[JTO]

I drove a regular Cayman over the weekend. I won a 24 hour rental through my local chapter of the PCA.

Heidi and I celebrated our 17th wedding anniversary in Bend where the Porsche dealer was located (Carrera Motors donated the prize-thanks Tom Anderson!).

I did the math and knew that a 3100 lb. car with 245 HP would not perform all that well. The acceleration experience was a chore! Plant your right foot and shift at redline and except for a brief burst of power when the variable cam came on at 5500 RPM, at 7000 fuel shut off kicked in and killed any joy. So, there was a "power band" from 5500 to 7000.

The chassis was great with wonderful steering and response. I loved the transitional response which was instantaneous. The car features were nice in theory (climate control, computer, PSM, etc). I couldn't see the LCD readout for the climate control while driving due to their dimness in sunlight. I had to ask Heidi to run it until I figured out the buttoms.

I realized that I want my sports cars hard core, rough, loud, fast. This car was none of that. I would have rather been in a Lexus if I wanted comfort, silence, and gadgets.

Fuel economy was excellent at 21 mpg even with the super hard driving (zinging to redline every time I accelerated).

Heidi drove the car hard and came away with the feeling that you had to drive at full throttle to get any kind of sensation of acceleration. She did like the very secure handling and felt comfortable driving at speeds she says she wouldn't do in the 911.

The body structure was nothing great. The 20-year old 911 feels much more solid. All you have to do is sit in both cars and slam the doors. The 911 is a vault, the Cayman feels like a Honda (with no disrespect to Honda, who makes a nice car but Porsches should be something special and feel that way).

So, all in all, I would rather spend $50K on a really nice 993 (or hot rodded 911!) than on a Cayman. This is crazy to say, but after dropping off the Cayman, I found myself glad to get back into my '99 Ford Expedition! Weird? Yep. But, the Expedition does exactly what you expect, with loads of room, comfort, and great visibility. The Cayman has little room, OK comfort, and terrible rear quarter visibility.

My $0.02

Troy