Porsche Boxster Spyder RS could be the ultimate sportscar

Anyway, onto the details. It should come as no surprise that the Boxster Spyder RS is almost a dead ringer on drivetrain spec for the Cayman GT4 RS. Sadly, that includes the one and only gearbox option. Excellent though the seven-speed PDK is, we’d have loved to have seen this ostensibly less hardcore model pair that engine and an open top, with a manual.

Happily in terms of suspension, the Spyder RS should deviate from its GT4 RS sibling. We say happily, as the GT4 really did test the limits of what was acceptable comfort and control on the road. The basic components are the same but Porsche claims “spring and damper rates have been reduced, to achieve a more relaxed, characteristically convertible-style set-up”. Sounds like the Spyder RS will be much better suited to spirited road driving than its hardtop sibling.

You’d be forgiven for worrying, given the release car very much leans in on the ‘RS’ aesthetic, rather than the ‘Touring’ approach some might have hoped for in a Spyder. The NACA-ducted partly-exposed-carbon bonnet is very much track special rather than Riviera ripper, though the big swan-neck wing of the GT4 is gone. In its place is a large ducktail, very much in keeping with the Boxster’s more elegant aesthetic. There is a Weissach package, which adds the forged magnesium wheels and 935-inspired titanium exhaust tips. There’s even the option of a custom Porsche Design watch, to match your car.

Given there are no windows aft of the doors, how does it breathe? Look closely and you’ll note a pair of snorkels protruding from either side of the Spyder RS’s roof bumps, which will no doubt provide a symphony of induction howl when you wind it up.

The roof isn’t just a carryover from the non-RS Spyder either. Weight has been trimmed in the form of the mechanised system being gutted from it. The single-layer sun sail and weather deflector work together to keep you dry, with the whole thing weighing 7.6kg less than the standard Spyder’s assisted item.

On the inside, it’s as you’d expect: carbon, ‘race tex’, fabric door pulls and flashes of red. The silver exterior contrasted with the part-red cabin is no doubt a nod to the original Boxster concept, which debuted 30 years ago to preview Porsche’s imminent junior sportscar. If only we knew then that one day there’d be a Boxster with more power than contemporary supercars of the early 1990s, costing supercar money. No, the Boxster Spyder RS won’t be cheap, starting from £123,000, sans Weissach and watch. Still, that’ll be the least anyone pays for one of these. After options and flipper tax, we can see these matching the GT4 RS on the used market, which has been known to touch a quarter of a million…

What’s particularly exciting for us is that you’ll be able to see the Boxster Spyder RS in action at the Goodwood Festival of Speed presented by Mastercard this July. Its presence will be a small part of our celebration of Porsche, from whom more spectacular models like this are no doubt to come.