While Porsche’s pedigree is usually reserved for asphalt, a few have been brave enough to rally a contemporary 911.
Pettigrew is a familiar face in the New Zealand Rally Championship, having driven a variety of purpose-built and custom-made cars.
His go-to car was a BMW E46. Others included a Ford Fiesta and later a Holden Barina built to AP4 specifications.
Making the move to a Rally2 car was ultimately cost-prohibitive, and when he stumbled upon a video of former Top Gear host Chris Harris rallying a Porsche 911 he knew he had to have one.
“I wanted a challenge and had done the AP4 thing,” he explained.
“The next step on from that — like a Rally2 car, is $600,000 for a new one, and that’s just not doable for my budget.
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“That Porsche was something I thought would stand out from everyone else.
“In terms of like the sponsorship side of things, it’s definitely made that a bit easier and have way more promotion around the car and what I’m doing, which is pretty cool.
“That’s sort of the big selling points for doing something as stupid as this.”
Pettigrew bought a 911 GT3 Cup that had been living at Highlands Motorsport Park in Cromwell. However, that couldn’t be road registered.
He then found a flood-damaged, first-generation 997 online and began retrofitting parts from the race car to the road car, plugging in the engine, electrical system, and sequential gearbox.
Converting a road car into a rally car comes with obvious hurdles.
“They’re designed to be a race car, which has big wheels and big brakes. When you try and go and put it on gravel onto a small, 15-inch wheel, that’s a big challenge,” Pettigrew explained.
“And then getting the suspension to work properly having probably twice as much travel as a race car was the biggest challenge.
“There are a lot of custom parts and designs that go into it to try and make everything work.”
It’s been a one-year turnaround from when he bought the car off TradeMe to making its competitive debut at the Otago Rally where he wowed fans.
Even in its first multi-day rally, Pettigrew was setting stage times that raised a few eyebrows relative to the fastest Rally2 and AP4 cars.
The Porsche was just over 30 seconds slower on average per stage than the fastest, event-winning Skoda Fabia Rally2.
All told, he finished just under 10 minutes behind rally winner Jack Stokes.
Pettigrew said there is still more time to find in the Porsche set-up.
“It’s pretty cool,” Pettigrew laughed when asked what the car is like to drive.
“It’s obviously completely different to anything else I’ve driven before.
“The weight is in the back, which is a big difference to anything I’ve driven before.
“There’s a lot more pace to come as I get more comfortable with the car and a bit more speed up changes to get it how I want it in the future.
“I hoped we’d be that fast heading into the weekend, but you never really know with a new car.
“We’d only done 50 kilometres before the rally, so just getting to the finish was the main goal of the weekend rather than trying to be competitive up the front.
“It’s pretty promising going forward with a few changes we want to do to make it a bit better as well.
“Definitely towards the end of the year when I’ve done a few more miles in it, we should be able to get the boys up the front a bit of a hurry up every now and then, hopefully.”
So where does a sports car that’s rear-wheel drive and has an engine in the back beat the four-wheel-drive, front-engined hatchbacks?
“It’s stage-dependent as well. The car is more suited to sort of faster roads with the horsepower it has,” Pettigrew explained.
“It’s got a bit more power than those [Rally2 and AP4] cars. A good long straight is always good for us – and probably a higher top speed as well.
“I’m definitely surprised at how good it is around corners as well. The first time we tested, it had a lot of understeer so I couldn’t be that brave in the faster corners.
“We’ve improved that a lot, and hopefully a bit more to come here as well. I’ve been a bit surprised at how good it has been in those faster corners as well.
“With weight in the back and the front being so light, everyone says it will understeer but it’s just been a lot better than I expected.”
Pettigrew is planning to contest the New Zealand Rally Championship this year but also wants to bring the car to Australia for a new challenge.
“I need to take it over to Australia as well in the future,” he said.
“I’ve done most of the rallies in New Zealand and I guess the rallying is an adventure, so doing the same old thing every time you get a bit bored of it.
“Being able to do some other rallies around the world would be pretty cool.”
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