San Diego Magazine / November 2006 / One Wicked Cayman

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One Wicked Cayman

WE WERE BAD. Very bad. My friend Tom, because he’s owned a number of Porsches. Me, because I’ve owned none. That was going to be my weak excuse in case a police officer pulled us over in Del Cerro going way too fast in a red 2006 Porsche Cayman S.

“Hold, please.” That is Tom-speak for me to hang on while he puts the Cayman through its paces. We’re flying around 90-degree turns, diving up and down steep hills. A few stomach flops later, the consensus of the man who has owned many Boxsters and several Carreras is “It feels a lot like the Boxster—but it has more horsepower, and it’s much stiffer. The brakes are great. Nobody does brakes like Porsche.”

But this observation comes from someone who doesn’t own the last-generation Boxster. Some current Boxster owners feel there is a minimal difference in performance between the roadster and the coupe. That may be more true now with the 2007 models. The Boxster S features the same 3.4-liter 295-power plant as the Cayman S, and a downsized version of the Cayman shares a 2.7-liter 245-horsepower engine with the Boxster. Despite the similarities, coupes are usually more rigid and athletic. Whether that turns out to be the case with the Porsche siblings, we’ll see. But I’ll take the coupe.

The Cayman S is a wicked, mid-engine rocket equipped with a six-cylinder engine that emits a throaty hum inside the cabin. I recognize it. It’s the same combination of restrained thunder and alto purr you hear all night at the 24 Hours of LeMans. The silky, six-speed transmission is a thrilling, seamless short throw with a powerful torque band and a clutch matched so precisely you can’t make a mistake shifting. It’s more fun than a Magic Mountain ride. I’m comfortable in a driver’s cockpit with seats bolstered to support a performance-driving experience. It’s heaven.

“You look kind of giddy,” says my editor, as he climbs into the passenger seat. Maybe it’s the red seatbelt. Or the thrilling 70-mph ride in second gear I just played with. Redline is about 7,000 rpm, just a tad faster—75 mph—and the automatic spoiler extended to increase my down-force. Yes, I’m giddy.

A quick fly around the block focuses his attention away from my mental state. “Wow, we caught some Gs there!” he says, grinning.

The Cayman has a 57-page brochure of options and accessories. Standard equipment is spare. A base price of $58,900 gets you no navigational system, no heated seats, few bells and whistles. You can add it all if you want it. But if your motivation for getting behind the wheel is your love of the driving experience—if you want to throw a perfectly balanced, mid-engine racing machine around a curvy road with complete confidence—you will be giddy in a standard Cayman S.