Through the Macan, Porsche puts the ‘sport’ in a SUV
The Macan has Porsche's racing DNA, and if you love cars, it's worth every penny
The Porsche Macan (the name is derived from the Indonesian word for tiger) is a seriously good car. It is so good, in fact, that it makes the two cars that it is derived from, the bigger Porsche Cayenne SUV and the Audi Q5, look decidedly ordinary.
When Porsche first decided to enter the sport utility vehicle (SUV) market, the brand’s loyalists (read: 911 owners) were howling. The Cayenne that came as a result of the brand’s entry in the space has, over two generations, turned out to be a phenomenal success and is by far Porsche’s best selling model across the world, and even in India.
Ergo, it was not surprising that the German car maker wanted to enter the “compact" SUV market to compete against the likes of the BMW X3 and the Mercedes M-Class along with its half-sibling, the Audi Q5. After all, it is estimated that around 1.3 million compact SUVs will be sold across the world this year. So confident is Porsche about the Macan that it has spent several million euros upgrading its plant in Leipzig, Germany, to be able to build 40,000-50,000 Macans.
The Porsche management had thus placed an immense challenge upon its engineers; the Macan had to be good. It was supposed to be the car that would help Porsche retain its admittedly tiny global marketshare of 0.25% even as the global car market grew. And boy, have the Porsche engineers delivered.
Firstly, while the Cayenne looks a bit brutish, and even possibly ugly, at its abrupt back end, the Macan looks proportional and actually quite good-looking for an SUV. Porsche designers do find their hands tied to the “family" look, but the clamshell bonnet and the sloping roofline have not been achieved at the cost of comfort.
The three-dimensional taillights borrowed from the Porsche 918 Spyder supercar make this vehicle’s rear stand out; you don’t mind being stuck behind a Macan at a traffic light. Yes, it is not a Cayman or a 911, but, as an SUV goes, it is definitely one of the best-looking SUVs in the market.
The steering wheel is one of the nicest in Porsche’s range, again borrowed from the new 918 Spyder, and the information display is nice, big and—importantly—quick. Smartphone connectivity is achieved in a jiffy and, oddly for a Volkswagen Group car, it has a USB slot. The standard 14-speaker Bose audio system in the car has very good fidelity and gets fairly loud if you want it to. However, you can opt for a Burmester sound system that has an incredible range of sound covering nearly the entire human hearing spectrum.
But how is it to drive? The Macan S and the Macan Turbo that several of us drove were fitted with all of Porsche’s driver aids. This included air suspension, which raises the car by 40mm, along with Porsche Traction Management (PTM) and Porsche Torque Vectoring (PTV) that give the Macan a surprisingly agile feel off the road.
The Macan can drive through rutted roads even if two wheels are in the air as the PTM+PTV systems send power to the wheels that have the most grip. These features help the car in soft sand, though the PTM system can kill the power if you try to be too aggressive. It can manage to drive up and down sharp embankments; we drove up a 35-degree incline and down. All in all, a very solid performer.
But chances are, like most SUVs, the Macan will rarely, if ever, leave the road. In the city, the phenomenal power of both the Macan S and the Macan Turbo, the latter with an imperceptible turbo lag, would embarrass most German sedans and leave them for dead. It is surprisingly comfortable to drive and has some of the nicest front seats in contemporary SUVs.
But when you show the Macan a hill, it experiences a shocking change. Shocking because you remember that this is an SUV, compact or not. You can switch the car into manual mode, where Porsche’s double-clutch system, the Porsche Doppelkupplung (PDK), allows you to change gears from the toggles. While the active safety features will keep you in line, the car is incredibly good fun and the active chassis does not make you want to lose your lunch, as it fights physics countering the centrifugal force on the car.
Here are some of the other numbers: The Macan will be launched with three six-cylinder engine options. The top-of-the-line Macan Turbo will come with a 3.6-litre engine with 400 horsepower, a top speed of 266km per hour (in a SUV!) and a 0-100km time of 4.8 seconds. There is also the Macan S with a 3-litre engine producing 340 horsepower and slightly reduced performance figures.
The car that will likely be the bestseller in India is the Macan S Diesel with a 3-litre turbo-diesel engine, producing 258 horsepower. We, however, did not drive the Diesel. Fuel economy for the petrol cars is, as expected, not great at all, but the cars are a hoot to drive. Porsche is expected to launch variants of the Macan with smaller 2-litre petrol and diesel engines, most likely by 2015.
In short, the Porsche Macan is a tremendous car; one could possibly dub it the best compact SUV ever made. It is not the most spacious car in its class, but definitely the most opulent and the best performing. However, as Porsche India director Anil Reddi pointed out, the car may take a few more months to come to India. A likely launch will happen only after a budget has been presented by the new government, possibly by late June.
Even worse, the car will carry a massive price tag of between ₹ 80 lakh and ₹ 1 crore, although India-bound cars will have most options specified. At that price, you are buying into the Porsche brand and not just a car. And you know what? The Macan has Porsche’s racing DNA, and if you love cars, it’s worth every penny.
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