Porsche is currently hooked on the hard stuff: the rare-groove special editions every manufacturer of note seems to be purveying as though their existence depended on it. (Maybe it does?) It’s obvious why.

These creations delight the engineering teams, but so too do they have the bean-counters positively frothing at the mouth, such is the willingness to swallow outrageous prices. It’s easy to see these projects as cynical.

And then you meet the cars first hand.

The Porsche 911 Dakar? Silly car, silly price, but truly, superbly fine company in the real world and an instant classic.

The new 911 S/T? Hugely contrived, despicably expensive, but probably the most intoxicating yet usable supercar Porsche has ever made. Sublime.

Which brings us to the 911 Sport Classic, which arguably started all this nonsense in the ‘997’ era, when it embraced a style-over-substance approach with an entirely pointless duck-tail, houndstooth innards and almost no mechanical tickles.

Porsche 911 Sport Classic braking – rear

Asking price: £140k. Or, in 2009, £10k more than a 911 GT2!

This year, Porsche reprised the Sport Classic idea, cueing prejudiced ambivalence in the Autocar office, particularly when the price was revealed to be £214k.