2008 Porsche Cayenne

Plenty of Porschephiles went depressive a few years back when their favorite high-performance sports car company announced it was about to enter the SUV business. “That will damage our vaunted marque beyond recognition,” they cried in unison. After all, who would buy a pure-as-snow sports car from a showroom shared with four-door, family toting, off-road-going—yech!—trucks? Many swore that if Porsche actually did this awful thing, they would surely shop elsewhere for adrenelin-pumping, image-boosting automotive excitement.

Spreading the Love

The reality was that Porsche was looking down the long, scary road of profit-killing costs and out-of-control regulation and sagely saw that the only way to remain viable as a small, independent car company would be to expand its brand to include a few select things other than race-winning, cop-baiting, mid- and rear-engine two seat rocket ships—no matter how much the lucky few who craved and could afford them were willing to pay. Things such as highly capable SUVs, for example, which would sit proudly in Porsche sports-car owners’ multi-car garages awaiting the need for missions involving towing, hauling, nasty weather, unpaved terrain or, on occasion, more than two occupants.


SUVs were ultra-hot in North America at the time, and Porsche was sick of seeing its otherwise loyal aficionados abdicating to rival marques to obtain one. They reasoned that if they did it right, if they made it the true “Porsche of SUVs,” even hard-core Porschephiles would accept it. They did, it has sold surprisingly well, and Porsche has been so profitable of late that it recently purchased a controlling interest in Germany’s Volkswagen Group, which shared the SUV’s development costs and its architecture for VW Touaregs and Audi Q7s.

Four Hot Flavors

The original 2003 Cayenne (“hot pepper”) SUV soon became Porsche’s best-selling vehicle, perhaps because it “allowed entire families to experience Porsche dynamics not only on pavement but off road as well,” the company says. Generation II comes in four distinct flavors for 2008: standard, S, GTS and top-of-the-line Turbo, all boasting larger, more powerful (yet more fuel-efficient) engines, a freshened face, a muscular new body and new dynamic technologies that enable them to perform more like sports cars than SUVs while retaining full SUV capabilities.


With starting sticker prices ranging from $43,400 to $93,700, their engines for the first time boast direct fuel injection, a have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too technology that improves power, emissions and fuel efficiency all at once. The base Cayenne’s 3.6-liter V-6 is good for 290 hp and 283 lb.-ft. of torque, plus LEVII (low emission vehicle II) status and 18 mpg city, 22 highway EPA economy—three mpg better city than the ‘07 V-6 model. And with its standard manual gearbox, it can launch from rest to 60 mph in 7.5 sec. and to a top speed of 141 mph.