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.