Payne: Cadillac goes big with CT5-V, its sexiest, fastest, techiest compact ever

[Bruce Nunnally]

Rebadged the Cadillac CT5 and re-sculpted with a handsome fastback, the 2020 Caddy brings the CTS’ mid-size proportions to the compact class. It even expands its wheelbase 1.5 inches to claim biggest class specs: biggest front seat, biggest back seat, biggest wheelbase.

Then CT5 goes bigger on value. Starting at just $37,900 with a turbo-4 under the hood, the CT5 not only undercuts the ol’ $45,000 CTS by a whopping 7 grand, it’s also 5 grand cheaper than the BMW 3-series. With those big headlines and Cadillac’s sculpted bod, CT5 should turn heads.

Read more: https://www.detroitnews.com/story/opinion/columnists/henry-payne/2020/04/02/review-2020-cadillac-ct-5-v-performance-sedan-test/2938007001/

[cdgrinci]

This review is all over the place:  price, better, less, BMW, M/B, Nissan Sentra, Model 3; I'm pretty savvy to a lot of performance models but this review is schizophrenic (just hard to find a clear path to what he is reviewing and what he is comparing it to).  I was already convinced that Cadillac is bringing a nice car to market in the "V", but comparing it the CTS-V (that has the Vette engine is out of line).  Rumor is that another "V" will be produced with an "8" (wouldn't the Blackwing be special) but that is all 'vapor-ware' at this point.  Perhaps my review of the review is nebulous as  well (but I'm not a published journalist so give me a bye on this post 😉).  

[Bruce Nunnally]

Because the CT5 ended up on Alpha platform instead of a short Omega, the Blackwing "doesn't fit" (doh).  The CT5-RV (really V) (or whatever) is expected to have the engine out of the CTS-V and the CT4-V the engine from the ATS-V now.  

This story that people came in to buy CTS-V's or ATS-V's but thought it had too much power/performance seems unbelievable to me.  Wouldn't those people just buy a platinum model or Premium Lux model instead?