2013 Porsche Cayenne GTS Review

Three little letters transform Porsche’s posh people carrier
By Imthishan Giado

2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS

Right off the bat, here is some automotive heresy for you: I enjoyed driving this goliath Cayenne GTS more than the brand spanking new Cayman S, the finest driver’s car Stuttgart has ever made – and that includes the 911.

2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS

No doubt some of you are already outraged, huffing and puffing furiously while reaching for your mice to open a new browser window and send me an angry comment or two. (Have at it, by the way.) But if the purpose of writing a review is to be honest and not service the commonly-held view, then I have to be honest – this massive two-tonne truck is an absolute hoot to drive and far less clinical than one expects from the notoriously staid Germans.

2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS

I won’t spend too long talking about the looks because, I’m sorry, by now you really should have sorted out where you stand. Because I’m not been raised a Porsche Person ™ and have only middling interest in all things 911 – but do love fast, filthy fast trucks – the first Cayenne was perfectly fine, and the second a vast improvement. In this eye-searing shade of Kermit green, it’s no shrinking violet. With massive Turbo-wheel arch extensions and 21-inch rollers, it looks properly tough. I’d have one. End of.

2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS

Moving on: interior. It’s a Cayenne. It’s the same interior you find in every other Porsche. It’s very comfortable with ridiculously-comfortable seats, superlative build quality and the traditionally Porsche penchant for scattered switchgear on the centre stack. When you spend AED336,200 on a Cayenne GTS, you will not be disappointed. Although you might be slightly outraged at the incredibly expensive options – AED106,020 on this car – or basically an entire Focus ST.

2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS

At this point some of you might be wondering what GTS is, exactly. In the grand scheme of Porsches, the GTS sits above the regular car and S models, but below the ridonkulously-fast Turbo or Turbo S. It gets nearly all the exterior goodies of the Turbo car including the afore-mentioned fatter wheel arches and rubber, smoked head and tail lights, matte black exhaust pipes, side skirts, camel-swallowing enlarged front fascia and so on. A Turbo body, in other words. But not the Turbo’s mighty forced-fed 550bhp 4.8-litre V8, instead the GTS must make do with the lowly S-Spec 420bhp version of the 4.8.

2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS

Do not be fooled. Even without the hamster wheel this engine is still capable of a Mustang-demolishing 5.4-second sprint to 100kph and a top whack well north of 250kph. Put your foot down and the 380lb ft of torque make their presence felt with a mighty bellow as the eight-speed auto drops down three gears, then propels you into the distance with the fury of an exploding Hindenburg.

2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS

So what, you ask? There are plenty of German trucks that deliver hot-rod straight-line performance, like the BMW X6. The difference with the Cayenne is that you can actually corral all this power and put it to good use, thanks to brilliantly-judged steering setup and an surprisingly nimble chassis. Where a Mustang feels (purposely) loose and wooly, the GTS is supremely tied down with massive amounts of traction available from those beefy Pirelli P Zeros on every corner. You can treat this truck to absolutely wanton levels of abuse, drive live like an absolute nincompoop, turn in late, bang on throttle and fire out the other side – and it just keeps coming back for more, only the slightest hint of early understeer to tell you to stop misbehaving.

2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS

That is if you drive like an idiot. If you drive like a sane person prepare to be rewarded immensely. True, there is not the ultimate straight line thrust of the Turbo car but what it does have is better suspension. Not that you need to keep the tach spinning; peak torque of 380 lb ft is available at 3,500rpm and the eight-speed Tiptronic smartly keeps the engine pegged around that figure at virtually all times, even if the Sport button is depressed.

To come back to the controversial beginning: why is this better than a new Cayman? Simple: steering. This rack may be on an big ol’ SUV but it has old school heft and feel, the rim talking to you constantly about what those big tyres are up to. Like all SUVs it’s slightly dead off centre; go a few degrees beyond that and you get a wonderfully unedited constant stream of information, the rack weighting up naturally as you wind on lock. It’s not what a electron-munching computer thinks the rack should do, it’s real life and no system to date – not even Porsche’s all-singing, all-dancing 911 – can come close.

God , I love this thing.

2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS

Verdict

OK – come back down to Planet Earth. Let’s not forget that at AED336,200 this is a very expensive toy to take to the track, so it’s best to treat it as a well-endowed, very comfortable road car.

And on that basis, it’s actually not bad value. The only car that comes close is the considerably more expensive AED399,000 Range Rover Sport Supercharged – and I’m sorry, but the Cayenne absolutely demolishes the poor old Rangey as a driver’s car. Sure, it won’t go offroad – at all – but who takes Rangeys into the sand either?

So if you need a luxury truck – it’s simple. Cayenne GTS. And you can tell your friends, it’s better than a Cayman to boot.

2012 Porsche Cayenne GTS 
Specs
Price: AED336,200($91,535)
As tested AED 442,220 ($120,400)
Engine: 4.8-litre V8, 420bhp @ 6500rpm, 380lb ft @ 3500rpm
Performance: 5.4secs 0-100kph, 260kph, 15.5L/100
Transmission: eight-speed automatic, four-wheel drive
Weight: 2085kg

 

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