Barrett Garese

On scaring one’s self shitless in a 556hp CTS-V Coupe.

In the past I’ve made no bones about my love of BMWs. I learned to drive on one and I think certain M models are as close to automotive perfection as one can find under 100 grand. There’s a balance to the overwhelming sensory overload, and a confidence that allows BMW drivers to know exactly where the car is, where the capabilities of the car allow it to be in a few moments, and then let you to put it there. Hitting an apex in an M-tuned BMW is a matter of seeing the apex and then wanting to - it really is that communicative.

So if I love BMWs so much why, exactly, did I find myself inside of a Cadillac dealership yesterday asking to test drive one of their newest and most egregiously “American” models, the CTS-V coupe? Simply put: I’ve been hearing over and over how it’s a better M3 than the M3.

Heresy.

I must drive it.

Now, I’m certainly not the “traditional” Cadillac target demographic (being that I’m still decades away from being AARP-eligible) but in the past few years, they’ve been making a play at the exact automotive space I inhabit: younger sports-luxury aficionados who value a well-built, fun car. So after trying and failing two different times to find a dealership with a CTS-V coupe in stock, I randomly swung into a dealership whose location sat equidistant to two errands, armed with some free time and willing girlfriend.

As it turned out, there was an idling CTS-V just outside the doors, sitting there for all the world to steal see. Pictures don’t really do justice to just how ridiculous the car looks in person. With the notable exception of the twin, center-mounted, cannon-sized exhaust pipes, the massive 20” wheels and tires, and the only-very-slightly-smaller-than-the-wheels brake discs, there doesn’t seem to be a single curved surface on the entire car. A huge bulge dominates the hood, as if the engine has tried and only barely failed to escape. Every part of the rear converges into a single crease, like an axe seen straight-on. Sitting there idling, it seemed…well, aggressive but not particularly impressive.

Nonetheless, “I’d like to test drive a CTS-V coupe,” I told Mac, a man who was exactly like my grandfather, had my grandfather been alive and much more willing to let me hoon around in his automobiles. “Of course you would,” Mac replied, a slight twinkle in his eye. The unstated implication was “don’t break it,” which was made slightly more specific when Mac let me know that the last test driver wanted to buy that exact car. But Mac, consummate professional that he was, gamely trotted out back to ensure that I had my fun before the soon-to-be owner checked for pre-purchase issues.

So with my girlfriend in the backseat and Mac on the passenger side, we settled into the jet black, 4000 pound beast and I set about arranging my mirrors to allow me to see anything aft of my shoulder-blades. The beltline felt like it came up to my neck, and the rear window was like a porthole to the outside world. But the seats hugged you in a forgiving manner and the engine purred - not growled, but purred - out in front.

About that engine… There are many reasons this car is being lauded to such a ridiculous degree, and one of the biggest comes down to a very simple number: 556. That’s the amount of horsepower they’ve crammed into pushing this two-ton beast. Five hundred and fifty-six ill-gotten horses, stolen from an unsuspecting Corvette before being supercharged and set loose upon the tires. And all it took to wrangle or wreck those horses was my ankle tilting my foot six inches in a single direction. Yee-haw.

At the moment they seemed fairly happy in that engine bay though, if a little eager to run. First things first though: backing the horse-sodden coupetank 100 feet out of the dealership and onto the road.

So high beltlines and WW2 bunker-esque sightlines revealed the first checkmark in the coupe’s con column. Even with the back-up camera projecting its fisheyed view of the world behind the coupe’s behind, it still felt a little like an airline pilot asking everyone to duck their heads so he could back the 7:45am LAX-Newark out of the gate.

“Don’t scratch the already-bought 70k coupe on an Escalade, you jackass,” I told myself. ”And don’t look like you’ve never driven a performance car either,” my ego interjected. Hush, you two; I’m trying to concentrate here.

With the side-mirrors cranked outward and alternating between the backup camera and looking over my own shoulder, I navigated the relatively drama-free affair with nary a touch to the gas petal. That’s the thing about an engine that additionally has 551 pound/feet of torque - it’s got idle covered. Hell, it’s probably got towing the aforementioned 767 at idle covered. Pulling the shifter down to drive, we started down the street.

A brief sidenote on transmissions: personally I’m transmission-neutral. I prefer manual but live in LA so an automatic does have its benefits. That being said, if I’ve never driven a specific model of car, I always - always - test drive an auto. I don’t want to spend the entire affair getting used to that specific car’s clutch take-up point and pedal effort and miss the details of the rest of the car. So I test drive an auto, and then try to find the best deal I can with a transmission-neutral attitude.

In the CTS-V, the auto isn’t some fancy duel-clutch affair, it’s a somewhat better-tuned, gear-selectable version of the familiar PRND automatic we’re all used to. Yes there are buttons on the back of the wheel that let you go up or down, and yes you can push the shifter to the right of D and do the same, but it’s nothing particularly new or exciting in the realm of speed and power management. Back to the drive.

Pulling out behind the dealership, the dynamics of the car were still a mystery, so I eased onto the go-fast pedal. Surprisingly there was no lurching or bucking from those broncos, just a smooth forward momentum that felt as at home in a Cadillac as it would in a mid-level 3 series. Tipping in a little further, it responded with the same amount of drama-free linear acceleration.

Interesting.

While Mac discussed the relative merits of the navigation system, I was feeling out the steering. A little overboosted, and way too light on the effort, but it tracked nicely and even felt nimble. Yes, I just said that a 4000+ pound car that I’d previously described as a “coupetank” felt “nimble.” Trust me, it surprised me too, but there’s no denying that the same slight directions that my BMW translated into inertia-destroying sideways movement elicited the same results here. A one-inch caress of the wheel and we changed lanes. No seeing or sawing necessary here, it tracked straight when needed, and turned quickly when asked.

The suspension was a surprise too. As is my test drive wont, I aimed for every crease, nook, cranny, rock, and small bug I could see ahead of me, just to get a sense of how the car can handle drama. Much to my surprise, the CST-V handled everything with aplomb. As many of you may well know, the major surface streets of the San Fernando Valley are well known for their driving prowess and excellent surfaces, so long as both of those phrases are intended to mean “filling-shattering brokenness.” But as I banged the 20” low-profile tires off of a small-ish intersection pothole, the car communicated the exact physics of what had just happened underneath me without forcing me to feel the harshness. It was like getting an email from a cousin that reads “Discharged from the hospital today, turns out it’s benign.” Full awareness of the situation, but not concern; exactly like my BMW.

Hmmm.

So it steers well, communicates well, and remains drama-free until asked - a couple points in the win column there. But about that engine…

“Let’s let you open the taps a little,” Mac asked, right on cue. “Two stoplights up, hang a right, find an opening, and punch it.” 

Oh Mac, you lovely, lovely man.

Keeping the car in auto, just to be safe(er), I did exactly as he said. Coming around the corner, I glanced down at the transmission indicator, which displayed a bright red “4.” Three inches of pedal travel later, it dropped to a “2,” the engine growled a few octaves higher, and two things happened simultaneously: The first was an immediate forward momentum the likes of which I’ve simply never felt before. It was what I imagine being kicked by a mule would feel like - one minute you’re in one location, and the next you’re not. The second was my girlfriend’s response to that acceleration: a squeak of surprise, slight indignation, and utter glee emanating from the back seat. A few dozen MPHs later, I back off before I rear-ended some unsuspecting Kia.

“Hehehe,” said Mac about two feet to my right, “it’s a fun car.”

“That was fun, let’s not do that again,” I hear, whispered through a smile behind me.

But there’s a problem with this: I’m hooked now. I’ve had that taste and I need more. It’s not enough to see the light, I need to see if I can touch the sun. Three miles later, I decide to do it again, this time without Mac or anyone else’s permission. Coming up on a red light, I’m alone in the right-hand lane with a couple cars to my left. 50 feet away from the crosswalk, the light turns green. I set my jaw, click off three ticks to the left-mounted steering wheel button - bringing the transmission down to first gear - and bury the pedal 3/4 of the way down to the floor. Your move, CTS-V.

But then word comes back up to me through the system: “Bad move Barrett; now you’ve made me angry.”

The gods shrieked down upon me in fury, or that’s what I remember hearing as light bent around the front of the car the same way it does when the Enterprise decides to go explore that distress beacon. The CTS-V allowed the slightest moment of hesitation as it prepped itself, went through its preflight checklist, dug in, and then hit the big, red “Fuck You” button.

Simply put, I’ve never, ever felt anything that accelerated with the kind of quantum warp feelings that this car does. It simply rearranges your understanding of immediacy and velocity. Less than one second later, I’ve bounced Mac’s skull off the Recaro seats, hit 4500 RPM, travled a hundred yards or so, and absolutely scared the shit out of myself to the point where I have to pull off the throttle completely. I glance down at the tach as I do so, and see that I’ve still got another 2500 RPM before the redline. 20 to 60 in about a second, at partial throttle.

Holy fuck.

“Thanks, you just broke my head,” Mac genially jokes. I get the sense this isn’t the first time someone’s taken a bit of liberty when it comes to his personal safety. He’s smiling though, his expression offset by my own sheepish grin. I don’t dare look back towards Beth, more out of fear of the car than her. We trundle back to the dealership, with me not daring to poke the sleeping dragon again along the way.

After a nice parting chat with Mac, we walk back towards my car, and I ask Beth what she thinks. Surprisingly, her response is to giggle a bit, letting me know that despite her predispositions she actually liked it. I call her on it too, to which she replies that if I buy it, she’s nicknaming it “The Beast.”

“Because of the way that it looks, the way it sounds, or the engine?”

“Everything.”

And she’s absolutely right, it is a beast. A beast in a tuxedo, but a beast nonetheless. A day later though, I’m thinking a new nickname is in order, because for all its Doctor Jekyll-like upper-class luxury tendencies around town, it’s got 556 little Mr. Hyde’s lurking, waiting, and ready to burst free at a moment’s notice.

And that’s the thing: that on-demand Jekyll/Hyde differentiation is always what made the BMW M’s so special. They’re the business casual of automobiles - sports jacket when you want it, but leather jacket when you don’t. That balance - that on-demand, free-flowing tap of fun and whimsy, hidden in the back of the company Christmas party - is what made the M3 the perfect car for those of us who still think from time to time that we’re just “playing adult.” Instant kid, just add right foot. And that’s the same ballgame the CTS-V coupe is trying to play.

I don’t know if it’s ready for that league though, as 24 hours after the drive, I still don’t know whether I want a CTS-V for anything longer than an afternoon. For all the things it does right, there’s just as much it does wrong. It’s the most “American” automobile I’ve ever driven in that the excesses are accentuated to a ridiculous degree, and its faults are both directly related to those excesses, and simultaneously hidden away in the hopes that they’ll be forgotten.

The engine is just plain bonkers, as are the brakes - slamming to a stop in this thing must feel like hitting a freight train head-on. It’s got style in spades and the interior is luxurious without hinting at bling. But the engine and style force you to notice how difficult it is to see anything not directly in front of you, and the steering and very slick  magnetorheological suspension (meaning magnetic fluid inside of the dampers allows a computer to control how hard or soft the suspension is, based on driving conditions) can’t help but remind you that the whole car’s got to really work behind the scenes to hide a weight that can be measured in whole number multiples of Volkswagen Beetles. Coupled with all of that is that if city driving revealed anything, it’s that trying to hit apex in this car would be like trying horseback archery - possible, but only with an overall skill and familiarity with the mount that few possess.

There’s a definite passion there, and in many ways that’s the biggest pro a car can have, but it’s mitigated by its own nature to only worry about moving forward as quickly as possible and not concern itself with anything in the past. In the end, it feels like a roller coaster - awesome to experience for a short period of time, but exhausting as well. Even for someone who values automotive adrenaline injections as much as I do, I think there comes a time when you reach the point of “too much for its intended purpose.” Maybe that’s the true achievement of the CTS-V coupe - revealing that exact point of “too much.”

Though, with that being said, maybe I need another test drive…just to be sure.