Cayenne Turbo Shows Its Off-Road Chops: Off-road Wednesdays

Watch 450 horsepower SUV navigate sloppy, muddy trails and wade through water as it shows how capable these early Cayennes can be. 

Back in the early 2000’s Porsche shocked the world and angered some purists by introducing their first SUV. At that time Porsche was financially facing a road about as messy as the trails their SUVs were designed to tackle. Bringing out an SUV was a significant gamble. So, how did that turn out? Well, they moved about 200,000 SUVs globally last year. Today they are one of the most profitable car manufacturers in the world. The SUV income allows them to build some of the greatest sports cars you can buy. In addition, today nearly every luxury car manufacturer offers an SUV, trying to compete with Porsche and their current crop of SUV offerings. So, yeah, it turned out pretty well.

The Cayenne was the first SUV Porsche developed and the top spec was the Cayenne Turbo. Knowing that entering the SUV market was a risk, Porsche didn’t take development lightly. They decided that their SUV had to have the sporty intentions that its road cars were known for, but they also wanted to ensure that they could really tackle the trails. On Car stories YouTube channel, you can watch these first-generation Cayenne Turbos, and a few other Cayenne models for good measure, attack some pretty nasty trails. By the looks of it, these appear to be stock rigs which makes the feat even more impressive. Seems like Porsche met their goal of making these off-road worthy.

These early Cayenne Turbos have been out of production for a while now, so it is easy to forget all the goodies that Porsche baked into these things. We are talking a lot of goodies as these early models were a pavement crushing 5,200 pounds. The heart of the beast is a 4.5L twin-turbo V8 with dry-sump lubrication that cranks out 450 horsepower and sounds great doing it. An adjustable airbag suspension was an option and allowed more than 4.5 inches of adjustment with nearly 11 inches of ground clearance. The Porsche Traction Management System came with a low range transfer case with a 2.7:1 ratio. Other off-road friendly options on offer were extra skid plating, a locking rear differential, and a hydraulic disconnect for the anti-roll bars to increase wheel travel. This was serious equipment.

The efforts paid off as you can see in the video. We know the trails being shown do not exactly rival Hell’s Revenge in Moab, but they are certainly more challenging than many owners would think their vehicle can handle. Don’t forget these are stock SUV’s that are tackling this stuff and yet can hit 60 mph from a stop in about 5 seconds and top 160 mph. Not a bad first effort for Porsche.

With these vehicles being a couple Cayenne generations old now, they are relatively affordable. And, as you can see in the video you don’t even need to have the top dog turbo model to conquer these types of trails. For those looking for a quick, comfortable and capable off-roader for a reasonable amount of coin, these first-generation Cayenne’s may be just the thing. With Porsche sports cars, you can’t really fully appreciate their capabilities until you get them on the racetrack. With Porsche SUV’s, you need to get some mud under them before you understand just how much they can handle.

Photos: Socalstuttgart; Hackomotive; Cars of Croatia

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Joe Kucinski

Joe has been obsessed with cars since he got his very first Matchbox toy in the ‘70s. In 2003, he found a new obsession in track days that led to obtaining his SCCA competition license in 2015. In 2019, he became a certified driving instructor for the National Auto Sport Association. His love for all things four wheels has never wavered, whether it's driving some of the best cars in the world on the racetrack, tackling 2,000-mile road trips in 2-seat sports cars or being winched off the side of a mountaintop in a Jeep. Writing for the suite of Internet Brands Auto Communities sites, including Rennlist.com, Ford Truck Enthusiasts, 6 Speed and more allows him to share that knowledge and passion with others.