Ray Ho – 01/27/2018

“Pardon me, would you have any Grey Poupon?”  This is what I felt like saying to the guy in the backseat of a Rolls Royce pulled up next to me. Except that I wasn’t seating at the backseat of my own Rolls Royce and there was no car next to me.  No. I don’t need medications.  Somehow, seating in the back of a parked 2017 BMW Alpina B7 xDrive in an empty parking lot during a recent test drive brought back memory of the 80s Greg Poupon commercial.

The 2017 BMW Alpina B7 is the ultimate luxury performance. This beauty in Blue Metallic commands a whooping suggested retail price of $137K.  Options such as the Tartufo Full Merino Leather, driver assistance packages, 21” Alpina wheels, Bowers & Wilkins sound systems, etc, pushed the as tested price to almost $154K.

 

 

The Alpina B7 comes with several drive modes; Personal, Sport+, Sport, Standard, ECO and Snow.  The instrument gauge is full LCD and changes per the drive mode.  I don’t particular care that LCDs are slowly replacing analog gauges, but the one in this BMW is more than acceptable.  Speaking of LCD, the BMW Display Key is also equipped with an LCD color touchscreen.  Besides the locking/unlock plus other standard keyfab functions, thru BMW’s connected app, you can access features from monitoring the vehicle status to remote park the car.  If you care, it gets an EPA estimate of 18MPG combined.

 

 

Needless to say, the interior is impeccable.  The messaging backseats are power adjustable, elevated (stadium seating) and feels roomy with plenty of leg room.

 

 

As good as seating in the back feels, I would much rather be the driver. The biggest impression on me is this stealthy big sedan has incredible amount of power.  Its 4.4-liter, Bi-Turbo V8, 32-valve engine cranks out 600 horses.  Flooring the accelerator launches the car like a cruise missile, reaching 60 mph from rest in 3.6 seconds. The steering is light yet communicative.  The front seats are very supportive and comfortable.  The cars feels very composed at high speed.  It drives like a much smaller car, almost like a bigger F-Type.  All thru the test drive, I could not get “Grey Poupon” out of my head.  Funny thing is that I don’t even like mustard.

 

 

I can definitely see myself in one of this when I grow up.  Then again, if I think I can afford this, even in the future, maybe I should be on medication.