Why the glum B&W pics? Have some Interlagos Blue (taken during the July day trip that I had the privilege of chasing my friend’s Z4M Coupe for ~500km):

Oh? So it wasn’t you that bought the 20mm Oerlikon?

For one, it is ~4300lbs when I weighed it at Mission Raceway’s dragstrip. Yes, it has lots of torque at idle, but that is a lot of mass to get going.

In the early 2000s I got hooked onto Best Motoring and their “track battles”, where sporty-but-ordinary cars duke it out on actual race tracks with the show’s roster of JGTC drivers behind the wheels.

I did eventually managed to trade in my 2011 E90 M3 7M-DCT for a 2013 Cadillac CTS-V2 6MT, but yeah after 5x BMWs, the GM dealership experience left a few things to be desired.

Aye. Mine next to my brother-in-law’s R8 V10, for size comparison. It was a family-friendly trip and his is obviously not a family-friendly car, so mine was useful.

GM V Platform (Holden Commodore VB -> VZ)

This.

It is Raceseng’s “Gate 2" shift gate engraving. You get to the Reverse gear in the Tremec TR6060 by going “right-and-forward”, and the R is done with Raceseng’s logo: http://www.raceseng.com/ashiko-texture-gate-2-cadillac-cts-v-shifter-arm

Give me this or give me... well, you get the idea.

Yeah. It is also MY CAR. Just saying that with proper trim level (“Ebony” + Midnight Sapele Wood trim + gloss “piano black” center console only available in the V2s) it is alright. This is coming from a guy who had 5x BMW 3ers, up to a 2011 E90 M3.

Black hides a lot of faults....

LF4: 464bhp / 445ft.lb.

Updated:

Here are all the times, on a single trip and on a single road, that I thought I ought to downshift, but then didn’t bother:

I came from 5x BMW 3ers, usually trading in every 3-4 years.

My 1st manual-transmission car: BMW E46 330i ZHP. Stalled it, leaving the dealership, at an uphill section of a pretty major thoroughfare, blocking traffic for two consecutive green lights, until the lady driver behind me came up and suggested that my brother-in-law take over. We got home, and I spent that night going…

looking back I have no regrets on that decision

In BC, Canada (and I’m sure in quite a few places throughout US and Canada, if not the majority), the buyer buying from the dealership only pays the sales tax on the difference of the sales price minus the trade-in value.

The Natural History Unit (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_Natural_History_Unit_filmography) is the BBC’s (and by extension, UK TV License payer’s) treasure, and Amazon may not have it. >:-(