Porsche has confirmed that the new off-road-focused 911 variant due to make its debut at the Los Angeles motor show next week will be known by the 911 Dakar moniker.
The model and name pay tribute to Porsche's assault on the gruelling 1984 Paris-Dakar desert rally in which it took overall victory using a heavily-modified Rothmans-liveried 911 featuring all-wheel drive ahead of the following year's launch of its first four-wheel drive road car, the 959.
It's easy to forget that the 911 was an incredibly competitive and successful rally car back in the sixties, seventies and eighties. Another of the Dakar's inspirations is those early 911s that were beefed up to cope with races such as the arduous Safari Rally in Kenya.
Not many details confirmed yet
While Porsche has yet to reveal a lot about the specs of the 911 Dakar, images released by the firm show a vehicle based on the current 992-generation model but featuring chunky off-road tyres and a significant suspension lift compared to the ordinarily low-slung 911. The firm did say, however, that the new variant would feature all-wheel drive, and a lack of Turbo-style air intakes on the rear flanks suggests the model will employ the 3.0-litre twin-turbo flat-six as opposed to one of the larger-displacement versions of the engine. The anti-lock braking systems and traction control, Porsche said, have been optimised to better tackle a broader range of surfaces.
Ahead of the 911 Dakar's full reveal, Porsche said that the model had notched up more than half a million kilometres of testing, 10,000 of which were conducted in off-road environments.
Snow joke
Among the locations used to test the new model was the famed Arjeplog proving ground in the Swedish Arctic which is used by many manufacturers to test their cars' handling dynamics in a low-friction environment as well as how they perform in cold weather conditions. Behind the wheel for at least some of the testing in Arjeplog was the Porsche brand ambassador and former rally ace, Walter Röhrl, twice winner of the World Rally Championship in the 1980s, who was enthusiastic about the way the Dakar drove.
"The car is incredibly fun to drive," said Röhrl. "Everything works so precisely and calmly. No Porsche customer will believe all the things you can do with this car before they've driven it themselves."
From one extreme to another
As well as the snows of Sweden, the Dakar was tested in what should, given its name, be home turf: the deserts of Morocco and the UAE, in which the pre-production model was pounded around sandy tracks and up steep dunes in temperatures of up to 45 degrees Celsius.
"The 911 Dakar delivered a commanding performance even in the desert," said Porsche's Frank Moser.
"Especially here, the 911 Dakar can make the most of its conceptual advantages - the combination of low weight, higher ground clearance, a powerful rear-mounted engine and the short wheelbase make for an exhilarating driving experience. I was able to experience it myself on test drives in the Sahara."
Another location used for testing the 911 Dakar was the Château de Lastours off-road test track in the south of France, where teams due to compete in the Dakar Rally (as the Paris-Dakar is now called - it can't run on the old route due to political instability in the region) often come to test their vehicles before the race.
Lastours' lengthy network of tough and twisting gravel roads was used to fine-tune the Dakar's suspension and handling over the rough and loose ground during the testing phase, with some of the driving conducted by one of Porsche's works drivers, Romain Dumas, twice winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Dumas was initially taken aback to have been asked to go to Lastours to test a 911 road car due to the site's reputation as a location for off-road testing, but, like Röhrl, he said he was surprised and impressed by the 911's gravel-surface capability.
"I knew what a 911 could do on the road," said Dumas, "but I was absolutely stunned by how well the car performed here on the loose."
Los Angeles reveal
The 911 Dakar is due to be revealed in Los Angeles on November 16.