What is it?
Our experience of the latest Porsche Cayenne, in all its forms, continues. This time round, in Sweden of all places, it’s the turn of the GTS, the willfully sporty (but not the fastest) version of Porsche’s best-selling model.
For most people, the standard Cayenne is plenty sporty enough; even the diesel-engined variants tend to feel seriously brisk. With the GTS, however, the Porsche engineers assume you’re a special kind of patriarchal head case, and perform a series of tweaks that include a finger’s width worth of lowering and stiffening on the steel suspension (slightly less if you opt for air).
The aim is tighter body control and superior lateral grip. Previously, this racier attitude came with perfectly matched propulsion in the shape of Porsche’s air-breathing V8; a combination that positively radiated performance heft.
Predictably, that engine is now considered as dirty and as outdated as an oil-burning street light and has been replaced with the same turbocharged 3.6-litre V6 which we’ve already experienced in the cheaper Cayenne S.
Except it isn’t quite same because Porsche has tweaked the software code to get an additional 20bhp out of it - 20bhp more, in fact, than the old V8 developed. It does this while emitting around 23g/km CO2 less and managing greater distances between fuel stops.
It also makes the car handily lighter - by around 120kg over the latest Turbo. The GTS also gets the 20-inch RS Spyder alloys, deeper sills, fatter arches and larger air intakes that typically go with the badge.
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