well my homeboy just bought a brand new s2000..this is a bad ass car..i loved it till he said "if i ever raced you tell me how my tail light looks from 10ft"i got mad but then again i was a little scared..i mean this was a ROADSTER..well one day we came back 3 in the morning from a party..he pulled up beside me and down shifted a few times to pick a race with me..i wasnt gonna back down..we were neck to neck when i agreed by pointing fowaRD..at 60mph i pushed my 2001 stock c320 for what it was worth..i looked to the sides but didnt see him...i was still flooring it till i noticed i was going 125mph..when i last look at him he was about 5 to 6 car legnths away..very surprised but took one for the team..smoked a 2002 s2000..
The C has a lot more torque and, reaches it at 3k v 7.5k rpms. More than enough to move the C's ~800 extra pounds apparently. Probably has more hp at the relevant rpms too.
A better match is BMW's 330i. The BMW should shine off the line because its crankshaft is not weighted. However, the C will handle it at the mid range and walk away pretty easily in mid to top performance, e.g., 40 to 60 or higher, as when passing, because the the C320 reaches a higher torque sooner on the rpm curve, and holds its max torque longer, giving the C the edge to beat the smaller cc's and variable valve timing (possibly even higher compression) of the 330 engine (if I remember correctly, BMW's 330 is actually about 3 liters v. C's 3.2l).
Linear Mode
