A few of you may have seen the MINI vs Porsche ad in 07-06-2010 New York times. Yes MINI USA is calling out Porsche to meet them on the track at Road Atlanta with a Porsche Carrera S and a driver.

MINI will bring a 2010 Cooper S and their own driver. We don’t know much about any of the other parameters or if Porsche will even show up. But we do know that MINI will win win lose or draw in just posing the challenge to a car costing (at least) three times as much.

Clearly the overall tone is cheeky and MINI is taking themselves too seriously with this. But can they win? If the track is tight and technical enough perhaps. However as much as we love MINIs, a Carrera S is fast car on any track (provided the driver is decent).

For MINI to win it would need to be a combination of the right track and right driver.

The event will be closed to the public but we’ll be part of the exclusive group of journalists covering the event.

You can follow all the updates  on www.MotoringFile.com and on MINI USA’s Facebook page.

Porsche Decides Against Racing MINI

Porsche has said “nien” to MINI’s request to race. Here’s Porsche North America CEO Detlev Von Platen’s answer to MINI’s challenge:

Dear Jim,

Imagine our surprise to discover our former employee, now the head of Mini, has challenged us to a head-to-head race. As you surely know, Porsche has a long history of racing success, with more than 28,000 wins over the last 60 years. In our early days, we pitted ourselves against the giants, so we’ve been in your shoes. But as you also know, Porsche doesn’t race for fame, stunts or publicity. We race to challenge ourselves; we race to push sports car technology; we race to translate every win on the track to our cars on the road.