Using the GT-R as an example of a manufacturer using technology to make a dominating drag, road race and driver's car is not accurate in my experience. One non-track friend owned the first Canadian GT-R in '09 after owning a couple of Ferraris and sold it because of it's poor road manners...he simply couldn't take it any longer.
A close track friend bought one in '09 and still owns it. He quickly found he just couldn't handle the poor road manners on his 30 minute drive from the country into work. Instead he drove his lowered NSX on race coilovers to work in good weather and his wife's C350 Merc in poor weather. He spent the first 5 years modifying the GT-R to handle track lapping days, and the last year tracking it reliably. He was tired of modifying previous cars for the track and bought the GT-R because he thought it would be set-up to handle lapping days in stock form. He couldn't even use the paddle shifters in manual mode without overheating the tranny so he drove it in auto and says he couldn't beat it that way anyways. He's had to improve the cooling for everything with duct work, additonal coolers and even brake fans. And so many components changed on a car that he thought was track ready...like some here still think.
He thought he'd try again to find a track day car that would be enjoyable on the road and took delivery of a C7 Z51 with mag suspension a couple of weeks before I got my TA in April. Tadge at GM had convinced folks that it was track ready and had been track stressed. He was to take that on our trip to VIR but killed the car at a shake-down lapping day at a local track. It still lays dead 4 months later after one track day as he addresses all the issues, and had to do the VIR trip in his GT-R.
I met a GT-R forum friend of his at VIR this summer, and drove in the same advanced run group with him for two days with Chin Motorsports. This fellow had also modified or replaced an exhaustive number of things on the car to make it track worthy, including prototype Alcon brakes as I recall. He explained that he felt the GT-R was designed not for road course supremacy, but rather for one phenomenal lap for the marketing and magazine machines to churn out. I believe he told me that between sessions after his day ended early due to boiling steering fluid!
I have yet to see a stock 911 of any variety run in the advanced run groups that I do. Suspension, cooling, brakes, wheels and tires are all popular mods.
The Viper is a completely different breed than most high-performance cars that are considered track worthy. In fact, I don't know of a single other car that can truly go from showroom to road course like the Gen V Viper can. My die hard track friends don't know of one either and are amazed at how I've driven the wheels off of my TA without over-heating or wearing out anything but tires. I can't even wear out the brake pads.
So let's recognize the extent of the focus that SRT made when focusing on the car's track and road manners, how they managed to keep it wrapped in an exotic package with world class fit and finish, and how they were unwilling to compromise the engaging and analogue driving experience that Viper buyers have valued. Isn't saying that they should have done this or that to suit another segment of the market just meaning that you don't fully recognize or value what they did accomplish so well, and so much better than those that claim to compete with it?
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