The Porsche VS Ferrari Wars, California Road Trip: Porsche 911 Slope Nose Turbo & Ferrari Testarossa

In the late 1990’s I owned a black Ferrari Testarossa, my own personal Batmobile dream machine. My buddy had bought a red Porsche 911 with a slope nose conversation. He had sent it off to Southern California to have a 3 turbo motor installed in it. When the call came in that it was ready to be picked up, we decided it was time for an epic road trip. We decided we’d drive the Ferrari down to SoCal to pick up the Porsche. And then go further. The plan was a stop in Palm Springs after driving some desert roads, then through the Joshua tree National monument and through the south eastern desert wastelands of California and Southern Nevada to Las Vegas. It was January but weather forecasts were clear and we rolled out of San Francisco one afternoon headed for LA on I-5. Worryingly, the Ferrari was occasionally throwing a converter check light as we rolled in. Everything worked out, it turned out there was a well regarded independent Ferrari shop in Costa Mesa, and when I called them to tell them of my plight, they said come on over, we’ll get your car on our dyno first thing and get you back on the road ASAP. True to their word they immediately diagnosed a pin hole burned spark plug extender, they had one in stock and fine tuned the fuel mixture while they were at it. $200 and an hour later we were on our way to the open roads east to Palm Desert. We were now in full cannonball run mode. We ran the red Porsche and Black Ferrari together, with walkie-talkie radios clipped to our shoulder belts, with the lead car running a radar detector forward and the trailing car running a detector out the back windshield. The Porsche was behaving perfectly and the Ferrari firing happily on all 12 cylinders again. It turned out that our hotel for the night had a pretty good bar attached. That was the good news. The bad news was we spent a lot of time there that night and as a result the next morning was pretty rough. The radar detectors pointed front and back worked. No tickets were issued. Once we checked into the Bellagio Hotel that afternoon, I slept as my hangover was kicking my a$$. My buddy had money burning a hole in his pocket and couldn’t wait to get down to the casino. A few hours later I’d just started eating the cheeseburger I’d ordered from room service, still lying in bed like a junky at 5 in the afternoon when my buddy burst in! He banged the door shut and started cursing. All his money was gone! At least he didn’t have the title to his Porsche with him, so he hadn’t been able to pawn that and dig a deeper hole for himself. We rolled out and had a couple exciting episodes that day. First I was surprised at speed by a decreasing radius turn. To add to the excitement there was just a touch of gravel at the apex of the turn. The Testarossa with its big engine and wide hips behind you and heavy rear weight bias is not a car you want to get sideways in. If you lose the back end, you better have a lot of skill and some room to save it, otherwise you’ll be going off the road backwards. All this information flashed into my mind in a millisecond. I didn’t have much room, time or high level driving skill, but in an instant I realized I was going to have to throw it sideways a little bit to scrub off excess speed and whip around the tightening bend. Hitting the brakes hard would just fling me into the ditch and trees that lined the downwards slipping hillside. Yikes. Bringing all my concentration to bear I very carefully and ever so slightly jerked the wheel slightly left and as the machine got a touch sideways I gently counter steered around the turn staying neutral on the brakes and accelerator. I made it. I felt relieved and then a bit of adrenaline started to flow. Yowsa. I nơw knew what it was like to get the Ferrari sideways, an experience I’d never really planned on having. Now, a man of greater maturity or prudence (I had neither back them) might have eased off at that point, but with the angry red turbocharged Porsche behind me I resumed high speed. We later stopped at Scotty’s Castle, an eccentric and well known landmark in Death Valley for lunch. And there we hatched a plan to find some empty flat roads to film a series of high speed drive bys for filming. Have a look, it was exhilarating as we took turns trying to outdo each other. I should note that during the trip we each had a go at driving both cars. My take away-the Porsche had superior acceleration, but only during the short time that the turbocharged flat 6 kicked in at full boost and then almost instantly it was time to shift up to the next gear. The Ferrari with a larger displacement naturally aspirated 12 cylinder had a much flatter and longer pull through each gear. It was also smoother and more refined than the raucous and rowdy Porsche hot rod. On the road there seemed to be little difference. Neither car could really pull away from the other. They were a fine match. It was a truly memorable trip.

Added 6 May 2026