BMW M3 Competition
REPORT 3
£74,000 OTR/£86,745 as tested/£1,260pcm
WHY IT’S HERE
Is BMW’s mighty M3 still the performance saloon benchmark?
DRIVER
Rowan Horncastle
THE THREE PEAKS CHALLENGE IS BASICALLY LE MANS FOR GORE-TEX enthusiasts. The aim of the game is to climb each of the highest peaks in England, Wales and Scotland – Scafell Pike, Snowdon and Ben Nevis – in less than 24 hours.
It just so happens that in the shadow of these mountains are some of the UK’s best driving roads, and when you string them all together in less than a day, it makes for quite the proving ground. It’s exactly what I needed. Not the hellish hiking (well, the lockdown paunch may disagree) but a properly chunky drive of the M3.
See, the new BMW G80 M3 is such a hefty, complex and techy piece of kit (it’s now more of a shrunk down M5, rather than a genetically modified 3-Series) in the first few hundred miles I really struggled to get under its skin. This 1,300-mile trip was the chance.
Rear seats down to increase the 480-litre boot space in order to swallow some golf clubs and glucose gels, I left London and headed for Wales where it instantly became clear that the M3 is a lot softer than the initial ride would have you believe.
To get into the meat of the ride you need a bit of speed and movement to get the springs and dampers working. And considering the 1,805kg G80 is the heaviest M3 of all time (just 100kg lighter than the much larger, much more luxurious M8 Comp) its body control is remarkable. It cushions and catches the lumpy bits of Wales giving you the confidence to push the chassis and use the traction that e-diff gives you.
At times it was actually a bit too soft for Wales, often using up all its suspension travel and smacking its chin on the tarmac. Luckily the suspension is adjustable (as is the engine, gearbox, steering and – weirdly – the brakes) so you can firm it up. Yes, this sacrifices some of its languid movement and comfort, but saves you grimacing every time it drags its face across the floor.
Arriving at Pen-y-Pass, the tectonic plates in my head shifted: I no longer had an issue with the front grille. Casting a magnificent deep, dark shadow, the M3 just worked with the scenery. A high-horsepower emerald framed by Wales’ beauty. We climbed Snowdon the next morning and headed to the north of England via a bootlid Burger King (the carbon spoiler is a great dam for stopping stray chips).
An impromptu brake test to avoid a sheep also proved you don’t need to spec expensive ceramics as the steels are still muscular things. But I’m pretty sure the development team in Munich didn’t simulate a nine iron ejecting itself out of a golf bag at 60mph, as it gave me the ultimate sucker punch via the kidney cutouts in the carbon shelled seats.
The Lake District’s very old, very narrow, immovable drystone walls really showed the G80’s increased footprint. This isn’t a humble saloon anymore. It’s 120mm longer, 10mm wider and 2.5mm higher than the F80 but feels even more so thanks to the incessant, overactive parking sensors.
Now, this is where our lawyers would like me to tell you that I had some sleep. Genius sleep, no less. I parted the bags to one side, slipped in a self-inflating ground mat, got in a sleeping bag and wriggled my way down. Hey presto! A full-length bed. BMW doesn’t advertise that.
After Scafell we refuelled the car (averaging an acceptable 33mpg) with V-Power (recommended by BMW) and headed to Scotland. Full of lactic acid and tired, this is where the M3 really excelled, serving up luxury and convenience as well as speed in a familiar but appealing package. That’s what M3s do well. But this one is £87k, so doesn’t have the same accessibility as older models.
The ‘Visibility Pack’ makes up £1,500 of that price. Don’t worry, headlights come as standard. But if you tick this box you get the fancy frickin’ laser lights where if you’re doing over 45mph and it’s pitch black the full beam magically doubles its length to over 600 metres, like it’s taken some sort of luminary Viagra.
Can I recommend them? Well, I’ve read online some people have just specced them because the blue headlight eyeliner that defines them is ‘cool’ (true). But if you live in the wilderness where the skies are dark, the weather is wild and scenery is supersized, it’s the best money you can spend.
You’re only as fast as you can see remember. And just be aware that the adaptive element (where it can maintain full beam while blocking out oncoming traffic or obstacles) hunts around a bit and isn’t as intuitive or reactive as the Mercedes system.
We arrive at Ben Nevis at 3am. But having forgotten to pack batteries for our head torches we nap and rise at daybreak. I couldn’t use the backseat bed, so had to settle for the carbon buckets on max recline. Not ideal.
We summited shortly after sunrise and came down again utterly broken. But the green machine was waiting for us and ready for more. Had I finally got under its skin? Yep. And better than that, I’d formed a bond with it and really began to appreciate its bandwidth and the tech on board; especially the autonomous function on the 14-hour drive back.
Three countries, three mountains, 24 hours. One very green, very fast BMW. I think the M3 Peaks Challenge should become a thing, don’t you?