Another towing ?

[tetice]

A couple of questions on towing with a 4.4 vs 3.0 manual.

I really like straight drive vehicles and wish my X5 were a straight drive. I currently have an '02 4.4 and tow a race car on an open trailer approaching 5000 lbs. It does great but I'd like to move to a newer 3.0l with a 6 speed manual. I have tried a friends '01 3.0l 5 sp manual pulling my rig and on normal (non mountain) roads it was fine and I think I could live with this.

My '02 is pretty much loaded with everything including sport pkg and the auto leveling rear suspension. I have serious doubts that I can find a 3.0 with the auto leveling rear suspension on anything other than a '01 where it was included with the sport package. So the question is how big of a deal is the autoleveling suspension for towing. I may be spoiled and taking this feature for granted since I only have towing experience with it. Secondly, I find the sport package to be a bit bouncy around town and have driven some non sport pkg X5s that seem more well behaved in non towing situations. Again, I have never towed with anything other than the sport package so I'm in a poor position to judge how much the sport pkg is contributing to the fine towing qualities that I'm currently experiencing.

Any thoughts and/or experiences would be appreciated.

TIA,
Tom

'98 M3/4
'02 X5 4.4
'02 325iT
'93 325iS SPEC E36 Race Car