The Club Ferdinand Collection - Club Ferdinand - Porsche Club, Driving and Touring, in Valle Crucis, Western North Carolina High Country

ClubFerdinand Explore North Carolina behind the wheel of our collection of new Porsches and discover a whole new level of freedom

Club Ferdinand - Valle Crucis, North Carolina

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Every month, the glossy pages of car magazines sport photographs of the quickest thing to hit the roads since, well, the last time. In their celebration of unbridled speed and handling, reliability simply isn’t a major factor. It should be. A high performance car may be fast, furious and fun, but if bits keep falling off, if it spends more time in dry dock than cruising the highways and byways, the machine in question is nothing more than a four wheeled prima donna with a propensity for bouts of “exhaustion”. And yet automakers continue to build supercars that can't run hard for one day without some kind of extremely expensive tinkering. - Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

There's an old racing expression: "To finish first, first you must finish." Porsche doesn’t just pay homage to the expression, they live it. The German company has dominated nearly every race series in which they’ve competed. More to the point, Porsche’s won the grueling 24-hour race at Le Mans sixteen times. That’s more than Ferrari and Ford put together. This phenomenal mechanical stamina is built into every Porsche road car made.- Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

A while back, I was invited to speak to a local chapter of Porsche owners. I tried to explain the over-engineering that makes Porsche’s road cars so tough. For example, their engines and transmissions are built absurdly strong for their size. You will find more bearing area, big-ends and mains for each liter of displacement in a 911 engine than in any other engine in production today. It’s an obscure technical point, but a telling one; indicating Stuttgart’s commitment to combining mechanical strength, accessible performance and glorious precision. You simply can’t buy a more robust high performance automobile.- Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

There are plenty of independent surveys to back up this assertion. Porsche’s Finnish subcontractors, Valmet Automotive, recently received the Bronze Plant Quality Award from J.D. Power’s Initial Quality Study 2006. The Cayman S was ranked best overall (together with Toyota Lexus LS 430) for having the fewest quality problems in the entire industry. The Cayman S was best in its category "Compact Premium Sporty Cars,” with the Porsche Boxster ranked third. And Porsche was awarded the highest initial quality of all automobile brands. - Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

OK, it is true that the Carrera GT’s carbon fiber clutch is a disaster that transforms a perfectly serviceable (if low slung) daily driver into a San Francisco supercar owner’s worst nightmare. But it’s the exception that proves the rule. The Porsche Turbo is still the single most effective exemplar of the “everyday” supercar. It’s the only ultra-high performance automobile I’d jump into at a moment’s notice and confidently head for the other end of the country– at speed. Or take to the supermarket to pick-up a weekend’s supplies. - Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

Is reliability the ultimate measure of a high performance car? Of course not. Otherwise, the Porsche Turbo would be in a class of one. But reliability is certainly an important safety consideration for anyone who intends on using their exotic as God intended. And it jibes with the age old question: what’s the world’s best car? One that starts.- Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

SPECIAL NOTE OF THANKS

The best automotive writing we know of one the web, or on paper, can be found at www.thetruthaboutcars.com. The writers there are talented, knowledgeable, and second to very few in terms of the quality of their content, analysis, and literary craftsmanship. Truth About Cars is a no nonsense, no-holds-barred, running commentary on cars and the automotive industry. No one is always right but they are right more times than anyone we know, and they are always honest and passionate. Add to that some of the most witty and sometimes downright hilarious writing which can be found today on any subject and you have a unique one-two punch guaranteed to keep you both informed and rolling on the floor with a side-ache requiring a chiropractor. The site is nothing short of a knee-slappin-full-blown-hoot. Saturday Night Live in Arkansas Dahlin.

A case in point from a recent review:
"So how does a vehicle that lays down 89.999% of its righteous 500 horsepower sound? Like the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse in an echo chamber. How does it feel? Like a head butt. Release the clutch and there is a moment of hesitation, almost as if the rear tires are asking, “You're not serious?” And then BAM"

To which another member of the same team wrote a counterpoint which said:
"Don't get me wrong: I love monstrous horsepower. Whether it’s the painful jolt of a Carrera GT or an Enzo stretching the time space continuum, I'm a fervent fan of fast. But I also like to write about it. That means I only deploy as much horsepower as the car can handle without hitting solid objects. First, that requires stop-the-world-I-want-to-get-off braking power. Second, it requires a suspension that's several orders of magnitude better than the one fitted to a 1972 Chevrolet Monte Carlo."

Many of the quotes and excerpts are from the www.thetruthaboutcars.com website because try as we might; a) there is no way we could write that well to offer you the descriptions and virtual experiences they are capable of providing, b) if someone has described something so perfectly it is almost sinful not to read it as many places as possible.

As such we would like to thank profusely www.thetruthaboutcars.com, Robert Farago and the fine writers there as well as commend them for their outstanding capacity to keep us all informed-in-stitches.

“Club Ferdinand in Valle Crucis, North Carolina,
is the first “Fleet-Sharing Club” in the World composed exclusively
of the legendary Porsche Automobiles.
Three surprisingly affordable membership options
enable Members to benefit from the use of the club’s
“Luxury Sports Car Fleet” of new Porsches,
using a reservation and points system which assures equitable-share
usage of the fleet by all club members.
Explore North Carolina behind the wheel of your collection
of new Porsches and discover a whole new level of freedom.”

ClubFerdinand
1644 Broadstone Road
Historic Valle Crucis
Banner Elk, North Carolina 28604
Telephone: 828-963-5857, 828-963-2626
Fax: 828-963-6404, 626-608-3594
Toll Free: 1-888-963-5857
www.clubferdinand.us
info@clubferdinand.us

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