Showing posts with label Cayenne. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cayenne. Show all posts

January 12, 2009

Winter Fix

13 comments:

Shop for Winter Tires Now!
theFlip MINO



Ok, I realize it's a drug song in the clip but if getting up at 5 am to drive two hours in 7 degree F weather to an icy track when a major blizzard is forecast is not a sign of addicltion, I don't know what is.

The Monticello Motor Club has had the brilliant idea to cater to track starved addicts in the middle of winter, We went to the second even and I hope it was enough of a success for the club to continue with it.

I don't think anyone cared if it was brutally cold, at least the drivers didn't, some of the organizers looked a little frostbitten. And it wasn't just Subarus that showed up either. While Stee was in the Cayenne Turbo and I in the Audi S6 battlewagon, there were a number of M3s and Adil was there with the 997s. He may not have been the fastest but he sure got the most exercise and I suspect had the most fun. 

Obviously tires were the key, but only as long as there was a snow cover on the track.  As the day went on many of the turns were swept to just bare ice and that added quite a bit of excitement, good thing for the still soft snow banks!

One of the most fun things I have ever done with a car. Highly recommended! 

Check the MMC WEB SITE for news of upcoming events.
(Thanks to The Dough and Ponycar.net for the additional photos)





When you buy one Valeo(R) ULTIMATE(TM) Wiper Blade from Tire Rack, you'll get one free!



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When you buy one Valeo(R) ULTIMATE(TM) Wiper Blade from Tire Rack, you'll get one free!

April 3, 2008

Yeah, we did it.

3 comments:
I admit we did the thing I've cursed others for doing. We took a 5200-lb truck onto the track. The “truck” was a Porsche Turbo Cayenne, graciously donated by Stee for some track time at VIR this past weekend.

“What’s it like?” people often ask upon seeing this monster. Well, that’s what we wanted to find out, in true Axis style.

My answer: it’s funny. Also, it’s entertaining because it felt... naughty. We knew better than to take a vehicle this useful, this capable of utilitarian deeds onto a race track, but we just couldn’t resist. It was also a little scary, but more on that later.

You probably know the Cayenne is decent off-road (with correct tires), but it’s branded as a Porsche, right? So naturally we wondered what would happen if your track car broke and you substituted the Cayenne as your ride in the instructor run group at a world-class road course.

Stee and I are convinced that the greatest driving club east of Hawaii is the Mid Atlantic region of NASA, headed by mad scientist Chris Cobetto and his band of loonies (ask us about Thursday Night Tech Inspection another time). We like instructing and racing with this group so much we routinely drive 10 hours to get there.

Anyways, as the Saturday afternoon instructor session approached, we loaded two instructors and two students (helmets and intercoms included) into the Cayenne and headed for the pit lane. The stares were pretty spectacular as we crept through the paddock at 5mph. Our gross weight should have been around 6000-lbs with that load. Unfortunately, the pit marshal mentioned there is a “one passenger per vehicle policy,” so we had to offload our students. Sorry boys.

Heading onto the track, the side mirrors had to be adjusted lower to ensure we didn’t squash some poor MINI like a bug. I ran the driver’s seat up as far as I could to get closer to the wheel. The track was cold and maybe damp in places, but mostly dry. Putting tires off, however, would spell disaster.

Surprise #1: Cayenne gets HUGE lateral grip from her dub-inch Contis. But it comes with a condition: don’t do anything stupid or the lateral grip evaporates instantly (ask Stee how I know and see #3 below).

Surprise #2: This thing is 4kin FAST. Not a big surprise but the 450bhp/460lb-ft ratings seem conservative. We lifted to help a modified E46 M3 pass us on the straight. Later, a Viper and C5 ZO6 had to do silly stuff to make the same pass.

Surprise #3: Understeer, thy name is Cayenne! Ok, ok, perhaps I was the only one who’s really surprised by that. On my first lap through the Oak Tree turn, I hit the gas early and was penalized with massive understeer toward the outside. After stopping the lurch and getting a well-deserved punch in the arm from Stee, I recalibrated my brain and proceeded. Friends don’t let friends hit the gas too early in a behemoth like this.

Surprise #4: Turbo lag will ruin your day if you are dumb. BMW used to say lots of bad stuff about turbo lag. The Cayenne, with its delayed-onset boost (~2500rpm) and the understeer mentioned above, showed us why.

Surprise #5: Despite numbers 3 and 4 above, this thing handles well overall. Granted, Stee has lowered her a bit so the roll is more controlled. He also did a custom alignment a few weeks ago. We noticed that once it takes a set, the dynamics are mostly predictable.

Captain Obvious #1: This thing will roast its brakes. What are those brakes that improve under blow torch temps? Oh, right, PCCB from the Carrera GT. That’s what this thing needs, badly. Like a couple of squirrels, one SpecMiata startled another going into Turn 1, which caused the second car (in front of us) to crank down on his brake pedal. Miss Cayenne, in turn, used all the brakeforce she had, but still closed on said Miata. Thankfully the Miata driver got three mirrors full of our intercooler and lifted off a touch, just as we entered the turn at school zone speed.

Captain Obvious #2: People love to play games with the weird kid in class. It was fun to watch the other instructors fool around with the Cayenne in traffic… reminded me of curious sea creatures picking on a grey whale.

During our driver change we observed blue smoke from all four brakes and that’s with uprated pads and half a cooling lap. In his stint, Stee adapted to manage the brake temps and kept them working.

I have to say the Stee called on all his experience and his power of observation (see Surprise #3) to put on a helluva show. Smooth is not even the word for how he drove. The Cayenne, in turn, got faster and faster as the session progressed, and this drive became the highlight of our weekend.

It’s not something you’d do every day, but we firmly established Miss Cayenne is a fat girl who can dance (hell, she can run to 60 in five seconds!), and could make a good playdate in a pinch at your local road course.

Porsche Cayenne Turbo: Axis Tracktard Approved™


July 14, 2007

The X Factor.

No comments:





We're very excited to have our first post by a woman reader! Ok, so she's not your typical soccer mom from Westchester, she is the patient other half of our own CG...but none the less she WAS looking for a third row seat option as they went shopping for a replacement for their Cayenne.

Here is Natalia's take, sure to raise some controversy:

"The X-5 4.8 beats the Cayenne S…

….Yes, in number of people it accommodates, technology gadgets and cup holders. One can’t deny the amazing gadgets of the X-5… but be careful with them:
  • You can open the door and turn the car on without a key. Just be careful when you change drivers, don’t leave the car with the key in your pocket and leave the car to be driven by someone without a key.
  • You can check the traffic on your route, just be careful with the time it advises you will be in a traffic jam, usually happens once you are in.
  • You can talk over the phone over the car’s speaker system, just remember to have a non-bluetooth device if you want to have a private conversation.
  • You can plan a route with detour, restaurants and bathroom stops, but you have to read 1,000 pages in a brochure to understand how to work with the navigation system… the i-Drive thingy is everything but friendly, considering that the main task should be driving. It’s a car, not a Mac Powerbook!

The X-5 has a 4.8-liter V-8 engine with 350 horsepower, that’s a lot, same as my husband’s über-Carrera Porsche, but it is an overweight baby. It has a very confident speedometer, it seems that it reaches 60 miles per hour in less than 6 seconds, and it also tells me that I’m doing 80mph anywhere without even noticing how I got there. However, it does remind me how it got there, only in long mileage highway trips I get to see the mpg computer go above 10!!

When I was driving my Cayenne S, I always felt in control of the car. In rare occasions I felt I was driving a big SUV. In the Cayenne I could hug the curves at every speed, on the X5 I can’t feel the same, the car doesn’t even tilt, it just floats through. Parking the Cayenne was an easy task; it would turn on a penny, the X5 not even in a golden dollar coin. It has a very easy to turn power steering, too soft for my taste, to the point that feels dangerous at 65 mph.

I miss my Cayenne. I miss the handling on the corners, the trustworthy brakes that always work great with immediacy, the coolness factor and the reliability of a Porsche. When I had it, I was never in a rush to drive my husband’s sports car, I had enough of an experience with my car. Since I have the X5 I am always looking for an excuse to drive Carlos’ car. Just to feel that I am behind the wheel of a real car.

The X5 is an amazing SUV... That is if you've never driven a Cayenne. Humbly I accept that in a search for a, seriously overrated, third row seat I ended up with a downgrade of my previous car. But hey, I can officially carpool and between an X5 V8 and a Toyota Sienna there are not too many words left to say."

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