The Porsche Mission R Is 1073 Horsepower of Racing Futurism – RoadandTrack.com

Porsche's decades of racing history are headlined by a record 19 overall wins at Le Mans, but most Porsche racing cars are spec racers. 4400 of those prolific 911 GT3 Cup cars have been built since the first Carrera Cup category kicked off 31 years ago. The near future of that category is the new 911 GT3 Cup, but the world is electrifying fast and Porsche knows its beloved flat sixes will not be around forever. Enter the Mission R concept.

The all-electric Mission R delivers what Porsche describes as "the same lap time performance" as a current GT3 Cup, but it finds that speed in a very different way. In its all-out qualifying trim, two sets of electric motors deliver 429 horsepower to the front wheels and 644 horsepower to the rear wheels for a combined 1073 horsepower. Porsche says the car will achieve a top speed of 186 MPH and reach 60 MPH in under 2.5 seconds. That output falls to 671 hp in race trim, but the smaller output greatly increases available track time.

An 80 kh battery allows the car to race for 30 to 45 minutes at a time, long enough for a current Carrera Cup race but not quite long enough for a serious endurance racing future. A new 900-volt fast charge system allows the car to reach 80% of that capacity in just 15 minutes, a number that will be the key to unlocking the car's ability to run both long track days and full race weekends in competition.

While the Mission R resembles a GT car, it was designed from the ground up as a racing car and should instead be considered a GT-like prototype. That means it is constructed around a carbon cage that makes up the entire visible roof section. It also means that the entire car, inside and out, has been designed for track-level performance and safety first, a direct benefit of a car that was built by an engineering team and a design team working together from day 1.

It also means that Porsche could make the Mission R look however they wanted. The resulting car is both shorter and wider than the modern 718 Cayman, but its shape borrows mostly from the Taycan and Porsche's vast backlog of legendary purpose-built racing cars. While the front pairs Porsche's now-distinctive quad-headlight setup with a massive splitter aided by active aerodynamics, the rear of the car exposes the backs of the tires as a wide variety of Porsche racing cars have done since the 917.

A relatively massive driver's cabin holds an unusual interior for a racing car. Like the 918 RSR concept before it, the Mission R's idealized cockpit has left room for very intentional design in a place that most racing cars have effectively standardized. Unlike the timeless natural-tone leathers in that concept, the Concept R's cabin follows the rest of the car in skewing toward futurism. Dashboard functions are handled by a screen in the steering wheel, leaving the screen on the driver's side of the dashboard to show images from the various cameras acting as side-view and rear-view mirrors throughout the car's exterior. In-cabin cameras are installed by default and designed by Porsche to allow broadcasters and fans to choose from a variety of angles during a race. Porsche claims this entire monocoque structure can be used as a sim racing rig, too.

The Mission R we see today is more than a stationary model, but less than a ready-to-sell customer racing car. While it can lap a track now, development will continue over the next few years. The company says that the final form of the Mission R might be ready by 2025 or 2026. That may be as little more than a limited-run option for loyal customrs like the 935 revival, but any fully-realized Mission R will be worth celebrating as the greatest customer-ready electric track car in the world.

While you may have seen a half-dozen "Unseen" concepts from Porsche over the past year, those cars were unseen at auto shows for a reason. Porsche shows very few concepts and, with the exception of tribute cars like the 917 Living Legend, eventually makes most of the concepts they do show. All of the road-going 918, Taycan, Panamera Sport Turismo, and Taycan Cross Turismo were debuted as concept cars first in what turned out to be near-production form. The Mission R even shares a naming system with the Taycan's working title, Mission E. While it could go the way of the 918 RSR and never be heard from again, a public presentation indicates that Porsche will follow through on its promise and build the Mission R we see today into the future of its customer racing division.

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The Porsche Mission R Is 1073 Horsepower of Racing Futurism - RoadandTrack.com