Porsche’s newest Boxster is what you might call a black sheep. Instead of the flat-six that you’ll find in most Porsches, the new Boxster comes with a turbocharged 4-cylinder. It’s still a spectacular engine, but it’s lacking some of the flat-six’s fortissimo.

Don’t get us wrong, though. It’s still a Porsche, and that turbocharged 4-cylinder engine is far from slow. With a top speed of 170mph, and a 0-60 time of just 4.9 seconds, we’d pit it against the 2015 flat-six Boxster any day. Plus, the new 718 gets nearly 34mpg on the highway.

The name 718 Boxster pays homage to the 718 RSK; a two seat, 4-cylinder race car that was well known for blowing the doors off of V12s in competition. In fact, the 718 RSK finished first in its class and third overall at the 1958 24 Hours of LeMans. Any vehicle that can do that is legendary in our book, so we’re hoping the new 718 can live up to its predecessor.

The post Zero to 60 Presents the New 2017 Porsche 718 Boxster appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.

Online shopping has become a massive industry in the last decade. In 2014, Adweek reported that the world of e-commerce generates just over $1.2 million dollars every 30 seconds – and that stat is almost two years old.

The changing times

It wasn’t too long ago that people wouldn’t have dared to purchase cellphones, t-shirts, or shoes online. Now, those items make up the bulk of all e-commerce. As a car dealership, we have to wonder if one day this trend will extend to our products.

Luckily, Car and Driver released a study that may provide some insight to that question.

Let’s look at the numbers

Car and Driver reports that 68% of their respondents would not buy or lease a vehicle without visiting a dealership, and 84% would not buy or lease without taking a test drive. Personally, we’d never buy a car before test driving it either, so that’s not too surprising.

But when the study turned to the question of online shopping, we see some interesting results. 54% of car enthusiasts would consider buying a car online, while only 34% of non-enthusiasts would.

This seems slightly backwards to us. We would assume that a car-enthusiast would be more concerned about coming into a dealership, sitting in the car they were thinking of buying, and taking it for a spin on the open road.

Which, we think you should do

Because the dealership experience is like no other. We combine great prices on our vehicles, state-of-the-art service centers, and most importantly, knowledgeable people who you can rely on. Which is something buying a car online can never give you – a personal, face-to-face interaction, and the opportunity to build a relationship.

Here at Leith Porsche, our goal is to satisfy 100% of our customers 100% of the time, and we don’t think that’s unrealistic. We look out for you, and do everything in our power to ensure your car-buying experience is memorable and enjoyable.

But just out of curiosity, would you ever consider buying a car solely online? Leave us a comment on Facebook and let us know!

The post Are You Part of the 32% Who Would Buy a Car Online? appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.

Do you own a mobile Apple product? If so, get ready. Apple is beta-testing iOS 9.3, which means before long all your iPhones and iPads are going to ask you to agree to their terms and conditions again. Except this time, we’ll be too excited about iOS 9.3’s features to read the agreement.

Just kidding, we’d never read it. Not even if we were anthropologists from the future, and it was the only remaining literature from our lost civilization. Anyway, the point is that iOS 9.3 is coming and it’s good. Here’s what you can expect:

Apple CarPlay

Apple CarPlay is nothing new, but it will be receiving some updates in 9.3. The Apple Music section will now feature a “New” section that showcases new songs, artists, and albums; it will also include a “For You” section that will recommend music based on your data-mined preferences.

Maps will also now include a “Nearby” feature which easily locates nearby gas, parking, restaurants, and more, while you drive. We can see this feature coming in handy when you can’t decide what you want to eat, or have no idea what food is around you.

Health and Notes

These two updates are consolidated into one since they’re pretty small. Apple’s Health app now displays your move, stand, and exercise data from Apple Watch, and contrasts these metrics alongside your goals. To help you achieve those goals, Health will now also suggest third-party health-apps that integrate directly to your Health dashboard. This includes apps that can track your sleep, your meals, or show how many calories you’ve burned throughout the day.

Notes will now feature a security system that allows you to protect any note you write with a password or touch identification.

Finally, Night Shift

This is the part of iOS 9.3 we’re most excited about. Night Shift is an app that is long-overdue. Back in 2012, Harvard Medical School published a Health Letter detailing the negative affect that blue light (the kind emitted by our iPhone LCD screens) has on our circadian rhythm.

In short, circadian rhythms dictate the eating and sleeping patterns of all animals; human beings included. Research has shown that while any light can disrupt this rhythm by suppressing melatonin (the chemical that helps us fall asleep), blue light has the strongest effect. Here’s an interesting quote from Harvard’s article:

“Study after study has linked working the night shift and exposure to light at night to several types of cancer (breast, prostate), diabetes, heart disease, and obesity. It’s not exactly clear why nighttime light exposure seems to be so bad for us. But we do know that exposure to light suppresses the secretion of melatonin, a hormone that influences circadian rhythms, and there’s some experimental evidence (it’s very preliminary) that lower melatonin levels might explain the association with cancer.”

So every night when you set your alarm for the next morning on your phone, or browse the web until you feel tired, you’re actually suppressing the chemical trying to help you fall asleep. Now you know what we mean when we say Night Shift is long-overdue.

So will you hit “Agree” when prompted by iOS 9.3? We certainly will – and we’ll sleep well knowing we made the right call.

The post Apple iOS 9.3 Updates CarPlay, and Gets Night Shift appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.

We at Leith Porsche make it our mission to connect people with their perfect car. We believe that the more you know about cars, the more you’ll love them, and that’s why we’re here to tell you all about brakes.

We step on our brakes every time we get into our car (hopefully) and people seem to be very well acquainted with their use – especially in free flow lanes. However, few know much about the actual hardware behind the braking process.

Rather than cover what we hope is the obvious importance of brakes, we’re going to outline the two most common types of brakes. We’ll examine their strengths and weaknesses in everyday use, show you how they work, and then compare the two.

Drum Brakes

Drum brakes are the original in-tire braking system. Before their introduction, brakes were essentially a block of wood on a lever that pressed against the tire (also known as a handbrake). The first drum brakes were released in the year 1900 on a Maybach, and were patented two years later by legendary automotive engineer, Louis Renault.

We could write a long explanation of how drum brakes work, but you can’t beat an informative video:

Problems with Drum Brakes

Since the components of a drum brake are all housed within a metal drum, they tend to heat up very quickly. When drum brakes heat up, they fail because hot brakes produce less friction. The less friction they produce, the less effective they are at slowing the wheels. This is often referred to as brake fade.

While modern drum brakes have come a long way in terms of design, brake fade is still a major drawback to their use. For this reason, drum brakes are typically found on either the back wheels of a car, or nowhere at all. Their replacement? Disc brakes.

Disc Brakes

Disc brakes were patented by Frederick William Lanchester in 1902, the same year Louis Renault patented drum brakes. Although they were the superior design, it would take half a century before the technology could successful manufacture the necessary parts.

In 1953, Jaguar – a small company at the time – developed the first reliable caliper disc brakes for their C-Type racing car. They entered the C-Type into the 1953 24 Hours of Le Mans, and took home first place. Later that year, Austin-Healey’s 100S would be the first production car sold with all disc brakes.

Since that time, disc brakes have become the standard for performance vehicles. They function upon the same friction principle as drum brakes, but are less prone to failure from overheating and dry quicker when wet. This is because of their open-air design, as opposed to being housed in a metal enclosure, like drum brakes.

Again, here’s a fancy video detailing how disc brakes work:

Drum vs Disc

So which brake type is better? As with most things in life, the answer is rarely clear-cut. Drum brakes have some major design flaws: they overheat too quickly, take longer to dry off, and are typically heavier than disc brakes.

At the same time, disc brakes cannot be used as a parking brake because they expand when hot and contract when cold. If we relied on them for a parking brake after using them, they would eventually cool off, shrink, and lose contact with the brake disc. Obviously we’d have a problem here.

The two brakes are just different. Disc brakes are the more effective and reliable choice, but they have their limitations. Drum brakes are not very practical, but they are crucial to parking a car – unless of course you’d like to go back to wooden blocks on sticks.

Therefore, drum brakes are often still found in modern cars. Manufacturers will usually outfit the front wheels with disc brakes since they have to work the hardest, and drum brakes in the rear. Some sports cars will use disc brakes on all four wheels, but have one additional drum brake for parking purposes.

Speaking of Brakes

Could you use a new set? It might be time if you’re starting to hear some squeals when you brake. Feel free to come by the Leith Porsche service center and we’ll take a look for you. Sometimes that brake-noise could just be debris on your brake pads, but it can also indicate they need replacing.

The post Which Are Better: Drum or Disc Brakes? appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.

You know that scene in the The Fast & The Furious where that one character drives really fast & furious? That’s what driving the 2015 Porsche Carrera S is like. Not to say that this Porsche is anything like a B-list action movie full of B-list actors. We mean instead that if you could put Red Bull, pure adrenaline, nitrous, and pixie stix powder into a cup, then gave that cup to a squirrel, and sent that squirrel into a laser tag facility (lots of black lights), you’d have a sense of what it’s like to drive this car.

At its base level, a Carerra S is already dangerous. It’s normal driving mode—without the “sport” or “sport plus” modes activated—is lively enough that it reminds us of an Audi S3 with all of its sport upgrades maxed out and running at full tilt. The S3 has a much smaller engine, however—a turbocharged four—while the Carerra S has that increasingly rare attribute: a naturally-aspirated six.

A naturally-aspirated six means that it has six cylinders—a larger engine—and creates its power without recycling its exhaust fumes (that creates a power boost but necessitates a slight delay in delivery). With natural aspiration, power is always available, from the moment you turn the key.

That naturally-aspirated six will zap you to 60 mph from a standstill in just 4.3 seconds. Its 400 hundred German horses will rip the cover off the U.S. air, stuff it into the combustion chambers, and vaporize it into a screaming triple-digit speed in less time than it took you to read this sentence. That doesn’t even get into the “sport” and “sport plus” modes.

Pressing “sport” is like giving your dog a 50 foot leash. “Sport plus” is taking him to the dog park. With no leash at all, the Carrera S is almost too much car, at least for the posted speed limits of a town like Cary. The engine is furious at the slightest provocation. The gentlest of prodding during parking lot maneuvers unleashes a barely contained quaking that is a bit much for picking up some stamps at the Post Office.

The on-ramp to U.S. Highway 1-South from Walnut St. is long and windy. We made sure to give the cars in front of us plenty of time to go first—not because we it was our boy scout deed of the morning, but because we didn’t want them in our way. The engine is already warring at 7,000 RPMs for no reason at all despite our pleadings to come down and join the rest of us like a normal person. As the light turns green, we let gravity do what it was meant to and send our foot to the earth like a piano onto Wile E. Coyote.

It was loud, it sure as science sounded like Judgment Day, and we very quickly discovered that having the engine in the back is something that needs to be managed and respected. Fortunately, we’d read up on first-time 911 drivers trying to merge onto highways while pedal-mashing and finding themselves several lanes further over than they’d intended. We got the top speed we wanted, felt a brief moment of numbness as the rear end twitched, then braked fast and early, bringing us back to the realm of mortal.

Flicking around the roads of Cary with sport plus activated is an exercise in watching for police cars. The engine is crying out for freedom with all the subtlety of a cat that is on fire. You’re really better off at the track with this mode. To test out the nav system, we keyed in La Farm Bakery and were soon attracting Mercedes’ and BMWs who looked over hopefully at stop lights before the light turned green.

On a normal day, and in a more controlled setting, we might have indulged them. Today, however, was macaroon day, which meant that La Farm was offering french treats at a discount. There’s no way we were going to let torching an AMG like a cedar stick get in the way of that.

Something else we should mention is that our Carrera S came equipped with PDK. This is Porsche’s take on an automatic transmission, something that even the most basic of 90s era Ford Taurus’s operate, except that the two are as alike as a paper airplane and an F-22 Raptor. No other transmission snaps off gear changes so ruthlessly, with endless capacity to supply peak after peak of power. It’s as if you’re a mountain climber with bionic legs; you bound up and up and up until the atmosphere itself begins to thin out and you realize that you’re nearing outer space.

There’s a reason why the 911 GT3 RS, the highest of Porsche’s 21 levels of 911 (the Carrera S is level 2, by the way) only comes with PDK. There comes when a point when you’re dealing with so much speed and power that the manual transmission simply isn’t adequate for driving. The Carrera S does allow for a manual, if you want it, but honestly, after trying PDK and reading so many auto journalists’ laudatory remarks, we understand why people prefer it. In fact, we might prefer it, too.

Besides that, the Carrera S comes with the standard Porsche engineering features that would make the fellows who built the Golden Gate bridge about want to stand up from the grave and applaud (assuming you’re into the zombie fad):

• Porsche Active Suspension Management – A system that manages each wheel’s interaction with the road. If you begin to drive aggressively, the suspension firms up to give you more control. If the road conditions worsen, the suspension takes that and your driving style into account.
• Porsche Torque Vectoring – A system the brakes the inner wheel of the car when cornering, helping the car to execute the turn faster and return to straight line position.
• Cross-Drilled Brake Discs – Improved ventilation and larger caliper sizes provide the balance needed to stop the 400-horsepower engine.

Out of politeness to you, we’ll stop here, but the list of standard engineering—things well beyond power windows and air conditioning—goes well beyond this. This particular Carrera S has about $30,000 worth of options added to it, things like Dynamic Chassis Control, Dynamic Lighting System, and SportDesign, which changes the front lip and rear spoiler to reduce air drag up front and increase it in the rear.

All in all, we totally get the allure of a 911. In an area like the Triangle, you’ll have no trouble running out for sprints to Durham, Chapel Hill and Raleigh. Even if you mainly tool around Cary like a boss, we guarantee that you’ll have a grin whenever you feel like it. Sport plus is only a touch away.

The post Carrera S Review: The Bane of Cary Speed Limits appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.

Much has been made about the Macan. From our launch party this past May, to the scads of reviews that auto journalists have published since then, this small SUV has undergone a lot of scrutiny: Is it fast enough? Is it light enough? Is it Porsche enough? The consensus among reviewers has been as united as they get: the Macan is a Porsche through and through.

In fact, the Macan has done so well that they’ve been sold out continuously here at Leith Porsche. Macans have been claimed before they even show up at our doorstep, so when a white, nicely-optioned Porsche Macan Turbo in Raleigh happened to arrive without a buyer, we seized the day like it was made out of chocolate, grabbed the key, and headed out for a brief spin in the hottest Porsche of 2014.

It’s beginning to feel a lot like Porsche

This being December, red ribbon and green garlands are everywhere you look. Many people have their decorations up, the air is colder, and the scarves and wreaths about town make it feel like the holidays. We want to test the Macan’s performance, but we also want to test it in everyday driving. As we admire the deeply cut LED taillights and open the door with keyless entry, we have an epiphany about where to take it.

Every year one of the songs on the radio lists a bunch of things: three French hens, two turtle doves, a partridge in a pear tree—you might know it. It’s an old song, and no one buys those sorts of things anymore, at least not for their special someone. It is, however, a large amount of stuff to haul, and the Macan is designed to haul a lot of stuff. You can probably see where this is going.

We’re dreaming of a white Macan, plus some hot cocoa

Salem Street in downtown Apex is quaint, charming, and has a number of shops. In those shops, we want to see if we can find all items from our song, which are:

1 Partridge in a Pear Tree

2 Turtle Doves

3 French Hens

4 Calling Birds

5 Gold Rings

6 Geese-a-Laying

7 Swans-a-Swimming

8 Maids-a-Milking

9 Ladies Dancing

10 Lords-a-Leaping

11 Pipers Piping

12 Drummers Drumming

Piece of cake, right? Well, let’s look at what we have to haul it in. Our Macan Turbo has an air suspension for an incredibly comfortable ride; it has an off-road button to raise it up; it has a lowering button for fast highway driving; it has a twin-turbo V6 engine; dynamic lighting, carbon fiber inlays, 3-zone climate control, BOSE sound, privacy glass, and rows upon rows of other options that you don’t have time to read. Yes, we’re pretty well equipped.

Our list of holiday items, however, is going to require some modern interpretation. Even if we drive out to a farm, we’re probably not going to find a milk maid, let alone eight of them. Lords went out of style, oh, around the time America was invented, and pipers might be legal in Colorado and Washington, but this is North Carolina. We regretfully leave our heated steering wheel and seats parked off Saunders Street to see what we can find.

Shopping isn’t a chore if you have the right sleigh

With the rear seats folded, we have 53 cubic feet of cargo space. Maximum cargo weight is about 1,400 pounds. Six of the twelve items are birds: hens, swans, partridge, etc. Thankfully, there are a number of gift shops on Salem Street with a number of decorative birds. They might be bookmarks, paper weights and tree ornaments, but we’re going to say that they still count. Plus, we don’t want to chance swan feathers or other leavings on the interior of our Macan. Let’s say that all of these will take up about 20 cu. ft. and 300 lbs.

The five gold rings are probably our easiest purchase. Sophie and Mollie’s Boutique, Virtuoso Jewels, or any of the other shops would do nicely. Seven maids-a-milking is a harder find, but between the Ice Cream Shop and Buttercream’s Bakery, we think we have dairy covered.

Nine ladies dancing sounds difficult, but a short drive away is the Infinity Ballet Conservatory and Theatre: dancing ladies found. Ten lords-a-leaping is a stretch but what is a dancing lord besides a happily-monied man? Edward Jones Financial Advisors and Woomer Financial Services are probably full of people going about their financial business.

With 10 out of 12 items found on or nearby Salem Street, we were surprised at how easy the Macan made finding them. With a massive panoramic roof and easy navigation system, zipping around town would be a snap. At the same time, the super-wide rear tires and massive air intakes up front were put there by Porsche for a reason: when it’s time to move, the Macan Turbo can go from 0 to 60 mph in 4.4 seconds.

Water-cooled Porsches don’t jingle sleigh bells so much as crush them

Pipers piping were found at Peak City Bar & Grill via a poster advertising jazz flutists on Tuesday nights. Drummers drumming were on the other side of the street at the Rock Harbor Grill. To make sure we weren’t leaving anything out, we kept walking north until only houses lined the sidewalks. Wreaths, twinkling lights, and signs for a holiday walking tour dotted the picket fences on either side.

We circled back and came to our Macan on the side of the road, brushed with the last of the fall leaves, silver letters catching the light in a faint echo of sleigh bells. Could it fit everything from our list? Maybe. What really matters is your list, and what you plan to put it in. In that case, we bet that this 2015 Porsche Macan at Christmas won’t go unsold for long.

The post We Fit Everything From the 12 Days of Christmas Into the Macan appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.

Photos: Motor Trend

A few weeks ago, we had heard about a special car that Porsche built for Motor Trend magazine. As part of an advance piece for the publication, Porsche had built two specially-equipped 2015 Cayman GTS’s, one for driving, and the other as a backup in case a bit of mud smudged the first one’s tailpipe, or something equally blasphemous.

As it turned out, the driving model was successfully delivered to Motor Trend who then had an obscenely fun time doing what every Porsche driver would love to do: taking it to a closed race track. Like any selfless, noble, casually disinterested third party, we happened to ask, just in passing, “Is anyone doing anything with the backup model?”

This Cayman is positively wicked. Since being introduced by Porsche in 2006, the Cayman—a two-seat, exceptionally well-balanced sports car—has received a variety of special versions: the Cayman S, the Cayman R, the Cayman S Sport and even a rumored—though never confirmed—Cayman RS. Never before, however, has Porsche thrown everything it has into its mid-engined sibling to the 911. This is the Cayman GTS.

Looking over its option sheet, it’s almost impossible not to sigh and offer thanks to what Porsche has been able to create in 2014: sport suspension, carbon fiber door guards, torque vectoring, ceramic composite brakes, 3.4-liter flat-six engine—the Cayman GTS weighs less than a standard Cayman, has more power, and rides substantially lower. A Cayman GTS gets Porsche’s Active Suspension Management System, which lowers it by 10 millimeters. Because ours has the sport suspension with analogue dampers, it gets lowered by an additional 10 mm beyond that, 20 overall.

As Autocar’s Steve Sutcliffe recently said, “If you are really into your subject matter, this is the Cayman GTS you would have.”

Going Nuclear

Later estimates would declare November 18, 2014 as the coldest morning in the United States since 1976. At the time, as we snagged the key and headed out to jump in our Carmine Red GTS, all we could tell was that it was properly cold. We barely had time to notice the exterior details that practically leapt into the arms of passers-by and curious fellow-drivers at stoplights.

This GTS has specially painted black accents all over to complement the GTS lettering on the sides and rear: the air intakes in the front, the headlight cleaners, the rear fascia, the wheels—all a deliciously liquid black to make the Carmine Red exterior truly pop.

“Let the brakes warm up,” one expert told us, referencing the carbon ceramics that are so indestructible that only the pads will ever need to be replaced, never the rotors. “They’ll break your collarbone.”

For a car like this, we knew that a jaunt around Cary would never do. This car needs somewhere special to go, some worthy backdrop that sets the right tone for a model so out of the ordinary, it is literally two of a kind. As we pulled up the navigation to look for an appropriate venue, our eye was drawn to a location that stood out from the Starbucks’ and shopping malls that cropped hopefully up to entice the masses for early holiday shopping and parking lot gridlock: just south of Apex in a maze of winding back roads lies the Shearon Harris Nuclear Power Plant.

We punched in the address, and let the car do the routing. This, we could tell, was going to be good.

The Bloodsport-Obsessed Kitten You Always Wanted

Turning the key in a Cayman GTS is enough to obliterate any sense you had of the day being cold. The GTS’s engine absolutely thunders to life in a way that makes us wonder if we haven’t climbed into a Cayenne by mistake. The sound is an all-encompassing extra passenger in the cockpit with you. If you come to the Cayman looking to find your quiet place, or a serene mountain lake in your mind’s eye, you should scuttle those notions right away. It howls. It screams. It wails and rails. It does not go quietly into that good night.

The second thing we noticed—after the sport seats, contrast red stitching, leather accents and the entirely suede Alcantara roof (who does that?)—was that this is the best steering wheel we have touched this year, hands down, maybe of all time. Have you ever been around a kitten and stroked its rib cage through its impossibly soft, downy fur? This is what our GTS’s steering wheel feels like. Also in suede Alcantara, it is the softest, downiest, most absolutely pleasant-to-touch steering wheel we have ever encountered.

Entirely devoid of controls for the audio and infotainment system, this wheel is for the purist, the one who is so devoted to the road that the only thing his or her fingers want to touch is the paddle shifters just behind. In fact, the only adornment to the wheel besides its textural nirvana of suede and aluminum are two pieces of dark glass that don’t catch the eye at all. It’s only when activating Sport mode, Sport Plus, or Launch Control that a subtle white text appears beneath the smoked glass, a silent reminder of what mode you’re in.

It’s an intoxicatingly restrained feature, one that reinforces the theme that for all the technology at work, Porsche went to great lengths to scale back on whelming the driver. It’s this kind of thoughtful reduction that makes this car incredibly focused on what it does best: driving.

Somewhere Out There, a Stretch of Asphalt Is Still Cooling Down

Going to the Harris Nuclear Plant is a good idea because A) it lets us blow by some bewildered economy cars on Highway 1, and B) its tree-lined back road circuit offers the perfect amount of fall leaves to streak by the windows like an autumnal golden smolder of a meteor in the air.

Many of the Cayman’s competitors have powerful engines. They warble and explode and generally have power instantly available the moment you ask for it. But you have to ask for it. What the Cayman GTS does so inextricably well—particularly in Sport Plus—is provide such a sense of being alive. It’s not just that the engine makes fantastic sounds—though it does—nor that the engine provides such a gravity-defying adrenaline rush of blitzkrieg—though it will.

The Cayman GTS has a quaking, shivering need to be pushed further and farther and faster and harder in a way that few cars are able to communicate. It is present in every tremor of its air, and in the very crackle of its aura. It is the storm about to break that makes the air seem heavy and thick. It is the pit in the bottom of your stomach before every significant moment in your life. It is the blood that pounds in your ears when you sprint flat-out, running for all that you are worth.

Alive is really the best word for it. The sounds, the smells, the tuning, the suspension—all of it conspires to make the GTS an enabler of the first degree—it is not the friend who will rein you in and keep you in check. This is the one who will push open the gate to an abandoned airplane runway and ask, “Why not?” This car feels lively to a degree that must make Porsche’s engineers, if they are reading this, sit back and clink glasses of some traditional German drink in vindication.

Conclusion

In the end, we didn’t visit the nuclear station itself. We could see its towering, steaming hulk beyond the security gates with the signs about protocol and surveillance, and we decided that they weren’t exactly open to casual visits. We did go by the Energy & Environmental Center, however, a geometrically interesting structure that resembled a cluster of crystals reaching out from the earth.

With a looping, semi-circular front drive that reaches its zenith at the main entrance of the Center, we paused for a second at the crest to look inside through our windows, not quite wanting to step out into the blistering cold.

At that moment, a man—younger guy—was hurrying out of one building toward another. Head down, neck up, no jacket, arms tucked under each other in futile protest, he saw us, and a funny thing happened.

He completely stopped. His back straightened and he stood normally for a second, exposing his neck and arms and ears to the freezing air. We gave a friendly wave, put it in Sport Plus, and as we took off down the long straight road to the highway, we could see him, still standing there in our rearview, immobile, watching our rear tires as we sped away.

The post Full Review: The 2015 Porsche Cayman GTS Takes North Carolina appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.

Standing outside Leith Porsche, it was hard to believe that just a week before everything within sight was covered in snow. Instead, we were being treated to a gorgeous day and an opportunity to test-drive the 2014 Porsche Cayenne GTS.

As Porsche’s first SUV, people weren’t sure what to think of the original Cayenne when it debuted in 2002. This is the premier German sports car manufacturer, so why would they feel the need to design a midsize crossover? No one was asking this question for very long after they actually got to drive one, yet we still had the same doubts going through our heads beforehand. Perhaps it’s just the way the dealership is arranged, but when you pull up, the 911s, the Boxsters, and the Caymans are all in a row, right out front. The Cayennes are more out of sight, sort of like a well-kept secret.

Our sales representative that day was Robert Brooks who has been a part of the Leith family for five and a half years. He brought our featured ride around, a Cayenne GTS in Classic Metallic Silver with bright red calipers. Even as a crossover, it still looks like a sports car. It has the curvaceous Porsche hood and large, rounded headlamps. LED daytime running lights are integrated into the air intakes that flank the wide grille. The car has a wide-bodied stance that narrows on its way up to the roof, and an integrated spoiler juts out over the rear window.

Robert opened the trunk to show us the available cargo space. Porsche does not make compromises, so there is no option for a third row in the Cayenne. There’s a retractable cover to shield luggage or groceries from direct sunlight, as well as folding chrome clamps to secure anything you don’t want sliding around – a serious risk if you don’t have a full trunk, as you’ll find out. The second row will fold down for extra space, and a storage compartment underneath conceals a spare tire. The Cayenne is the only Porsche that comes with a spare. While other models include a repair kit and air compressor, the spare’s presence in this one represents a tacit acknowledgement that people who take their Cayenne off-roading could actually do some damage to a tire.

Under the hood, this GTS had a 4.8-liter V-8 engine with direct fuel injection and VarioCam Plus technology. It makes 420 horsepower and 380 pound feet of torque, which is power enough to go 0 to 60 in 5.4 seconds and pull a best-in-class towing capacity of 7700 pounds. Standard to the GTS is Porsche’s Tiptronic S transmission, an 8-speed automatic capable of detecting various styles of driving and responding for maximum fuel efficiency and driver comfort. As in any Porsche, the multifunction steering wheel can control gears manually, up with the push of a thumb or down with the pull of an index finger – an ambidextrous system to boot. Fuel efficiency is at a premium as well, thanks to an Auto Start Stop function.

As part of his training to be a Porsche Brand Ambassador, Robert visited the Barber Motorsports Park outside Birmingham and enrolled in Porsche’s sport driving school. It made sense for him to take the first turn at the wheel so that he could show us how the Cayenne is supposed to be driven. He put the key in the ignition, found to the left of the steering wheel. As he turned the car on, he explained Dr. Porsche’s thinking in terms of older races, when starting the car and putting it in gear were actually part of the race itself. While drivers of other vehicles had to turn the key and work the shift in sequence with one hand, Porsche drivers were able to start the car with their left hand and put it in gear with their right. The ignition has stayed to the left on every Porsche ever since.

You remember our misgivings about driving the Cayenne? Well, Robert said that what he most often hears from people stepping out of one for the first time is that they forget they’re driving an SUV. It certainly doesn’t sound like one. Robert turned on the Sport exhaust mode immediately and exited the parking lot, heading for a convenient roundabout to show us the Cayenne’s cornering. There are handles all over the inside, and that’s for the best because you can really take someone for a ride in this car.

We got a chance to ride in the front and the back, and we can attest that both are equally comfortable. As we said, Porsche makes no compromises. The GTS trim includes an Alcantera headliner and Alcantera centers on the leather seats. The second row can slide forward and back, and even reclines, while the front seats have the option for heating, ventilation, and eight-way adjustability with memory settings. We also opted to pull back the sunscreen to enjoy the full breadth of the panoramic sunroof.

Our test-drive route is classified, so we can’t tell you where we went, but we can tell you it included highway and neighborhood roads. Robert whipped through his half of the course, putting on a clinic for us. He said that down in Birmingham, they had an off-road motorcycle track that they took the Cayenne on. Before this we wouldn’t have believed him when he said they got air in this thing, but now we have no doubts. Once he could tell we were excited enough, Robert pulled over and switched seats with us.

It’s a basic tenant of Porsche design philosophy that their cars should be as light as physically possible. The engineers prioritize lightweight over power, and it’s amazing that they are able to balance the two so perfectly. The Cayenne feels lighter than some sedans and compacts we’ve driven. Most of the other cars in its own class outweigh it. Robert said that he’ll have customers come in who have tried other midsize crossovers, and they say the Cayenne is like the baby bear’s bed from the story of Goldilocks: It feels just right.

We hit the highway early on our drive, and we were reminded how much we like two-lane entry ramps. Usually on test-drives like this one, we’re driving a car that is powerful enough to pass anyone else before the merge, and the Cayenne is no exception. Robert had to remind us to watch our speed, saying, “The only difference between going 75 and 100 is the road goes by a lot quicker.” It feels the exact same, and speed is not electronically limited like in other cars. The power and responsiveness of the Cayenne is enough to make you lose your inhibitions, so some caution is advised. Some.

Steering on any Porsche is legendary, but the Cayenne’s has been totally revised and updated for flawless precision. One of Robert’s customers actually commented once that he was all over the road going down the highway, to which Robert said, “Well it’s going where you tell it to.” The Cayenne has a low center of gravity that helps it take corners easily, and the turning radius is magnificent for a larger car.

Handling also came up when we asked Robert about safety. Porsches are built with the autobahn in mind, so they’re capable of surviving high speed crashes from any angle. Of his customers that were unfortunate enough to be in an accident, Robert said he had never heard of any that were injured. He also made note that he’s rarely heard of a Porsche instigating a wreck. When you have superior brakes and handling, it’s much easier to avoid accidents than the alternative.

To be frank, we really did forget that we were driving an SUV by the end of the test-drive. All this is to say nothing of the Cayenne’s off-roading abilities. Air suspension and Tiptronic transmission make regular streets feel like coasting on clouds, but they’re also more than a match for tougher terrain. We didn’t get the chance to go mudding ourselves, but we think back to Robert’s story about the off-road test track in Birmingham and don’t have any trouble believing it.

Back at the dealership, we got out and looked around again, admiring the perfect day. It was a much needed taste of spring in February, and yet as nice it was, the Cayenne was more beautiful to us just then. If you want a sports car that can also handle rough roads, a full cargo, or a carpool, we recommend you take this one for a spin.

We also want to thank Robert Brooks for making our test-drive possible. Not only is he one of the nicest people you’ll meet, but he’s also a true ambassador of the Porsche brand. As always, we urge you not to let our words be the final arbiter of your judgment. Feel free to visit Leith Porsche for your own test-drive. There is no other car on the road like a Porsche. You owe yourself the experience.

The post Test Drive Review: The Ferocity of the 2014 Cayenne GTS appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.

The Porsche Boxster is in many ways the quintessential Porsche.

It can never, ever be acknowledged as such, however, because of its spot in the family tree. It’s a great sports car that just so happens to be in the most famous family of sports cars in the world—the 2009 UNC Tar Heels of sports cars, if you will.

Officially, the 911 will be the flagship, now and forever, that is for certain. In terms of what consumers want, Cayenne sales—which is an off-road vehicle—dominate the balance sheets. The introduction this May of a smaller, lower-priced off-road vehicle—the Macan—is predicted to skew revenues not only irretrievably into the SUV market, but also to increase sales to 200,000 units per year, a company goal that will now be met three years ahead of schedule. The Panamera scratches the itch of people who really want a sedan, but want it to feel like a Porsche, and CEO Matthias Müller has said that the company is investigating a true sedan concept.

And then there’s the Boxster/Cayman (the Cayman is essentially the hard-top version of the Boxster).

The Boxster was introduced 18 years ago when Porsche was going through a very tough time. Quality issues abounded, production costs were bloated, and acquisition was a real possibility. The company hired former Toyota engineers, razed the metaphorical house the previous generation had built, and said, “The 911 is good, but the Boxster is what will save us.”

The idea was to reboot the company with a brand new, lower-cost sports car, and for that they turned to a Dutchman named Harm Lagaay. As an automobile designer, Lagaay started in 1968 with French car company Simca. In 1971 he moved to Porsche, in 1977 he moved to Ford, in 1985 he moved to BMW and in 1989 he returned to Porsche where he would stay until 2004. Lagaay is said to have had more influence on Porsche vehicles than any other designer in history.

The Boxster was the first time the company used a mid-engine design since the 914/916 in the 1960s. A mid-engine placement allows for a low center of gravity, and fantastic balance between front and rear weighting. This in turn gives the Boxster an essential but devilishly hard characteristic to capture: handling.

A mid-engine placement also impacts the boxing design of the engine’s pistons, from which the vehicle gets its name. Many six-cylinder engines place their pistons in a V configuration because it saves space. The Boxster’s flat-six style is wider than a V6 and has the pistons pound toward each other like a boxer pounding his gloves before a fight. The pistons’ boxing movements balance one another and result in smoother revs than a V6 engine. The result is a more focused use of energy and controlled handling even while accelerating and turning simultaneously.

These are the platonic characteristics that every great sports car, from the Aston Martin DB5 to the Mercedes Benz 300 SL, Jaguar E Type, and 911, has always pursued. The Boxster is one of the purest embodiments of those values because it adds a crucial ingredient: fun.

That’s exactly what Porsche-Certified Brand Ambassador Robert Brooks told us to do when we rolled up to a stoplight. Our particular Boxster was a white 2014 model with blue soft top and red seat belts. Robert was letting us cruise around Cary with it after driving rather spiritedly himself (Porsche Brand Ambassadors are trained on new vehicles at Porsche track centers in Alabama and Utah).

We put the blue top down, turned out of the Leith Porsche lot, and it was on. Our personal vehicle is a white 1999 Porsche Boxster, so it was exciting to see what improvements had been made in 15 years. In short, everything was better. Many manual transmissions deliver best torque in 2^nd and 3^rd gears, but our first note when letting out the clutch in 1^st was: Holy Mackerel; 15 years makes a difference.

The exhaust note soars through the air and loops around the open-air cabin of the convertible in endless spirals that delight the ears. Following the snow of the last few weeks, the mid-60s temperature was perfect for convertible play. Thanks to a sponge-like suspension that soaks up road impurities, the driver and passenger are dominated by a sense of speed gilded only by the crackling snarls of the engine and furls of sunlight and wind that act like nature’s loudspeakers.

With the sports exhaust mode activated, the engine burbles and seethes even more whether idling or punching through the air. Robert showed us the trick of down-shifting to take advantage of the car’s rev-matching technology. The car essentially spits and raises a racket, pulling off all sorts of grand-standing revs to prepare for a blistering speed run so that anyone within several hundred yards will think that Mario Andretti is coming down the pike. An essential feature? No. Cool? You better believe it.

Gear shifts are short and business-like which helps you to spin through them as quickly as possible, just like they do in the movies. Standard start-stop technology cuts the engine at stoplights and restarts it instantaneously, which is a fantastic fuel-saving measure for a non-hybrid vehicle. The top opens or closes in just 10 seconds, and doesn’t require the car to be in park or have the emergency brake engaged (our 1999 model does).

One of the most controversial aspects of the newest line of Boxsters is the switch from hydraulic steering to electrically-assisted. The reduced weight of an electric motor compared to a hydraulic system is one of many decisions that keep the car feeling spry and saving fuel at the same time. It also draws the ire of purists who argue that you can’t feel the road as much through the wheel.

First off, we never noticed it. We were too busy having fun in the open sunlight with the exhilarating exhaust note to do a mental compare and contrast with the hydraulic steering found in our 1999 model. And that, to us, is precisely the point. Sports cars are about living in the moment, not holding to dogma.

Second, we can’t help but see the similarity between this objection and the decision of Porsche to use water-cooling in the Boxster. Porsches had previously always used air-cooled engines; the Boxster was the first ever Porsche to use a water-cooled system. Traditionalists hemmed and hawed, but the brand survived and now all Porsches, even the 911, use water-cooled systems. For us then, the Boxster’s electrical steering is a non-issue.

Finally, one of the biggest issues of the Boxster when it first came out was that it’s chassis was so well-engineered, so perfectly structured, that the engine could have been even more powerful. Not much of a complaint as far as they go, but it was enough to have been noted and addressed in 15 years.

Porsche knows that driving is a fundamentally visceral experience. The feeling of joy as you roll past a turn and earn a thumbs-up from a total stranger is more likely to happen when nothing but air separates you, and when you’re wearing a big, goofy grin. Sunshine and rainbows do matter when you’re in a Boxster because all the engine warbles, torque-vectoring and cooling circuits work together to get you to a place where you don’t care about them. A Boxster owner doesn’t have to know how all the technology works, and what the stats and numbers are compared to other cars for one simple reason: a guy on his way to the beach in a fly car is a happy man. That’s what the soul of a sports car is about. And that’s why the 2014 Boxster is one of the best sports cars in the world.

Special thanks to Robert Brooks and the team at Leith Porsche for making this test drive possible.

The post Test Drive Review: 2014 Boxster Offers Best Thrills Yet appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.

During our visit to Leith Porsche, we discovered how so many people came to pronounce it “Porsh”. The exhilarating acceleration of these cars makes you breathless, and the “ah” sound is whisked away quicker than the cars that once idled in the neighboring lane at the stop light. Before we go on, let us clarify that this description doesn’t fit only the Boxster, every model we drove off the lot performed with Autobahn-readiness.

2014 Panamera S e-Hybrid

Okay, don’t panic. We had the same thought: a hybrid Porsche? It must be some diluted version of a sports car lucky enough to boast the iconic branding of German precision. Wrong. This sedan-in-name-only balks at glacial rush hour speeds and sates itself by devouring the road with a 3.0-liter V6 engine that generates 416 horsepower and 435 ft-lbs. of torque.

The e-Hybrid simply helps you leave others “in the dust” with greater fuel efficiency. In fact, we were able to reach 74 MPH purely with the electric motor and uncompromised acceleration. A complex drivetrain affords you the discretion to utilize the electric motor and engine as a pair or individually.

… More on that later…

Upon first approach of the Panamera S e-Hybrid, there is no distinction between it and the pure-gas Panamera S models. Bulky curves, a sleek roof, a broad base, and an expertly designed rear diffuser are enough to allow “hybrid” to float into the ether of your memory, rendering it an irrelevant descriptor.

As writers, we were immediately struck by the color scheme of a green that appeared in multiple places – almost like a subtle theme as that found in The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Each of us will deduce our own interpretation of what it may signify.

The neon green appears as an outline on the exterior branding, on the calipers, on the analog clock’s arms, and on the meters’ needles. We won’t corrupt your thoughts by injecting ours, but we’ll ask you to think on it.

At the rear of the car, there is a hatch that opens with ease and closes with the mere push of a button. The Panamera S e-Hybrid we took for a test drive just arrived, so it still had the boxed-up charging station and bag of “goodies” for its eventual owner. It is here, near the hatch, that you can find two ports: one on the left for electric charging; one on the right for gas fuel. As you walk around the hatch, be sure to furtively glance – don’t want to appear too excited – at the exhaust pipes that will soon roar a beautiful note for you.

Now it’s time to get behind the wheel.

You approach the door and open it. Much to your surprise, it stops in the exact spot you released it and doesn’t swing back on you. That is thanks to German engineering, creating magnetic doors that can be placed into any position. In the finely manufactured leather bucket seat, you close the door beside you. It sounds as solid as the interior looks. The cabin is as sculpted as the exterior with curves and angles that are as athletic as the car’s performance. Each piece is solid, including the steering wheel, dash, and pedals. Everything about this car speaks to its engine’s strength, like the active musculature of a Pitbull.

The plush driver’s seat has three memory presents, which save your seat, steering wheel, and side-view mirror adjustments, as well as radio stations. Your front-passenger may also save three settings for seating preferences. In the rear of the cabin, extra passengers enjoy tremendous spaciousness in both length and width of the vehicle. A wide center armrest provides ample space. Deep set, narrow windows lend an almost aeronautic feel.

As your eye scans the captivating landscape of the interior, it absorbs the gorgeous black and silver trim that covers the dashboard, center console, and bevy of controls throughout the cabin. A shallow design of the dash puts you closer to “the action” for a feeling of absolute control. The adjustable steering wheel is home to paddle shifters in case you decide to find a track or enjoy more spirited driving.

In the driving cluster, amid the standard meters and gauges, there is a rounded screen that displays trip information, fuel consumption, navigation, and infotainment controls. This may be manipulated through a miniscule wheel embedded into the steering wheel. That screen may be utilized if you don’t care to look at the incredibly crisp touchscreen LCD display in the center of the dashboard.

Remember when we wrote “… More on that later…” about the engine?

Turn the key to wake the Panamera S e-Hybrid from its slumber. It growls, ready to feast on asphalt.

There is a multitude of factors that contribute to this car’s superior handling. Perfectly executed design in the frame, including a generous rear diffuser, provides downforce that grips the road with unmatched strength. Through twists and turns, and an enticing round-a-bout, the Panamera S e-Hybrid deftly capered like an artful ballroom dancer. Not a single body roll disrupted the pleasure of driving this car.

The robust suspension intimates no imperfections of the road, creating a perfectly tranquil cabin. Only the throaty timbre of the exhaust overwhelms the light, whispery air slicing over the car. A gentle brush of the accelerator melts the dashed lane markings into a continuous white line. Cresting and rounding the small hills on our path washes sunlight across the dash, and we chased after it each time it faded. As we turned into the dealership, our arms suddenly felt heavy – a precursor to the pangs of disappointment. Hands still clutched tenaciously to the steering wheel, it felt wrong to let the experience end.

We want to thank Robert Brooks, our congenial Porsche Brand Ambassador, for the time and effort he spent in showing us the capabilities of the 2014 Porsche Panamera S e-Hybrid. He provided thorough explanations of the vehicle and engaged us in beneficial conversation, but he also sat silently for us to focus on the experience. It was an exhilarating test drive, and we have a greater understanding of the enthusiasm people, like Robert, possess for this brand. It would be a disservice to yourself if you did not stop by Leith Porsche in Cary to live what we’ve so passionately written.

The post Our Panamera S E-Hybrid Test Drive Review appeared first on Leith Porsche Blog.