Given all the praise heaped on the BMW 3 Series over the years, we can't blame you for thinking there's more to the story. We've heard all the conspiracy theories, most of them involving checks in large denominations from Munich.

This might seem believable to a certain segment of the population, but there's a far less interesting truth behind all those wins: The BMW was the best car. Sure, certain rivals often upped their game in one area or another, but the 3 Series always put it all together in a way that made it better.

So now the 2010 Audi S4 is here to take another shot. It's all-new this year and the old V8 is gone. There's now a supercharged V6 in its place, along with a lower price designed to better align the S4 with the BMW 335i.

The BMW 3 Series received a face-lift of its own last year. It was mostly minor trim changes and the like, but we're told that iDrive thing was tweaked again, too (oh, lovely).

Sounds like a fair fight, no?