ABDC: Porsche Cayman GTS

It doesn’t always follow that vehicles universally praised overseas translate their abilities to the real world Down Under. But in the Cayman GTS, the added power and braking and the chassis magic weaved by Porsche’s best boffins, proves as effective and infectious in Australia as our initial European drives suggested.

What do you say about a vehicle that our Australia’s Best Driver’s Car testers awarded more 5/5s than the rest of the 15-car field combined… It wins!

Porsche is synonymous with great driver's cars and as sporty Porsches go, there's arguably none better than the Cayman GTS.

The fastest road-going Cayman ever — at least until the race-ready GT4 arrives — the GTS is powered by a mid-mounted 3.4-litre flat-six that packs 250kW. But to think of it only as a muscled up Cayman S sells it short.

In the evolution to GTS status, this car’s chassis, steering, braking and engine performance has been picqued and polished to near-perfection.

Porsche Active Suspension Management (PASM) is standard, expanding the GTS’s dynamic repertoire by enabling the suspension, powertrain, steering and stability control to be tailored from cruise friendly to maximum attack.

Compared to its sibling, the Cayman GTS sits 10mm lower on 20-inch Carrera S-sourced rims. Oversized discs pull it up quick smart.

The maker's 0-100km/h claim of 4.6 seconds is 0.5sec faster than we measured. But we'll take Porsche's word on the GTS top speed – over 280km/h is fast enough for anyone.

Over the standing 400m, the GTS was only bettered by the Jaguar and Godzilla… Praise here (as there is on the road) for Porsche’s Porsche's PDK double-clutch gearbox. Optional but almost a must-have for a fast Porsche these days.

But high tech and pure numbers are not what Australia's Best Driver's Car is about and this is no better illustrated than by the Cayman GTS.

Tactile, communicative and eager, in the best tradition of great sports cars, the Cayman GTS is at the same time nimble and trustworthy... Fast but never, ever frenetic.

In the wet and sometimes icy conditions we struck, the standard Pirelli tyres often let the rest of the package down, but unlike some of the other cars with less than ideal rubber, the inner brilliance of the Cayman shone through.

When the roads were dry the car could be driven faster by more of our drivers more often. In the wet, the purity and consistency of the feedback delivered to the driver via the Cayman's controls and the chassis' natural balance and poise made it possible to safely maximise the grip that existed. And sometimes even go past it.

All of these factors combine to make this car our favourite road-going Porsche.

There are good drivers cars and great ones... No prizes for guessing in which the category the Cayman GTS belongs.

As the only car to register multiple perfect scores across our testing panel, the Porsche Cayman GTS is — by a sizeable margin — Australia’s Best Driver’s Car.

Porsche Cayman GTS pricing and specification:
Price: $167,190 (plus on-road costs)
Engine: 3.4-litre flat six-cylinder direct-injected petrol
Output: 250kW/380Nm
Transmission: Seven-speed dual-clutch automatic
Fuel: 8.2L/100km (ADR Combined)
CO2: 190g/km (ADR Combined)
Safety rating: Not tested

ABDC ranking: It wins!!! First

ABDC Scorecard