If you're optioning your new sports car with carbon ceramic brakes for higher performance and longer wear, you may be ticking the wrong option boxes. That surprising revelation comes from Porsche Australia's technical representative Paul Watson, in an interview with the Australian motoring publication Which Car.

Watson sheepishly admits that when Porsche first brought carbon ceramic brakes to market, they advertised them as lasting the lifetime of the car – before quickly being proven wrong by owners who used their cars as intended.

There is an undeniable performance benefit to carbon ceramic brakes, though. The substantial reduction in unsprung weight can definitely impact lap times for the better. With that said, don't expect your brakes to last particularly long if you're taking it to the track for some weekend fun.

“Yes, ceramic discs can degrade if you’re hard on the brakes. Heat build-up will degrade the carbon fibers in the disc, so if you’re doing club days we’d always recommend iron discs,” said Watson.

Understandably, we're a bit shocked, and we'd imagine that the Which Car interviewer felt the same way. It left us wondering what the actual intended use of the carbon ceramic brakes were in the first place. Who is the target customer for Porsche's famed PCCB option? Apparently, Which Car felt the same way, as that was their follow-up question.

“People who don’t like cleaning their wheels,” said Watson. “They don’t leave a build-up of brake dust, so that’s an advantage.”

It's pretty clear that Watson himself is likely not a fan of carbon ceramic brakes.With this new information, more or less straight from the source, we can certainly understand why.

Porsche has built their reputation on taking their products racing – and winning. While high-performance developments that improve lap times usually make roadgoing sports cars better, it seems that carbon ceramic brakes are not one of them.