Porsche Boxster: balance is bliss

The perfect car in the world: great balance, great handling

I have a rather long-standing love affair with the Porsche Boxster, which is only made more intense with its latest offering.

When the little Porsche first came out, it had the rather unenviable position of being pit against the mighty 911, and there were no cars that ever really withstood that.

The 928, the 924 and 944 all have come and gone, even though to be honest now, they are actually gaining interest in the enthusiast market (along with almost any Porsches including the perpetually-maligned American-bumper models.)

Like many enthusiasts with more passion than sense, I thought it was a marketing ploy by Porsche to bring new people to the market, and to make a Porsche more accessible. The thing is, it was also the perfect car in my book.

I covet handling more than I demand power. I love balance more than sheer speed. This perhaps comes from karting, which remains to me the purest most enjoyable connection between driver, machine and road.

This most probably came from the fact that I couldn’t afford huge engines, so I learned to do the most with what I had. Handling cars force you to be better: you need to be faster on curves in order to offset the advantages on the straights that power cars have.

The first real experience I had with a Boxster (meaning on-track and with a mission) had me running it through a slalom over a dozen years ago. I was told that the car would be way better than I was, so I had to trust myself and trust the car. Which I did.

I sliced through the cones and stayed on the gas far later than I would have thought was intelligent, then hit the brakes with all my might. Thank heavens for ABS—the instructor cringed, then looked at the cone in front of which I was supposed to stop, then looked at me, then looked at the cone, then held up a sheet of paper and motioned for me to get out: I was that close to the cone when I finally stopped, he said.

The Boxster Spyder is beautiful, attractive, sleek and simply breathtaking.

My respect for the balance and ability of the Boxster was unshakeable from that point. I have to admit, I was also shaking at that time.

This was all before actually getting into the automotive industry with C! Magazine, so since then, I have had many chances to mess up with the car. I have seen it grow up and mature, gain more power and more respect and more safety as well.

It was the testbed for the introduction of new technologies and new ideas in many ways because you could so easily and purely feel the changes of the mid-engined machine.

If you paid proper attention, you felt everything. From there, it went on to major changes and acquired a sibling, and the Boxster and Cayman with their shared platform took the Vehicle Dynamics awards for the fact that they are just that much more cohesive and connected than any other car.

The differences between the two are basically tuning and a hard shell at this point. The Cayman is the purposeful track machine, while the Boxster is a tiny, tiny bit less focused. Tiny enough that seriously, the driver with better turn-in on one corner could make the difference.

When experienced racecar drivers tell you that this platform is the best handler Porsche has ever produced, you listen. The smallest displacement engine they put in is a 2.7 liter boxer that puts out 265 horsepower but also gives the car the lowest possible weight. It is hard to explain to people why adding power makes a car less fun but it quite often does.

Inside, two light sports bucket seats with large side supports

The car changes character. It becomes less playful in corners, and the additional push available sometimes makes you use it as a crutch. I am a very big fan of having all a company’s soul or DNA available at every level.

Just like a watch, if you can’t make a simple two-hand beautiful, then complications are often used to compensate. Same with cars. There is a massive rush that comes with pushing an insanely powerful car towards 300, although that requires a strong foot and a stronger heart.

Weaving a car through a fast set of corners, requiring you to keep as much speed as possible, and being at the very edge of traction and mountainside while pitching the car from side to side—that takes skill. Some cars make you feel better, others make you get better.

From Stuttgart came the Cayman GT4, the answer to the 911 GT3. It threw down the “We are better” gauntlet at everyone including the drop-top sibling. Case closed.

Then, from my inbox came this beautiful image. It reminded me of the very short run and coveted 911 cabriolet speedsters with shortened windshields. It had curves and rear streamliners that speak of the 918 but go even further than that to the 718 Spyder of the 1960s. It was a cloth-top manual-transmission Boxster Spyder—with an engine from the GT4.

The current Boxster is a beautiful car, attractive and sleek where the Cayman is determined and aggressive. The GT4 looks meaner; the Boxster Spyder is just breathtaking. It almost makes the 918 look just too long. It has the silver wheels it should have (I like the GTS cars and their black wheels look mean, but the silver rims on the Boxster Spyder are just right).

So then comes the question, do you go for pure handling or the changed handling but with more power? It is in my case a moot point, but definitely one worth exploring in a “Zen and the art of racecar driving” way.