By Paul Kramer · January 23, 2026

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Every once in a while, a reader emails something so passionate, so well-written, and so slightly grumpy that it deserves public airtime.

This week’s note, paraphrased:

First of all:
Respect. This is not a troll. This is a properly aged Porsche take from one of our followers/listeners.  Thank you for sharing.

And honestly? I get it.

In a perfect world, Porsche would:

Boom. Done.
Sign me up yesterday.

But here’s the inconvenient part...

Modern Porsche doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It exists in a world that demands:

Those constraints make building light, loud, analog sports cars nearly impossible unless Porsche also builds… the “un-real” ones.

Here’s the number nobody likes but everyone needs to hear:

Nearly 75% of Porsche’s global sales are four-door vehicles.

Macan. Cayenne. Panamera. Taycan.
Those cars don’t replace 911s — they subsidize them.

No SUVs?
No GT3s.
Full stop.

The Cayenne didn’t dilute Porsche.
It kept it alive.

Without it, Porsche would either:

Instead, we still get:

That’s not selling out.
That’s survival.

My 82-year-old father just sold his manual 996 Turbo — a car he bought new almost 25 years ago.

What’s next for him?

A CPO Macan GTS.

Is it an air-cooled 911 with no nannies?
No.

But it:

Otherwise, he’d be in some floaty luxo-barge that can’t turn or stop, headed toward the desert like every other octogenarian in a Cadillac.

That Macan lets him stay a Porsche guy.  It lets him enjoy driving for a tad bit longer.  
That matters.

If you haven’t driven a Macan, Cayenne, or Panamera hard, on a real road, in anger…

You’re missing the point.

They aren’t 911s.
They were never meant to be.

But the handling, steering, and braking DNA is still there — and that’s not an accident.

You can love air-cooled 911s and understand why Porsche builds SUVs.

You can hate the optics and appreciate the engineering.

And you can mourn what’s gone without ignoring what made it possible to survive.

I’ll keep selling, driving, and defending the “real” Porsches.

But I’m also thankful the others exist —
because without them, there wouldn’t be anything left to argue about.

And honestly?

A Porsche that keeps someone driving longer in life still feels pretty real to me.

— Paul Kramer

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