The racetrack is the 2015 BMW M3's

I met up with Road & Track's own Sam Smith and Robin Warner at Mid-Ohio, my home track for club races and a place where two of the Armco barriers in “Thunder Valley” have my name on the purchase order. Sam was there to drive a real unicorn—a genuine Hartge-built Group A racing E30 M3. Robin and I were there to hold Sam's helmet and make sure that we got performance numbers on both the E30 and a brand-new F80-generation M3 that BMW was providing for comparison purposes. Near the end of the day, I had the chance to take the F80 around the entirely deserted circuit and get some driving impressions of this very fast and capable sedan.

Upon its introduction several years ago, the outgoing E90/E92 M3 was criticized for its size, weight, and nontraditional powerplant. This, by the way, has happened to every one of the previous four generations of M3 sold in this country. The initial buzz is always semi-negative; I remember working for a BMW dealership in 1989 and listening to the salespeople gripe about how the now-iconic M3 was a slug in real-world driving compared to the much cheaper 325i. The E36 M3 was slagged-off for having a low-power US-market engine. The E46 M3 was big, heavy, complex, and delicate. The E90 M3 was a V8, which seemed completely sacrilegious to everybody who didn't remember the PTG E46 racers.

"It really has more of a Corvette balance than a Mustang one. "

Now that we're all used to how brilliant the outgoing M3 is, BMW's decided to return to a straight-six, this time with a relatively small displacement (three liters) and twin turbochargers. The redline's down, but torque and power are both up, with a rather improbable 406 lb-ft torque plateau from 1200 to 5000 rpm. That engine makes its home in an M3 sedan that is physically larger but also usefully lighter. More power? Less weight? Sign me up.

First impressions of the M3 are, frankly, mixed. This is getting to be a fairly large car; just a few months ago, I was in a LeMons race driving an E34 525i that is almost exactly the same size as this 3er. Although the hard-backed seats and self-consciously chunky steering wheel are deliberately sporting, the rest of the F80's interior has more in common with a modern BMW SUV than it does with the driver-focused E21 or E30. The fact that this particular M3 has the M-DCT self-shifting transmission doesn't help matters.

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Ditulis oleh Yeye pada tanggal Sunday, October 19, 2014