Abeba
A raised 911 born from contradiction, dust and the possibility of escape.
There are automobiles that try to convince you with logic. And then there are automobiles that, fortunately, do not even try.
The Porsche 911 Dakar belongs to the second category. It is a controversial object, almost absurd, certainly not necessary. A raised 911, with all-terrain tyres, a gravel setup and a name that evokes sand, dust, Africa, adventure. All on a Porsche. All on a 911.
It is exactly the kind of contradiction that interests us.
Because TURE is not a collection built around utility. In fact, it is often the opposite. We like things that seem useless only until you understand what they represent. Objects that do not answer a practical need, but something deeper: an image, a memory, a short circuit, a possibility. The 911 Dakar is totally unnecessary. But really essential. Unnecessary, because no one truly needs a Porsche 911 capable of tackling a dirt road. Essential, because it reminds us that the most interesting automobiles are often born when someone decides to do the wrong thing in the right way.
And Porsche has already done this.
In 1986 the 959 won the Paris-Dakar with Rene Metge and Dominique Lemoyne, finishing ahead of another sister 959 and transforming one of the most sophisticated cars of its time into a machine capable of crossing the desert. The 911 Dakar is born from there too: from that improbable and wonderful genealogy in which Stuttgart meets Africa, engineering meets dust, and a German sports car decides not to remain on asphalt.
We called ours Abeba.
It is a name that looks to Africa, to its light, its colours, its mental distance. We like to think that, at least ideally, it could run on those dirt tracks, raise dust, cross enormous and impossible landscapes. Perhaps it will never really do it. Or perhaps it will. But it matters little: certain cars also serve to keep a possibility open. Abeba is this: a 911 that seems to want to escape the city, even when it is standing still in the garage.
Then, naturally, there is the irony. Because however useless an object it may seem, in Milan it risks being one of the most sensible Porsches in the collection. Between potholes, cobblestones, tram rails, manholes, ramps, construction sites and roads that sometimes seem more like special stages than urban avenues, the Dakar finds its own surprising daily field of action.
After all, perhaps, one does not need to go all the way to Africa. Sometimes crossing Milan is enough.
Abeba is a Porsche born from a contradiction and saved by coherence. It is too high to be a pure 911, too low to be a true off-roader, too expensive to be mistreated, too capable to remain merely a styling exercise. And that is exactly why we like it.
Because some cars do not have to make sense. They have to have character. And Abeba has a great deal of it.