[Sil3nt611]

Bottom line, ... shift where YOU feel comfortable. based on road and weather and traffic conditions.... unless you are trying to optimize fuel economy, in which case, ... Why buy one of these cars?

Exactly. There's no set place that you must shift. Just shift when you feel you should shift or when you want to. It's all in getting the feel for it. It takes a bit to get used to driving a different manual transmission even if you've previously driven some before. I'm pretty good at driving my car with a manual, and going from my car to the Fiesta ST test drive cars was easy, but I wasn't perfect at it. It just takes a bit to get used to the feel. Once you get the feel you'll get the shifting down right.