I bought the car in April of 2025 from Facebook marketplace, and I was looking for a cheap track car that I can take endurance racing. The obvious choice would've been a Spec Miata but given that my dad had a Porsche 944 Turbo track car for almost 20 years and a Porsche 944S streetcar beforehand, the Porsche 924s/944 chassis was a known car to us. It was a very unoptimized SCCA EP car before I bought it and previously competed in NASA time trials prior to being sold to the previous owner. The last owner knew very little of the history behind the car and spent a few months getting enough information/pictures from the seller to feel confident enough to buy it.
We picked the car up from New Jersey and drove it 10 hours back home to New Hampshire. We unloaded and started inspecting it more closely. The car had some obvious bumps and bruises from a few on track incidents. Mainly the driver's side door and rocker were bent inwards, and the driver's side front fender was a different color. It looked like someone dive bombed and/or t-boned the car, but the damage was all cosmetic. The car had some good parts on it from the previous 2 owners. The front hubs were swapped to late 944 hubs, a manual steering rack replaced the power steering, the car had no sunroof (extremely rare), the interior had up to date safety equipment and was fully gutted, the roll cage was recently updated and inspected by the local SCCA tech inspector, fiberglass bumpers front and rear, front coilover conversion, front camber plates, bigger sway bars, external oil coolers, and 2 sets of OEM wheels with tires. Solid platform to start from and the car came with all of its previous logbooks.
After we assessed the state of the car, we started modifying it to fit within the rules of the intended series and class we were planning on racing in. That class is GT18 in the Northeast GT endurance series. It's a power to weight ratio class with performance modifiers to similar to NASA's ST classes or GridLife's GLTC class. GT18 cars have a rough power to weight ratio of 18lbs for every 1hp plus performance modifiers.
Our first race was in June of 2025, and we intended on making that event to shake the car down and set a benchmark for the year. I made a list of parts, and we got to work getting the car ready for its maiden voyage. Since this was an endurance series, there was the possibility of racing in the rain and at night. We added a set of custom 924 Carrera GT style headlights since the previous owner gutted the pop-ups and added a rain light to the back of the car. We next tackled the interior of the car to make sure that both my dad and I fit comfortably in the car. The seating position needed to be modified, and we swapped the small rearview mirror for a wink wide view mirror. We also had some OEM parts left over from the 944 Turbo so added some 944 side view mirrors and a 944 hatch.
The car is far from finished and each race/track day I take it out I find something that can be improved upon from the last time. The car had issues in it's first outing despite doing all the routine checks after I bought the car. However, each modification I've done since I've owned has made the car not only more reliable but significantly faster and more competitive. It's currently competing in Northeast GT under the GT18 class and my goal is to have a competitive and reliable car for the class.
