Some cars take months of searching. Mick’s took about a thousand yards.

“Matt took me up the road in it. I got in it and after about a thousand yards I said, yeah, I’ll have it. I knew it was special. It just felt right.”

We caught up with Mick at RennWorks in Stevenage. Over the last two and a half years, Matt Owens and his team have turned an already well-specced 2005 Carrera S into one of the most thoughtfully modified 997s we’ve come across. It has a 4.1-litre engine, a fully retrimmed interior and a stance that’s been worked out properly. And it still gets driven, a lot.

A properly specced starting point

The base car is a 997.1 Carrera S that came from one of Matt’s own clients. It was clearly specced by someone who liked driving. It has the factory aero kit, Porsche sports suspension, a factory short shifter and no sunroof.

“Everyone says avoid the dot one,” Mick laughs. But this one had been used well, which meant it was mechanically sorted. It also meant the nose was peppered with stone chips. The bodyshop next door repainted the front end. Alex from the RennWorks team then replaced the headlight lenses, because, as Mick puts it, “it’s little things like that that age a car really quickly.”

The colour is the other thing that got him. It’s an unusual blue with a green fleck that shifts depending on the light. “As soon as I saw it I thought, yeah, it’s a very special colour.”

Aero, stance and a brave choice of wheel colour

Mick is firmly in the aero kit camp. He prefers it to the Turbo front end, because it helps the car hunker down. The original cup lip “used to hit everything,” so it’s been swapped for a slightly lower, narrower one that survives real roads.

Underneath, the Porsche sports suspension has made way for KW V1 coilovers. The car now sits at roughly GT3 height, and the front has actually been raised 20mm. That wasn’t for looks. “I live on a road with speed bumps,” Mick explains. “It was either clunk and hit every one, or we bring it up a little bit.” The KWs give him more adjustment than most setups, which matters when you’re chasing the right stance and not just the lowest one.

The previous owner had fitted BBS wheels in gloss silver. Mick had them refinished in Porsche’s Neodyme gold, and against that blue they really set the car off. The tyres have done about 10,000 miles since, and he reckons there’s “one good road trip left in them.”

At the back sits the factory spoiler. “I’m a man of a certain age and I wasn’t certain about the spoiler,” he admits, “but it’s part of the car. It works.” Smoked rear lights are next on the list, to bring the only slightly dated corner of the car up to date.

The heart of the build: a 4.1-litre conversion

This is where RennWorks really went to town. At 72,000 miles, the engine already had the larger IMS bearing. But Mick knows the 997 horror stories as well as anyone: bore scoring, spun rod bearings, IMS failures. He wanted longevity.

So he and Matt went for a 4.1-litre conversion. The spec list reads like a wish list: Carrillo con rods, new 4.1 liners and pistons, fresh small and big end bearings, and a single-mass flywheel that’s been lightened and balanced. “Matt really went to town on it,” says Mick. “It’s well beyond my pay grade.”

Matt reckons it’s good for around another 50bhp. The real difference is in the mid-range, which is exactly where a road car lives. The car is just finishing its running-in miles, with the final service booked for next week. After that, it’s properly unleashed.

Keeping that flat-six voice

Modify a Porsche exhaust too far and you lose the thing that makes it a Porsche. Mick’s car runs stainless steel pipes with 200-cell sports cats and a cross pipe, all on Matt’s advice. It gives more tone and reach while keeping the raspy, burbling character intact. The tips are only slightly bigger than standard, so it’s noticeable without being shouty.

An interior that got a bit out of hand (in a good way)

The interior is custom from top to bottom. It didn’t start that way.

The seat backs were tired and the foam in the seats had gone, making long trips uncomfortable. Mick had a go at the Alcantara under-dash himself first. “I thought I was a trimmer deep down, but I realised I wasn’t. It took me so long.” Matt then put him in touch with Dave the trimmer.

The plan was just to redo the seat centres, then maybe leather and Alcantara. Dave talked him out of that: if you’re doing Alcantara, go all the way. The whole thing was built around a set of yellow seatbelts. When Matt produced the swatch, the yellow just popped against the dark exterior. The dash, steering wheel, centre console and seats are now all in Alcantara with yellow detailing.

“I wasn’t going for luxury,” Mick says. “I was going for more sports car.” It’s a nod to the modern 718 Boxsters and Caymans, set inside a 20-year-old 911.

Built to be driven, not polished

For all the work, this isn’t a garage queen. Mick isn’t a track person. He’s a road trip person, and he thinks the 997 has the perfect amount of power for British roads. He drove it to Spain last year. In a couple of weeks he’s heading for the Black Forest, then Austria, then back through the Alps, with a bit of autobahn if the chance comes up.

He sums up why he left modern cars behind: “You can get in a modern car and think you’re doing 70 and you’re doing a lot more. In this, you think you’re doing a lot more, then you look down and you’re doing 60, because it’s so visceral.”

Pulling at the thread

Mick is honest about how builds like this happen. “It was a bit like pulling at a thread. You start and you just want to go to the next thing.”

Most of us know how it goes. You log onto Design911, look up one part, and before long the basket is full. What makes that easier with a car like the 997 is having genuine OEM parts and aftermarket upgrades in one place. You can keep an analogue car feeling fresh without losing what makes it special.

Keeping it all on record with DRV247

With a build this involved, keeping track of it matters. Mick uses DRV247 to log everything that’s been done to the car and to get reminders for MOT and insurance. That’s handy when it isn’t your daily. “Storing and documenting what I’ve done to it has been brilliant,” he says.

The platform also connects him with partners like Design911 for parts. It shows him drive-outs and events matched to the cars he owns, from the big Porsche shows to small local meets.

What’s next for Mick’s 997?

The underside has been dry-ice blasted and treated. A couple of small corrosion spots on the rear quarters are next on the list. Beyond that, Matt is developing a set of equal-length headers, and Mick is considering 991-style side skirts to bring the car down visually. Then there are those smoked rear lights.

Mostly, though, he just wants to get out and use it. And that’s the best part of the Porsche scene right now. Whether you’re into resto-mods or keeping things strictly OEM, everyone backs each other.

Working on your own 997? Browse Porsche 997 parts at Design911, from service items to full performance upgrades.