First Drive: 2021 Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 Review

On paper the Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 is just about the most delicious prospect you could imagine for this kind of money. In these days of downsized motors, forced induction and paddle shifts comes a mid-engined Porsche with a 4.0-litre, normally-aspirated flat-six engine and a six-speed manual gearbox. Two pedals are only now, two years on from first release, an option.

The reality of the Cayman GT4 is very little different, at least so long as you remember that this is the entry point to Porsche’s GT range and has neither the punch nor the price point of a GT3.

So hats off to the delightfully crazy people of the Porsche Motorsport department who decided not to simply turn up the boost on the 2.5-litre four-cylinder turbo motor in the Cayman GTS until the requisite 420PS (309kW) appeared on the dyno sheet (which the engine would have taken with ease). Instead, it removed the turbos from the 911’s engine and both bored and stroked it out to 4.0-litres, which I think we can agree is going the extra mile.

What results is a car with less torque than a four-pot Cayman GTS and because of that and the fact you can spec a double-clutch transmission for the GTS, one that’s actually slower to 62mph than the GTS and no quicker to 100mph.

But if ever there were a car in which how fast it goes means nothing relative to how it goes fast, this surely is it. The engine is not savage – I expect we’ll have to wait for its GT3 application before we see that – but it is sweet and sonorous. And it makes you work: it won’t pull its hardest until 5,000rpm is on the clock, so you have to use that delicious gearbox to ensure you’re always in the right ratio, which is, of course, an entirely good thing. The more a car involves you, the more involving it will be.

Even so, and just like the 2015 Cayman GT4, the powertrain is cast as an entirely supporting role to the chassis whose suspension is modified almost beyond recognition compared to a standard Cayman, including borrowing the entire front end of the GT3. On the right road, driven with a commensurate level of commitment, the car is mesmerising. Grip levels on standard Michelin Cup 2 tyres are dazzling, the car’s balance, poise and accuracy sufficient to make normal sporting cars look and feel slow-witted and stumbling by comparison.

For all the sporting attitude of the Cayman GT4, it forgoes none of the trappings available in any other Cayman. To drive every day, it retains decent ride comfort, a quiet cabin and good quality appointment. If not for the Alcantara, a smattering of GT4 badges and fabric door pulls, you might mistake it for another Cayman in normal usage.

For some that perceived lack of distance between the GT4 and more conventional Caymans could be seen as a weakness.

The Cayman GT4 comes with adaptive dampers as standard and Apple CarPlay. Android Auto, however, is not available. Other than that, standard fitment is entirely reasonable. Air conditioning, cruise control, digital radio and satellite navigation are all present and correct.

It doesn't benefit from the very latest Porsche infotainment but audiophiles can upgrade the Hi-Fi to the optional Bose Surround Sound. If you're feeling as committed as you are brave, the GT4 can be specced without any infotainment at all.

Overall I just appreciate the fact that there still remain enough mavericks out there to fly in the face of now conventional thinking. People that use the money of the world’s largest automobile company produce a car where the provision of pure driving pleasure in a form you can enjoy every single day is the single over-riding priority. Enjoy it while you can.