Porsche Macan and mud slinging

It’s all in the name they say. If you ask us, it’s all in the badge. The badge a car wears is enough to tell you all you need to know about its DNA. So when you see the golden shield with a black horse in the middle and Porsche on the top, you know the car you’re looking at will be a tarmac scorcher regardless of its shape or size.
Porsche is the manufacturer who put the ‘Sport’ in Sport Utility Vehicles or SUVs. The Cayenne despite being a behemoth could handle like no other SUV did when it was launched, and even today you can feel the large SUV dripping with Porsche DNA. And its younger sibling, the Macan takes the Sport in SUV even more seriously.

So when Porsche said that they wanted us to take their SUVs off tarmac, it was an opportunity too interesting to pass. The venue was Bandhwari, a village well known to off-road enthusiasts in the Delhi-NCR region, particularly Gurgaon. We were to drive around a course on the rough terrain that took us through steep inclines and descents, some at odd angles and some too steep to believe. We had a choice between the capable Cayenne and the Macan but I went for the sportier SUV instead.
So there I was, buckled up in the seat of the recently launched Macan R4, staring down a steep decline and suddenly unsure if it should even be doing this. Not that I doubted its capabilities but here was an SUV with a 2.0-litre four pot turbo petrol engine  that dishes out 252PS and 370Nm of torque, and can sprint to 100kmph in less than 7 seconds. Lest you have forgotten, those are sportscar numbers and the Macan is one, despite looking like an SUV.

The voice on the radio crackled, egging me to proceed downwards. I switched to off-road mode to maintain maximum traction, and the good news is that the system comes as standard fitment on all versions of the Macan. Slowly but cautiously I let go of the brakes, inching forward and down. The car slid momentarily until the Hill Control system stepped in and helped us slither down the unbelievably steep slope with relative ease.
The sigh of relief I let out one making it to the base was involuntary, trust me. It took me a few minutes to let the feeling sink in, that such an expensive car, with the kind of luxury it had ensconced me in, could be this capable! Trust the Germans with their engineering, I said to myself before looking at the next exercise. And next up was a climb up a slope. 
Natural instinct was to tap the throttle lightly and intermittently, lest I give it too much gas, despite knowing that I needed to maintain a constant throttle to be able to climb up smoothly. And then the inevitable happened – midway through the climb I lost momentum, and the tyres started kicking up dirt, forcing me to hit the brakes instantly. My instructor’s voice crackled on the radio again, asking me to simply step on the gas.

This wasn’t the easiest of things I did that day – picture yourself looking up at the skies from an expensive, luxury SUV that offers 252PS of power, holding the brakes on loose gravel and then being told to give it gas. Despite my apprehensions, I stepped on the throttle, and the Macan moved forward thanks to its strong performance and Hill Control, albeit with some wheelspin and momentary loss of traction. Once done, the Macan felt as unfazed as an athlete out on a stroll!

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The next hurdle was another steep decline, but immediately after a sharp left turn. So we were to descend the slope at an odd angle. And when the radio crackles with the information that the Macan hasn’t been tested for this, it isn’t exactly a confidence booster. Nonetheless we trudged on and as I put the SUV into the turn its weight shifted to the front due to the odd angle, causing the rear right wheel to get airborne, which had other passengers in the car let out a gasp.

The car made it down safely with a gingerly use of the brakes, which is when I let you a little sigh of relief myself. We were then taken to an off-road course, set up specifically for showcasing just what the SUVs are capable of. The first was a rumble strip – the idea was to let us experience how composed the car is even on these, and the strips weren’t able to unsettle us inside. The slush pit, despite the Macan not being tested for, was a piece of cake for the SUV.

Next up was a sprint. Oh yes. Here I was to keep the throttle pinned until I reached a red flag where I was required to brake hard. I lined up, the flag dropped and the throttle was pushed into the footwell. The car scurried ahead, thrusting me into my seatback, even as revs were built quickly, the turbocharged engine howling towards its redline of 6500rpm. Despite the dirt and loose gravel the Macan didn’t feel out of shape once, and accelerated relentlessly.  Within a few seconds we approached the red flag and I slammed the brakes. The large diameter rotors brought us to a complete halt a lot earlier than I anticipated, despite the loose gravel.

The only place it felt a bit out of its element was at the negative banking hurdle where the left wheels were on a banking and right wheels on the ground.
So essentially I was driving it propped on one side, constantly worried about turning it turtle. But instructions from the marshals coupled with feathering the throttle we made it out unscathed. I knew the Macan is an impressive tarmac scorcher, and I’m now convinced it is a capable off-roader too. It isn’t without reason that Porsche has become the brand is it, even when it comes to SUVs, let alone sportscars!