the details and memories. I�ve been tracking my 99 996 since 2004. I bought from a gentleman who had set it up amazingly well when he purchased a 996GT3. GT3 seats, 2 sets of Fikse FM-10 wheels, double adjustable coilovers w/external reservoirs, amongst other things. I purchased it with the intention of using it primarily as a track car. While I can�t say the car has been as reliable as some others here, it has served me well. I club raced it in NASA and PCA back in the mid to late 2000s. Since then it�s been my dedicated track car and I love it and still whip it around some local tracks. Apparently I have been using the wrong motor oil (Mobil 1) all these years, but having recently had the motor scoped there was minimal bore scoring. As a track car though, the oil gets changed after every other event. Edit: Oh, and I have a Shiba pup too. He�s an old guy at 13 years. -KJ

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if only there was a (relatively) fresh track engine with all the spendy bits included floating around somewhere. And imagine if that was attached to a refreshed/inspected 997s transmission with the unobtainium Guards LSD. Now what if that entire package cost about half of a �performance� engine rebuild.

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I see what you did there and i APPROVE !