After decades of decay, Cadillac began a transformation in the waning years of the last century that would allow the brand to compete against modern luxury brands. Decrepit beasts like the late Eldorado and Seville were euthanized and, while the decision to switch mostly to alpha-numeric naming was dubious, Cadillac finally started creating cars that could compete directly with the best from Europe and Japan, and the first generation CTS was one of them.

 In spite of this progress, the Germans still had something Cadillac lacked, namely AMG, M and RS models. So Cadillac devised the V-Series, the first of which was the 2004 CTS-V. Just as BMW does with the M3 and M5, Audi with the RS4 and RS6 and Mercedes with innumerable AMGs, the CTS-V had a bigger, more powerful engine; beefier brakes and tires; a suspension to match and an upgraded interior. This, however, is an arms race that has yet to subsie in spite of ever higher fuel prices. With BMW, Mercedes and Audi now offering even more powerful engines, Cadillac has stepped up to the plate with an all-new CTS-V and we had a chance to drive it at the even newer Monticello Motor Club in New York. With a new supercharged LSA engine closely related to the LS9 in the Corvette ZR1, the CTS-V makes some big promises. Read on after the jump to see if it delivers. Continued

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While Cadillac busies itself with a 2-door version of the new CTS sedan, the folks over at Coach Builders, Ltd have been busy taking their tops off. The boulevardier CTS gets an insulated, hydraulically-powered roof fitted with a heated glass rear window and cloth headliner. The top also comes in several colors. Judging by this pic, it also looks like a fair bit of work has gone into making the car look good with the top down. No word on what happens to trunk space, however.

It’ll cost you more than a few quarters — $19,000 gets the job done in eight weeks — but that’s the price of exclusivity, right? It’s also employs a manual release, but these things happen when you’re a style pioneer. We’d like to see pics of the car with the top up, because we wonder if this could be the first cloth-topped Caddy truly fit for the younger set.

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When the Cadillac CTS-V and Corvette ZR1 were introduced in Detroit, they both had nice, round horsepower figures that look good in a press release. Last week, GM restated the output of the ZR1, raising it from 620 ponies to 638, which is an increase of about 3%. Cadillac admits that they didn’t want to overstate the final horsepower figure for the CTS-V either, so we’re likely to see a similar press release from GM’s luxury division in the near future. Given the fact that the 550 hp figure for the top CTS was likely a lowball figure, Inside Line used the same 3% understatement from the ZR1 to peg the CTS-V’s real horsepower number at 567.

While Inside Line’s 567-hp hypothesis was based on the fact that the CTS-V has the same basic engine as the ZR1, 567 is nothing more than a well-placed dart on the horsepower pinwheel. When we talked with GM’s Ron Meegan, he pointed out that there were several differences between the two powerplants, including the length of the rotors in the Eaton Supercharger. While adding 3% to 550 sounds logical, there is likely more to it than that. But as is the case when making a guess, they may actually be right, too. Whether the final output is 550 or 567 hp or somewhere in between really doesn’t matter, as anything in the 550 range represents an absolutely ludicrous tally that will surely catapult the CTS-V to the stratosphere of sports sedans. We can’t wait to take one for a spin.

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