BMW steps on the exhilarator in MIAS 2018
CAR shows are always about gleaming cars, almost always much-awaited new models. But the one car that I’m truly excited to see at the upcoming Manila International Auto Show (which opens tomorrow at World Trade Center and runs until Sunday) is not an all-new model. It’s not even a face-lifted new model.
The car I’m holding my breath to see in the sheetmetal is actually 40 years old, and it’s none other than the incomparable BMW M1.
I wasn’t even a teenager when the BMW M1 hit the automotive scene in 1978. I already had a major infatuation with long-slung Italian exotics of the time, particularly the Lamborghini Countach and the Ferrari 512 Berlinetta Boxer.
The Germans were still more known for luxury sedans. That is, until BMW unveiled the M1 to an unsuspecting world. Suddenly here was a waisthigh German sports car that looks and goes like the Italian supercars.
Not surprisingly, the M1 was designed by an Italian design house, Giugiaro, (but built in-house by BMW). A total of 451 M1’s were produced from 1978 to 1981, 20 of which were used for BMW’s M1 Procar onemake racing series.
It was the first midengined BMW, and was powered by a 3.5-liter DOHC 24-valve inline-6 developing a then-heady 277ps, good for a then-astounding 260-kph top speed. Remember, this was 1978.
And now, finally, after 40 years, an all-original BMW M1 rolls on Philippine soil.
SMC Asia Car Distributors Corp. (SMCACDC), the exclusive importer and