Video: 2016 Cadillac ATS-V - First Look

Obviously it's based on the ATS, which is a good pedigree, being one of Cadillac's most balanced cars in terms of dynamics. Let's see what the brand cooked up here with the new ATS-V. Let's start with the good stuff under the hood. Now, Cadillac fans should be familiar with the brand's 3.6 liter twin turbo V6 engine. It's in V sport versions of the CTS and the XTS sedans. Here, it makes 455 horsepower, 445 pounds feet of torque made into either an eight speed automatic or, nice to see, a six speed manual transmission. With the ATS's lightweight chassis, Cadillac says zero to 60 in the ATS-V happens in just 3.9 seconds. Now atop that engine is a carbon fiber hood with a functional air extractor here. This brings hot air out of the engine bay. Cadillac also says it reduces lift. Speaking of air, all of these areas around here are actually open. None of them are kind of fake and for show. Cadillac even says the mesh pattern here has been enlarged to allow more air all coming in to cool that engine bay. There's an available track aero package with even more down force. Also an available carbon fiber package, which this car here at the auto show has. A carbon fiber front splitter here. More carbon fiber around the hood extractors. Now wheels and tires. You've got 18s up front, 19s in back. 255 millimeter wide front tires. 275 millimeter wide rear tires. Those are 20 millimeters wider than the widest rear tires you can get on a non V version of the ATS. Now, the suspension has different spring rates. It's got stiffer stabilizer bars, stiffer bushings. It's actually got a thicker drive shaft with a different driver's side half shaft. Now Cadillac says that's to actually improve wheel hop to create less of it when you're accelerating real hard. Let's take a look at the inside. The interior has plenty of Cadillac sort of cut and sewn stitched areas. It's also got Recaro sports seats. They're pretty high performance it seems like, from the feel of this car at the auto show. They seem like they'd hold you in pretty well. Well obviously you have to get the car out on a test track to do that. Now, as far as manual transmissions in sports kind of luxury cars go, we're not huge fans of the bulky unit in the regular ATS. The ATS-V here, by the feel of this car at the auto show, seems to still have longer throws, but they're a little bit crisper, a little bit more defined. Again, we'll have to try this out in the real world to report more on it. Now, there is an available performance data recorder, Cadillac says. That's like on the Chevrolet Corvette. Chevy and Cadillac, both General Motors brands. Which means you can go out on a track or on regular roads and actually drive around and then it'll record it. And you can show that to your friends. You can put it up on Twitter or Facebook. Not while you're driving though. The ATS-V faces stiff competition from established German luxury sedans, particularly BMW's M3 and M4, both recently redesigned. So it all comes down to how well this car drives. We won't know that until closer to the car's on sale date, which is sometime after production begins in spring 2015. (engine revving)