New Cayman GT4 Redefines The Performance Car

Porsche’s 718 Cayman GT4 is waging war on the neutering of the sports car with a new, naturally aspirated flat‑six and a manual ’box. And that’s just the start of what makes it so special

- Adam Towler

There’s something missing on the centre console of this Porsche 718. It takes a few moments for me to twig, but now I have I can’t stop the smile from spreading broadly across my face. It doesn’t matter how hard you look for it, you won’t find a Sport button on the new Cayman GT4. Nor a mode switch on the steering wheel, a Manettino-style device or anything of their ilk. So while I sincerely hope you do go on to read the rest of this story, and with a bit of luck maybe derive some enjoyment from it too, if you don’t, and you need a five-second summation of this car’s character – and why it’s a thoroughly essential Evo machine – you could do a lot worse than remembering the above small observation.

Replacing the 981 Cayman GT4 was always going to be a task fraught with potential controversy. Our 2015 eCoty winner, it’s a car that slew even such giants as the 991.1 GT3 RS and Ferrari 488 GTB that breezed every group test it was entered into and, back in 2015, felt like the right car at the right time: an antidote to all the increasing power outputs, turbocharged engines, dual-clutch ’boxes and number chasing performance cars preoccupied with breaking records but strangely disconnected from what real enthusiasts actually wanted from their cars – and could actually use. No wonder everybody wanted one.

Therein, of course, lay the problem: there weren’t enough to go around, and pretty soon a speculator’s market turned what was meant to be a Motorsport department car for the common man (relatively speaking!) into another brilliant Porsche tantalizingly out of reach. While many cried foul, Porsche’s response was that it simply underestimated demand. This time the promise is that everyone who wants one should be able to buy one.