Comedian and dyed-in-the-wool car guy Jay Leno got his first shot at the 2022 Cadillac CT5-V Blackwing on his Youtube/CNBC program, Jay Leno's Garage. He calls it a great American road car and marvels that in 2022 you can't get a manual from Ferrari or Lamborghini, but you can get one from Caddy.

Leno gets Cadillac chief engineer Tony Roma to join the fun and talk about the newest entry into the performance sedan market. The pair discusses the Corvette-sourced engine and what it took to get the money guys at Cadillac to sign off on a manual transmission. It takes more engineering and more money for certification. Roma even notes that a full 50% of buyers have specced the manual on the new CT5-V Blackwing.

The CT5-V Blackwing comes with Chevy's LT4 V8 producing 668 hp and 659 lb-ft of torque, allowing it to shoot from 0-60 mph in only 3.7 seconds with the available automatic transmission (though we still say take the manual). It's capable of reaching a top speed in excess of 200 mph.

It uses the biggest brakes ever fitted to a Cadillac, from legendary brand Brembo. Those carbon ceramic discs will cost you a pretty penny, though. They also talk about the performance data recorder camera that is normally used for recording lap times, but it also has a valet function that can record what happens when you hand the keys over. Leno notes that you can go online and look at the horrible things they do to our cars.

Cadillac engineered the "Corvette" engine specifically for Cadillac. In addition to the added power, the company had to tune for smoothness and quietness. It has to feel like a Caddy. That also means that things that look like carbon fiber are carbon fiber and things that look like metal are metal. No cheap imitations here.

At about 17 minutes Leno and Roma go for a ride, and as you would expect Jay is enamored with the power and handling as well as the sound. They discuss the future of the hobby and the future of fuels, with Leno remarking that the market is similar to what it was in the early 1900s when it didn't know if steam, electricity, or gasoline would be powering the vehicles of the future. And that's the kind of insight you can only get from a historian like Leno.