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They've only gone and done it!
Weissach get their hands on the Cayman. Awesomeness occurs
Since the Cayman was released, there have been a group of us who are not as invested in the current (water cooled) 911s who've been aching for Porsche to let it off the leash to be all it can be. The chassis is simply one of the most magnificent of all time. Beautiful balance, massively rigid. Yet all the time it's been the poor upstart to the 911. We have shook our heads constantly at the electronics and other gubbins like rear wheel steering that's required to make a 911 behave more like a mid-engined car, when Porsche already make an absolutely belting one. Finally that day has come, and I have to admit, it looks like they've utterly nailed it.
So it's a proper Porsche Motorsport developed car for a start, not a parts bin special. Thank the automotive gods it's a manual, and better still it's the excellent 6 speed, not the silly 911 7 speed. It's got the 3.8 engine conservatively rated at 385 hp (which I consider to be more than enough). Buckets, check. Cage option, check. It's all there. They've even not fitted the daft centre locks in favour of much more sensible 5 stud affair. I'm looking at it, and I can't see anything I'd change.
Well, obviously there's the price, because quite frankly, I can't afford one. But again, I can see why it costs what it does and I have no issue with that other than not having £70k to throw at one (technically it's £65k but once you put a few options on it...). Anyhow. I'll never own one and it's unlikely I'll ever drive one, so instead I'll just ogle it from afar.
I'll give the final word to the guy who heads the GT development team.
UPDATE: Possibly the best review I've seen of it where it actually talks about how the car is. Odd it's not a Harris review I'm posting. His are usually so good, but I didn't think his really articulated things as well as Meaden's did. Harris' interview with the head of development was good, and I liked him highlighting how the driving characteristics of the car can be easily changed with the adjustable ARBs. But I found him constantly refering to the 991 and how not specical it was in comparison because of the engine was missing the point greatly.
The 991 is still the halo model. It's not desgined to be as special as it is otherwise Porsche wouldn't be able to charge 50k more (or whatever it is) for it. I think Meaden grasped this perfectly in that the GT4 has been designed to be driven. In comparison the GT3 has been designed to be as fast as it possibly can utilising as many electronic tools as possible to make that performance accessible to as many drivers as possible.
If someone at Porsche feels like they want to loan me one to test and write about for say, a few years... The following spec would be marvellous: Configurator Speccage.
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