Porsche to unveil 911 Dakar soon, will be off-road capable: Check details

Porsche has announced that they will be unveiling a new variant of the 911 sports car at Los Angeles Auto Show on 16th November. It is called the 911 Dakar, it was expected that Porsche will call it the 911 Safari after the 1978 911 Safari Rally cars. However, that has not happened, Porsche says that they opted for the 911 Dakar moniker after the first overall victory by Porsche in the Paris-Dakar rally.

This was the first time when a modified Porsche 911 was fitted with an all-wheel drive system. Porsche says that they have tested the 911 Dakar for over half a million km or 5,00,000 km under extreme conditions. This includes more than 10,000 km of testing on off-road conditions.

The suspension of the 911 Dakar was fine-tuned at the Château de Lastours test track in southern France. Porsche opted for this location and Romain Dumas got behind the wheel. He said, “All Dakar teams come here to test their cars in Europe before the rally. I knew what a 911 could do on the road, but I was absolutely stunned by how well the car performed here on the loose."Porsche says that the 911 Dakar even managed to take some airborne time because of the robust chassis and increased ground clearance. According to the manufacturer, the sports car even performed well on sweeping drifts and turns.

Porsche also took the 911 Dakar to Morocco and Dubai to test how well it performs on loose surfaces. According to Porsche, “test drivers mercilessly drove the off-road sports car up steep, 50-metre dunes in temperatures of up to 45 degrees Celsius time and time again."

As of now, the pricing, specs, engine and hardware of the 911 Dakar have not been revealed. Porsche will be showcasing all of that at the Los Angeles Auto Show on the 16th of November.