Today we took the afternoon off from work to help support our Olympic Team. By driving in the new BMW 3 Series, and a couple of its competitors, a Lexus IS250 and a Mercedes-Benz C250* BMW donated $10 for each of us to the US Olympic Team. Now, all these cars were optioned out so that their list price was about 190% of the cost of our much larger Purple Whale, so the fit, finish and interior quietness of them were also nearly twice as fine. Even though they were still more the size we would have liked to have bought when we were shopping last year, their cost kept them off the list.
*The Audi A4 was missing because they didn’t get enough pre-registered drivers to bring out every car.
The driving course was an abbreviation of the Susan Komen loop we used to drive and at only 6 miles long didn’t give a chance to wring the cars out and get real familiar with them, so all I have are little snippets of positives and/or negatives about each.
We first drove the IS250 and as it turned out it was the car we liked the most. We both loved the seats, very comfortable. The navigation screen was large and where it should be, right in the upper portion of the center stack. Nit picks were window, mirror and lock switches were placed awkwardly forward on down on the driver’s door. Back seat legroom was the smallest of the group.
Next we drove the MB C250. This was our least favorite of the group. The seats were hard and flat and Donna never did feel comfortable. Very Teutonic styling inside and out, so not really to our tastes. The only real plus was the turbo motor kicked butt when pushed, but the lag made it show up long after you wanted the giddy-up.
Lastly we drove the 3 Series and this was the Momma Bear of the group. Driver ergonomics were top notch and this is the one I would pick for driving (the IS250 would be the cruising choice.) The exterior is traditional BMW, pleasing, but the interior is not to our liking really (the faux wood interior accents were cheap and had an unnatural waviness.) Plus, I have complained about this in previous BMW drives, but today it seems worse than I remember, the linearity of the electronic throttle was awful, it almost felt like the Mercedes’s turbo lag.
All in all it was a pleasant way to kill a couple hours and we each got a nice little BMW ball cap (well, really I got two caps, because Donna doesn’t wear hats.)
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