Thanks again! While I will probably never drive the vehicle aggressively, and cannot even imagine taking it to redline, I have noticed (somewhat) your comments about gradients. I have also noticed the coast factor. My experimenting is looking for a compromise between enjoying the vehicle's abilities (been very gentle as she is so new) and looking to find driving styles that will help me reach towards better MPGs. I just didn't/don't know anything about BMWs (my first - obviously) and this is also my first adaptive.

FWIW, another thing I HAVE noticed, that I haven't yet seen posted in any of the three forums I monitor, and don't see in the manual, is the cruise lever pull-back (decelerate) applies brakes when pulled past the resistance point. Clearly, I have no idea if this is new for 2010 or not but if you are on cruise and gently pull the cruise lever back (incremental deceleration), the vehicle coasts down in speed. If you move the lever up or down (turns cc off), the vehicle coasts. If you pull the lever back past the resistance point - brakes are applied for rapid deceleration. Surprised the hell out of me the first time it happened. If I hadn't been accustomed to a car applying its own brakes (my G had distance laser guided cruise control and if I got too close to a car in front of me the G would apply brakes), I would have really been kind of freaked when the X did it.

One more Q: does SD (manually) shifting impact the adaptive drive? I am not asking about redline aggressive, or even full throttle, but wondering what the adaptive "learns" from D vs SD driving. And how I may be able to better 'teach" it towards that downshift while braking. If I just need to wait until after 1200 miles or so and then drive it a bit more aggressively of if I could possible help it "learn" using SD shifting (seems like this might be a more gentle way to "teach" it).

Thanks again!