Vehicle Description
Chassis No. WP0CA29835L001499
Just when it seemed that a supercar successor to the 16-year-old,
world-beating 959 was less likely than ever with Porsche pulling
the plug on its sports racing program in 1999 and reassigning its
motorsport engineers to the utilitarian Cayenne, Porsche shocked
visitors of the 2000 Paris Auto Show with a concept dubbed the
"Carrera GT." Unbeknownst to Porsche racing fans, the concept's
5.5-liter V10 engine, internally designated "Type 3512," traced its
origins back to the early 1990s when Porsche was an engine supplier
in Formula One.
Meanwhile, Porsche's legendary sports racing car program during
this period is recognized as the most dominant in the marque's
history, with the Group C program - headlined by the 956/962 series
- achieving five consecutive World Sportscar Championships and six
consecutive overall victories at the 24 Hours of Le Mans from 1982
to 1987. The three-year 911 GT1 program extended Porsche's
international sportscar racing efforts into the late 1990s, until
the cancellation of the production-based GT1 class and the
expansion of dedicated Le Mans Prototype (LMP) racers at the turn
of the millennium. Reviving the long-shelved "Type 3512" engine,
the engineers in Zuffenhausen pursued the development of an
LMP900-class car internally designated "9R3," with the now
5.5-liter V10 mounted amidships. However, like its Formula 1
predecessor, Project 9R3 was abruptly canceled after building just
one running prototype, never to go racing. Thankfully, the Porsche
production department deemed the V10 suitable for the mid-engine
Carrera GT concept, which entered production in 2003 with a target
of 1,500 units.
Among the some 1,270 customers who eventually took delivery of the
production Carrera GT was American racing driver John Andrew
O'Steen - an active competitor in North American sports car racing
for three decades and longtime racing partner to Bob Akin, Dave
Helmick, and Hurley Haywood. O'Steen, also a member of the Porsche
Club of America since 1969, began his racing career in the late
1960s winning two SCCA races in a Porsche 356 Speedster (chassis
number 84430). Over the next several decades, O'Steen led an
enviable racing career, usually behind the wheel of a Porsche,
progressing through a legendary series of Porsches including 911
Carrera RSRs, 935s, and the 962 - including the iconic
Coca-Cola-liveried 935-84 and 962-102 fielded by Bob Akin Motor
Racing. He twice finished on the podium at the Sebring 12 Hours,
once finishing third alongside John Graves and Dave Helmick in 1975
and finishing second with Bob Akin and Dale Whittington in 1983.
The following year, he achieved a first-place finish in the C2
Class at the 1984 24 Hours of Le Mans in the BFGoodrich-sponsored
Lola-Mazda alongside John Morton and Yoshimi Katayama. In 2000,
O'Steen competed in his last 24-hour race at the Daytona 24 Hours
in a 911 GT2, capping off an incredible three-decade career.
After an extremely long-lived and successful racing career with
Porsche, O'Steen purchased this 2005 Carrera GT finished in
stunning Black (741) over Dark Grey (DZ) interior via Porsche St.
Louis. Specified with a carbon fiber handbrake handle,
leather-stitched sun visors, upper door finishers, center console,
and thicker armrest, limitation number 0991 retains its matching
Dark Grey five-piece luggage set and a car cover. Under the sole
ownership of O'Steen from new, the Carrera GT has enjoyed a life of
fastidious care, routinely visiting authorized Porsche dealerships
for annual maintenance as documented by the clean CARFAX Vehicle
History Report. In recent visits to Porsche of Melbourne, Florida,
the Carrera GT had its rear trailing arms replaced in June 2021, an
annual service including mounting four new Michelin Pilot Super
Sport tires (April 2022), and an annual service late last year
encompassing a new battery, changing the oil, brake and
transmission fluid, replacing the front hood struts, and installing
and new spark plugs and ignition coils in December 2023. A full
mechanical inspection and clutch measurement at Porsche McKenna in
Norwalk, California followed in April 2024, which found the clutch
to measure 30.5 millimeters - a further testament to the careful
use and meticulous care it has been treated to over the past two
decades.
Rarely do Carrera GTs emerge from single-ownership care, let alone
from the stable of a retired racing driver who competed at the
highest levels of international motorsport in some of the most
dominant Porsche sports racing cars of all time. Offered with just
3,601 miles at the time of cataloging and benefitting from paint
protection film on the front nose, rockers, side mirrors, wheels
and calipers installed in October 2020, this low-milage 2005
Carrera GT is an immaculately well-preserved, investment-grade
example of one of the most celebrated supercars of the 21st
century.
