Yes ABSOLUTELY. I feel you have to get a revvy first gear 'out of the way' before normal power is delivered.
I, too, initially thought it might be some kind of electronic safeguard that might be programmed to gradually reduce when the car has done a few more miles. (You know crankcase bearing recall etc...these might have been the wrong parts that were fitted, tho'...)
Coming straight from a '14 R56 and more than a little concerned I made an appointment and took my new June '17 build F56 back to the MINI dealer after 500mls of embarrassment that other motorists were regularly climbing all over me at the usual traffic lights and lane changes (2 actually hooted in frustration during this time!) after reading than a forummer might have secured an ecu reprogram for something similar. At the garage a senior adviser assured me that it would loosen up in another 3000mls and told that I wasn't driving it correctly or hard enough. He asked me to show him how I drive (I felt deflated like a schoolkid), took over, 'showed me how', smoked the tyres, screamed the engine and made a similar lack of progress - which left me quite unimpressed.
I'm currently on 2300mls and driving around this 'weakness'. Nothing seems to be changing apart from becoming convinced that first gear acts like it is very poorly matched to the rest of the 'box, there might be a traction control glitch or reprogram (let's face it you can program any ecu to do 'stuff'- remember VW's embarrassment?) and my 6-speed manual has 5 useful gears and one seemingly sourced from a dustcart...
It's the one thing that spoils my enjoyment of a car that I initially resisted changing to 'cos my R56 seemed finally 'sorted'.
