BMW M3 Coupe 2008 Review

Overall Rating: 4.0/5.0
Engine/Drivetrain/Chassis: 4.0/5.0
Price, Packaging and Practicality: 4.0/5.0
Safety: 3.5/5.0
Behind the wheel: 4.5/5.0
X-factor: 4.5/5.0

About our ratings

Great cars are easy to write about; shockers even more so. Near-perfect cars are the hardest.

Great cars usually foster strong emotions -- there's always somewhere to start... The engine's high points; the clever packaging; the styling, oh so sublime. In the case of the near-faultless, you must start with superlatives and ramp on up. Within a paragraph your once considered opinion reads like advertising copy.

BMW's M3 is not strictly a supercar, but it is a super car. Driving it on the track, I found it hard to find fault. Having driven it on some of the best roads on the planet there was even less to grizzle about (see our local launch review here). Now, I've just lived with it for almost a week... My only complaint? I had to give it back a day early.

Some critics will suggest the latest V8-powered car is not as involving as the E46 inline six-cylinder model it replaces. Some have suggested the steering isn't quite as communicative. Some have suggested the chassis is a touch inert in comparison. They're finer or more demanding judges (or both) than I.

I find it difficult to say anything other than, if you can, buy one. If you can't, at least drive one...

Here is a car that will run at the very sharpest end of the sharp end of road cars when you so desire -- on road or track -- and come back for more. Here is a car that with a change of brake linings and a rollcage could (and does) compete on the racetrack and humble pure racecars. Here is a car that will deliver sub-5.0sec 0-100km/h times consistently, yet is no harder to drive to the shops than a diesel 1 Series.

And here is a car that will do all of the above, yet can be parallel parked in a busy shopping centre without histrionics or a periscope, seats four comfortably and has a boot that will swallow three suitcases. Oh, and return better than 12.5L/100km over two tanks (well, one and a half) and six days of urban and intra-urban use.

It's been compared to Benz's excellent C63 and will probably be shopped against the likes of the yet-to-be-released Lexus IS-F. Even the significantly more expensive Porsche 911 is trotted out as a potential 'replacement' in the usability stakes. As good as all these cars are, they are not an M3.

I'm not sure how I get this message across, but the M3 is quite literally one of a kind. Its understated yet muscular coupe lines could never belong to anything else. Its sheer all 'round competence and convenience is quite literally in a class of its own.

Every car nut has a list of dream cars they'd buy should their fortunes (and bank balance) change for the better. For some of us, the writer included, the M3 is the whole list.

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