Throwing Down the Gauntlet: The 'Maximum Bob' Lutz Cadillac CTS-V Challenge

By Rich Truesdell

Automotive Traveler

GM’s Bob Lutz is staking the Cadillac CTS-V against all-comers as part of General Motors “May the Best Car Win” advertising challenge. Automotive Traveler is up to the challenge and takes him up on his offer (as does Jalopnik, The Truth About Cars, Autoblog, and others!)

The Cadillac CTS is in the opinion of this reviewer, a world-class luxury car, a clear case where GM set the development bar high against its intended competition, and in most regards, exceeded expectations. Clearly, offering a class-competitive entry closer in size and power to a BMW 5 Series while priced closer to a 3 Series was a smart positioning move. This was followed by the introduction of the mammothly-powered CTS-V, with a 556-horsepower engine that would set at the time a production sedan lap record at the Nürburgring of 7:59:32 (anything under eight minutes is damn fast). The CTS-V clearly had the BMW M5 in its crosshairs and its time to tell the automotive world that America had finally came to play with the big dogs. Now, how to get this message across? Thus the CTS-V Challenge at the Monticello Motor Club 90 miles north of New York City. If GM invites us to the party where we plan to show up in a 2009 Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT8. Read more about our challenge, and the course layout at Automotive Traveler.