Monterey, California—Laguna Seca’s fabled Corkscrew is one of the most challenging sections of racetrack in the world. It’s approached via a long climbing sequence of challenging corners, culminating in a crest over which one brakes—blind—before plunging eleven stories, heart-in-mouth, in a few hundred meters.

It is telling that Cadillac used it to demonstrate the prowess of the CTS’s Nurburgring-honed chassis, where its benign yet adjustable balance and incredible composure were obvious. Pressed to—and beyond—the limit, the CTS displays commendable reserves of grace: it will willingly rotate in either slow hairpins or fast sweepers, yet never does it bite. Partially this is because the Cadillac’s wide-track chassis is so resistant to roll, dive, and squat.

Another key part of its complementary nature is down to the wonderfully transparent and feelsome steering (courtesy of ZF); it has no on-center deadness, and its weighting and precision are a match for anything from the Fatherland. The brakes show no inclination for fade, and offer a level of initial bite and degree of transparency and modulation that is above reproach.

Translated to the street, these traits mean that the sports-suspended CTS need fear nothing from rivals in terms of outright pace or prowess. It never succumbs to overt crashiness or lateral head-toss, and resists pogoing on the coastal state’s choppy concrete freeways.

That said, the more supple mid-level FE2 suspension is the better option for all but the most committed pilots, adding a degree of edge-chamfering charm without sacrificing much in the way of control. Even the base chassis tuning will be considered extremely athletic by traditionalists.

The car’s engine options include carry-over 2.8 and 3.6-liter sixes. The larger unit pumps out a healthy 263hp and 253lbs-ft of torque, but sadly it sounds harsh and unrefined. Better to spend the very modest premium for the direct injection version, whose extra 20lbs-ft and 304hp total make a discernable difference to the alacrity with which the Cadillac picks up its skirts, while sounding much better in the process.

The engines can be coupled to a brace of new six-speed transmissions: the manual is expected to account for around five percent of CTS sales Stateside. This isn’t surpising in light of the excellence of the 6L50 automatic. It offers all the smoothness owners will be expecting in a Cadillac, along with a level of driver involvement—thanks to its brilliant Sport mode programming and available manumatic operation—that makes a clutch seem fairly redundant.

The CTS boasts the finest interior ever from GM. That’s not damning with faint praise, for while we might wish that a few more pennies had been spent on some of the moldings hidden in the shadows, the combination of original dash architecture (swathed in French stitched, cut-and-sew material), clear control layout, intuitive interface for the navigation and hardrive-based Bose surround-sound, and perfectly tunable ergonomics leave little to be desired.

It also perfectly compliments one of the CTS’s strongest assets: its exterior styling. A natural maturation of the 1st generation car’s angular aggression, it offers more elegance yet still manages to pump up the visual muscle via a very confident grill and strongly sculptured fender forms. Combined with the Cadillac’s newfound dynamic strengths, it suggests a truly competitive player in the class.

CADILLAC CTS 3.6 DI
Price: $
Engine: 3.6-liter V6,
304hp @ 6300rpm
273lbs-ft @ 5200rpm
Transmission: Six-speed auto, rear-wheel drive
Performance: 5.9 sec 0-100kph (mfg)
On sale in the ME:

RATING *** ½
Visual brashness with dynamics to match

THIS ORIGINALLY APPEARED IN CAR MAGAZINE’S MIDDLE EAST EDITION

THE MORNING AFTER: 2008 CADILLAC CTS

About a month after the Cadillac launch, I had a week with the CTS. This is where it really cemented itself as a wonderfully fulfilling real world performance sedan.

On familiar roads it showed exceptional deportment in the ride/handling compromise, and a level of refinement and polish that were wonderful at the end of a long day.

The Cadillac’s technology and ‘labor saving’ devices are actually useful. Being able to use remote start to cool the car on a warm day is a godsend, as are the very effective cooled seats.

The user interface—touch screen or control mouse—is intuitive, and the nav system is one of the only ones I might spend my own money on. Utilizing real-time traffic updating, I was able to plan routes to avoid tie-ups, and the graphics were the best I’ve yet seen.

As an audiophile, I tire of the boasts of OEMs about their in-car entertainment. While the CTS’s Bose system didn’t entirely blow me away—Lexus’ Mark Levinson and BMW’s Harman Kardon are still the standard bearers in the price range—its hard drive was easy to use, and didn’t degradate the sound to any degree whatsoever. Now they just need to ad Hi Def Radio, which makes a mockery of the crap Sirius and XM serve up.

Other little touches, like a driver’s seat and wheel that move to ease ingress and egress, only bolster the case for dropping one’s own coin.

Demerits include a back seat that’s spacious, but has a cushion set too low for optimum comfort, and some sub par plastic moldings that bespeak cost cutting. The DI engine is a bit harsh in the upper registers, and the shift mapping isn’t as good as BMW and Infiniti.

On balance, though, the Cadillac has to rank a close second to the BMW 335i, and the CTS V-series looks set to demolish the M5 as an ownership proposition, at least for yours truly, living in the Mile High City.

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