Porsche Cayenne 2017 Review

"This just shouldn't be allowed," I exclaim as my driver tips the Cayenne Turbo into a tightening, soaking wet left-hander at an unspeakable speed.

Thomas, meanwhile, grins as the Porsche SUV's front tyres somehow find grip and bite hard.

There’s a momentary lift and then full throttle as the Cayenne's tail arcs wide and generates an epic drift you'd expect from a fully-blown WRC car. On snow.

"This car can do this all day, if you want. It's just so easy, so balanced. Anyone can do this."

We leave the wet surface and head back to a dry stretch of concrete but instead of worrying about the impending transition from sideways to straight, Thomas is already flat on the throttle and gently winding off lock before we're away.

More than 15 years on since the original genre-busting Cayenne was launched, it's still difficult to fathom how any car-maker can make an SUV this quick and agile from where I'm sitting.

But despite the challenges, plenty of other car-makers have already rolled out a rival for the Cayenne Turbo — from the Range Rover Sport SVR, BMW's X5 M and even Bentley with its Bentayga W12.

Faster than all of them is the Cayenne Turbo that, thanks to its 404kW/770Nm 4.0-litre twin-turbo petrol V8, can reach 100km/h in a stunning 3.9 seconds -- 0.2sec faster than the Bentley and 0.4sec faster than the car it replaces.

From the passenger seat it feels every bit as mighty as we charge down the short straight.

The car Thomas is pedalling at an alarming rate comes standard with the new Porsche Surface Coated Brake (PSCB) brakes that are combined with enormous 10-piston callipers and are claimed to withstand abuse and last 30 per cent longer than the normal cast-iron discs that are standard on the Cayenne and Cayenne S.

Rumoured to cost a third of what Porsche usually charges for its carbon ceramic brakes, it could be an option worth considering, especially the way they haul the 2175kg Cayenne Turbo down from big speed into a tight right-hander.

Again, it looks as though we've overcooked it, carrying far too much speed to the apex but here, at slow speed, the Cayenne's four-wheel steer comes into play. They help, as impossible as it sounds, the big SUV feel like it's pivoting around the centre of car.

Usually I'm not a fan of rear-wheel steering, as it ruins the sense of feel and connection you have with a chassis, but on a big SUV if it helps boost agility it might be a price worth paying.

As well as the trick brakes, the Cayenne we're in has the new three-chamber air suspension, with adaptive dampers and the 48-volt active roll stabilisation.

We can't vouch for ride comfort, because the roads on the test track are far too smooth to replicate a typical Australian road, but the way the Cayenne corners flatly is remarkable.

Changes of direction too, are impressive.

Now for something more accessible
After a trip to the skid pan for yet more gratuitous sideways action, we return and swap into a Cayenne S to test its off-road abilities.

To be fair to Porsche the test isn't to prove it’s created a Land Rover beater in the mud, but to sure, on the same standard 21-inch wheels as the Cayenne Turbo we were drifting in just moments earlier, it the Cayenne S still has decent ability on rocks and steep climbs.

The German car-maker’s equivalent of Land Rover's Terrain Response system, it's possible to select and pre-arm the all-wheel drive for the conditions ahead. Crucially this also adjusts the amount of slip available to help deal with sand.

After a few steep climbs that trigger plenty of hill descent intervention on the way down, it's clear the eight-speed auto and Porsche's all-wheel drive system will be well up to what most drivers will throw at it off-road.

Back on the road I ask for a quick demonstration of a high-speed lap with the second Cayenne S that does without the complex air suspension and active roll cancellation.

Entering the first corner and it's instantly noticeable there’s more roll and the big Porsche was also slower to change direction.

Entering the corner we gracefully drifted around in the Turbo and, again, grip generated was immense. But this time there was no tail-out antics, although I'm reliably informed later that the secret to successfully drifting the Cayenne Turbo is actually its (optional) torque vectoring rear limited-slip differential.

After a flat-out stretch down the straights, the Cayenne S, which gets a 324kW/550Nm twin-turbo 2.9-litre V6, still feels plenty quick enough (0-100km/h in 4.9sec) even beside the ballistic Turbo.

Perhaps even more astonishing is that faster Cayennes are yet to come, with both a Turbo S and a Turbo S E-Hybrid performance plug-in model rumoured to be coming next.

From our early taste of the Cayenne S and Cayenne Turbo, it feels a dead certainty from where I’m sitting that when they arrive in Australia – early next year and around mid-2018 respectively – Porsche’s flagship SUV will reclaim its title as the most accomplished (and fastest) road-biased SUV that quite a lot of money can buy.