Yes, the Porsche Panamera Is Way Faster Than the 718 Boxster S

However, it's also credited with saving the brand that wasn't doing so well at the time. And over the years, Porsche has rewarded its entry-level model with ever more grunt, style, and equipment.

Prices have also gone up. For example, this brand new 718 Boxster S with 350 horsepower starts at €70,000 before any options. With options, it easily cracks 80k, which is twice what the Cayenne cost back when it was new.

Before we go off on a tangent about how inflation has doubled the price of cars since 2002, we have a drag race to consider. Well, it's not a drag race, but one with a rolling start, which cancels out the advantage of the Panamera Turbo's four-wheel drive system.

Still, the difference between these two is like night and day, black and white... VW Up! and VW Golf R. Once the anchors are tossed, the new Panamera rockets away from its two-seater rival in a surprising way.

Why surprising? Well, the 718 Boxster S is what you'd call a fast car. We recently saw how the same car was quicker than an Audi RS3 and a TTS.

Porsche took one step back with this new roadster, replacing the old boxer-six with a turbocharged 2.5-liter. But this is still a 350 horsepower dedicated sportscar that weighs only 1,385 kilograms. By comparison, the Panamera Turbo weighs about two tons. But its V8 engine makes 200 HP more, as well as 770 Nm of torque to dig it out of the hole. Perhaps we should have looked at the 0 to 100 km/h sprint times first: 3.8 seconds for the sedan vs. 4.4 seconds for its little sister.

So it's little wonder that Porsche sells these 4-door powerhouses by the bucketload, while the Boxster and Cayman remain niche products.