ePinion: BMW builds last ever M3
9 July, 2013 | by topgear
Lance Branquinho
http://www.topgear.co.za/news/epinion-bm...t-ever-m3/
![[Image: 3ca8d617-0af9-4963-8772-92f95095c5ff.jpg]]()
![[Image: b3f3c8d2-153a-4edc-beed-f958ebc278ad.jpg]]()
![[Image: 6a307c7f-e12b-4eb3-a991-49ee9504189a.jpg]]()
Last week two rather important events occurred, involving car brands.
In the suburbs of Munich an orange E92 BMW became the very last M3 ever assembled. Sad, but inevitable. A day or so later, in the mountainous Cape winelands, VW revealed its Golf7 GTi to the South African media. A comparatively happier occasion. Well, you’d think so, but you would be wrong.
See, if you polled the online forums and collated comments, the assembly of BMW’s last M3 was an event tantamount to an automotive apocalypse. Logically, we all know BMW’s forthcoming M4 will be brilliant, as has each evolution of M3 from the first to the last, but petrolheads have this bizarre notion that the last version of anything is always the best and any incumbent is a marketing fraud. Illogical, but true.
I remember when BMW’s E92 was launched way back in 2007. How the brand fanboys complained that its V8 engine was a mockingly ‘un-M3-configuration’, how it was too heavy and had styling that looked too embellished with aftermarket trinkets. And now, in the fullness of time, the passing of E92 M3 is being made into legend. Somehow, that doesn’t really makes sense, now does it?
Is this a case of us being afraid to say goodbye to something or the fear of something new? Is E92 the loving family Labrador and new M4 the hipster couple that have moved in next door?
This veneration of E92 M3 as opposed to the venom reserved for its M4 replacement is rather bizarre, but nowhere as bizarre as the intolerance shown for VW’s new Golf7 GTi. This most successful of hot hatches, in its seventh incarnation, has been derided as being too slow, too underpowered, too glibly styled and too common. Too expensive too. Right, so by this logic the perfect product is all wrong. Better tell Apple that with regards to its iPhone/iPad/iPod range.
REMEMBERING GOLF6 GTi
Let’s go back in time, again, to the year 2008, when VW launched Golf6 GTi and Opel, Ford and all other hot hatch brand aligned petrolheads ridiculed it as being too underpowered, too familiar-looking to Golf5, too expensive and too common. Sounds familiar doesn’t it?
Now, as Golf7 GTi is introduced, its predecessor it suddenly elevated to hot hatch sainthood – the exact same car scorned for being a Golf5.5 GTi a few years back. Does this prove that car fans are a touch fickle at times?
I think it does. There is no logic to this all.
How is Golf7 GTi a bad car because it will undoubtedly be rampantly successful? That makes absolutely no sense.
Let us unpack the facts. Golf7 GTi’s impeccably refined; all things considered just simply the perfect hot hatchback: dynamic and agile when you want it to be; refined and effortless the rest of the time. What is not to be admired?
It will be the same formulaic state of affairs when BMW releases the full specification and images of its M4. Fanboys will accuse it of being too slow, too plain-looking, too turbocharged…But when the driving starts, it is sure to be another epic evolution of M-division engineering execution, just as all those other M3s were. Such as E92, now gracefully retired and assured of its legendary status. Something nobody would have believed back in 2008 when at first contact it was not believed to be quite the Audi B7 RS4 besting thing brand fans had hoped it would be.
You can authoritatively believe be the same when Golf7 GTi is replaced by the eight generation.
The lesson here? Look beyond the marketing and your own projections of Grand Turismo fantasy fallacies.
Cars evolve: they are vehicles (literally and figuratively) of technology. They won’t be naturally-aspirated or manual transmission driven indefinitely.
If something outsells everything else, such as Golf GTi does, it’s because of an inherent product quality and engineering excellence. Not discount pricing. It’s the Apple Inc business model and very few automotive brands are able to replicate it with their offerings. So when M3 and GTi manage to do that, don’t be jealous. It’s just so pithy.
9 July, 2013 | by topgear
Lance Branquinho
http://www.topgear.co.za/news/epinion-bm...t-ever-m3/
![[Image: 3ca8d617-0af9-4963-8772-92f95095c5ff.jpg]](http://www.topgear.co.za/wp-content/uploads/top_gear/3ca8d617-0af9-4963-8772-92f95095c5ff.jpg)
![[Image: b3f3c8d2-153a-4edc-beed-f958ebc278ad.jpg]](http://www.topgear.co.za/wp-content/uploads/top_gear/b3f3c8d2-153a-4edc-beed-f958ebc278ad.jpg)
![[Image: 6a307c7f-e12b-4eb3-a991-49ee9504189a.jpg]](http://www.topgear.co.za/wp-content/uploads/top_gear/6a307c7f-e12b-4eb3-a991-49ee9504189a.jpg)
Last week two rather important events occurred, involving car brands.
In the suburbs of Munich an orange E92 BMW became the very last M3 ever assembled. Sad, but inevitable. A day or so later, in the mountainous Cape winelands, VW revealed its Golf7 GTi to the South African media. A comparatively happier occasion. Well, you’d think so, but you would be wrong.
See, if you polled the online forums and collated comments, the assembly of BMW’s last M3 was an event tantamount to an automotive apocalypse. Logically, we all know BMW’s forthcoming M4 will be brilliant, as has each evolution of M3 from the first to the last, but petrolheads have this bizarre notion that the last version of anything is always the best and any incumbent is a marketing fraud. Illogical, but true.
I remember when BMW’s E92 was launched way back in 2007. How the brand fanboys complained that its V8 engine was a mockingly ‘un-M3-configuration’, how it was too heavy and had styling that looked too embellished with aftermarket trinkets. And now, in the fullness of time, the passing of E92 M3 is being made into legend. Somehow, that doesn’t really makes sense, now does it?
Is this a case of us being afraid to say goodbye to something or the fear of something new? Is E92 the loving family Labrador and new M4 the hipster couple that have moved in next door?
This veneration of E92 M3 as opposed to the venom reserved for its M4 replacement is rather bizarre, but nowhere as bizarre as the intolerance shown for VW’s new Golf7 GTi. This most successful of hot hatches, in its seventh incarnation, has been derided as being too slow, too underpowered, too glibly styled and too common. Too expensive too. Right, so by this logic the perfect product is all wrong. Better tell Apple that with regards to its iPhone/iPad/iPod range.
REMEMBERING GOLF6 GTi
Let’s go back in time, again, to the year 2008, when VW launched Golf6 GTi and Opel, Ford and all other hot hatch brand aligned petrolheads ridiculed it as being too underpowered, too familiar-looking to Golf5, too expensive and too common. Sounds familiar doesn’t it?
Now, as Golf7 GTi is introduced, its predecessor it suddenly elevated to hot hatch sainthood – the exact same car scorned for being a Golf5.5 GTi a few years back. Does this prove that car fans are a touch fickle at times?
I think it does. There is no logic to this all.
How is Golf7 GTi a bad car because it will undoubtedly be rampantly successful? That makes absolutely no sense.
Let us unpack the facts. Golf7 GTi’s impeccably refined; all things considered just simply the perfect hot hatchback: dynamic and agile when you want it to be; refined and effortless the rest of the time. What is not to be admired?
It will be the same formulaic state of affairs when BMW releases the full specification and images of its M4. Fanboys will accuse it of being too slow, too plain-looking, too turbocharged…But when the driving starts, it is sure to be another epic evolution of M-division engineering execution, just as all those other M3s were. Such as E92, now gracefully retired and assured of its legendary status. Something nobody would have believed back in 2008 when at first contact it was not believed to be quite the Audi B7 RS4 besting thing brand fans had hoped it would be.
You can authoritatively believe be the same when Golf7 GTi is replaced by the eight generation.
The lesson here? Look beyond the marketing and your own projections of Grand Turismo fantasy fallacies.
Cars evolve: they are vehicles (literally and figuratively) of technology. They won’t be naturally-aspirated or manual transmission driven indefinitely.
If something outsells everything else, such as Golf GTi does, it’s because of an inherent product quality and engineering excellence. Not discount pricing. It’s the Apple Inc business model and very few automotive brands are able to replicate it with their offerings. So when M3 and GTi manage to do that, don’t be jealous. It’s just so pithy.