As with all my airport pickups of test vehicles, I immediately had the chance to sample cargo capacity. At 18 cubic feet, it's adequate: it handled my suitcase and could have handled another just like it.
Style-wise, I think the wagon-y Sport Turismo trim improves on the unloved Panamera design. We first experienced this Stuttgart estate in the more expensive and more powerful Turbo trim.
The Sport Turismo treatment solves the problem of the Panamera's rotund rear end by making the back of the car even larger.
... A small winglet that you can throw up anytime you want, but that auto-deploys above 100 mph to add downforce to the back end.
The headlamps, with their four-point running-light feature, are a cool upgrade to the familiar Porsche bug-eyes fascia.
The 21-inch "Turbo Design" wheels were a $2,160 option. The other major add-on was a combination of dynamic chassis control and torque vectoring ($5,600), which in practice makes this car one of the most firmly planted I've ever driven at speed.
The interior of my Panamera GTS Sport Turismo was a combo of leather and Alcantara, all in black. Severe! Purposeful!
The multifunction steering wheel is Alcantara-wrapped and stupendously responsive. There are paddle shifters, a customizable instrument-cluster display with the tachometer front and center, and ...
Again, the GTS ST I tested was overall a study in not overdoing it. The dark, grained wood and brushed-metal trim were epic in their restraint.
It ain't a Porsche if there isn't a clock to measure the 0-60 mph time. Which was about four seconds flat.
Well, we can't see much, so we'll take Porsche's word for it that there's a 4.0-liter twin-turbo V8, making 453 horsepower with 457 pound feet of torque, under that lovely hunk of plastic.
The Panamera ST Turbo test car we previous sampled was powered by a 550-horsepower, 4.0 liter, twin-turbocharged V8.
In the wagon-y realm, one can also obtain a 330-horsepower, 3.0-liter, turbocharged V6 and a 440-horsepower, twin-turbocharged, 2.9-liter V6. There's also a pair of hybrid drivetrains, one with 462 horsepower and the other with a whopping 680 ponies.
The power is channeled to the aforementioned torque-vectoring all-wheel-drive setup via a quick-shifting, eight-speed, dual-clutch transmission. Fuel economy isn't great: 15 mpg city/22 highway/18 combined.
I didn't have a lot of time to test all the features, but I've experienced this system before, and it performs all the expected functions admirably.
So what's the verdict?
I don't like the V8 Panameras, but this guy finally did it for me. This isn't a modest vehicle. No, it isn't a raging beast, as was the Turbo Sport Turismo version, and it does weight in at close to 5,000 pounds. But the V8, the snappy transmission, and especially the dynamic chassis feature and the torque-vectoring combined to fill me with confidence on both freeways, byways, and some twisty asphalt.
My time with the GTS Sport Turismo was brief but joyful. And it was a full test, including a variety of different types of driving in the Bay Area, plus some basic cargo hauling. No, this car isn't as much fun as a 911. Yes, it does argue for a suitably grand four-door experience. Yes, you do want to make this puppy go fast. And yes, it does go fast. Real fast. At any given time, you're likely to be the fastest thing in your immediate vicinity. Making space on San Francisco's crowded freeways was no problem.
So, in the end ... shocker! I cozy up to the slightly less powerful and in my view more fun wagonized version of the Porsche I probably like least.
Nothing wrong with that, and props to Porsche for creating a Panamera, almost literally, for everyone.
