Everything you (didn’t) need to know about Ilya’s Orange Porsche
Let’s start with some basic car facts:
The specific car that Ilya drives in the book is a Porsche 918 Spyder. It looks like this:
This car was only manufactured from 2013 - 2015.
Cost: The starting price was $845,000. It was actually not available in orange from the factory, which means that Ilya’s is a custom color. There was also a racing sport package (the Weissach package) available with this car that cost an extra $84,000, which, for the sake of this post, I am assuming Ilya ordered. This means that he spent at least 1 million USD on this car.
Engine: The Porsche 918 has a hybrid-electric motor, so yes, Ilya drives a hybrid. A really, REALLY fast hybrid. It can go from 0-60 in 2.6 seconds. It has done a bunch of very impressive race car things, which I will not go into detail about but I am 100% sure that Ilya knows every single stat and tells Shane about all of them in excruciating detail when he’s drunk.
Body Style: It is a two seater convertible. Kind of. The 918 has what is called a Targa Top, which is a Porsche-specific thing that means there is a removable roof section with a full roll bar that goes across the back of both seats. The roll bar is there in case the car… rolls. It’s basically a piece of metal that keeps the top of the car (and therefore your head) from being crushed in the event of a collision. It is called a Targa Top for race car reasons that I will not get into, but I will say that Connor is driving a vintage Porsche Targa in this photo shoot for Vogue Adria.
Which is not actually relevant but is a fun fact. (Sorry about my shitty screenshot, I couldn’t find a non-Instagram image of this)
Transmission: The 918 has a manual transmission but is NOT a stick shift, because it has a really, really complicated gear box so it has what is known as a paddle shifter, which essentially means that the shifting is controlled via two little levers behind the steering wheel.
Other Fun Facts: The sports package also came with body-hugging race seats, which could make any potential sexy car times pretty difficult, but these are two professional athletes fueled by an inherent need to fuck nasty 24/7 and I believe in them. It is also only 45” tall, which is going to make going through the drive thru problematic. And because this is a Porsche, it is a mid-engine sports car, meaning that the engine is located in the (approximate) middle of the car, so sadly no dirty fucking on the hood after Ilya has been working under it because the engine is not under there.
In conclusion: If Ilya had to pick one car to keep from his European sports car collection, this is a pretty excellent option. It’s fast, horrifically expensive, and there are only like 5 of them in Canada, which makes him an extra special princess. Plus it’s a hybrid so it’s good for the environment, Shane.
