By US spec, I meant what we can actually get here. We have different options and packages available from Europe. There is no driver's package here for instance.
That's just a packaging / marketing decision by BMW NA.
Same car, engine, suspension, just different option packages grouped together for different markets.
European markets usually a-la-carte options one at a time. BMW NA likes to group them together in a few bundles, as they don't trust us to have the attention span to digest them otherwise.
As for the baseline M3 speed being governed at 161, I suggest you contact BMW USA, and let them know that they're wrong -
BMW M3 - BMW USA
No need.
I know what my car can do.
And finally, the M3 CS is a limited edition model, which I specifically excluded in my prior posts. For $100k, it really ought to be quite a bit faster than a regular M3 or a Model 3 performance model.
M3 CS is about as limited as beer in Germany.
There is one sitting on the floor of every dealership in NJ. They can't push them out the door discounted by > $20K from MSRP. Still sitting pretty.
Excluding CS from the comparison is about as valid as ignoring TM3 Performance, just because it's too fast and more expensive ;-)
I will stick with my statement that a base M3 is extremely unlikely to break 8 minutes at the Nurburgring.
You are a strange fella'.
You know what you are saying is dead wrong, yet insist on repeating the fallacy.
Whatever you don't don't read the link below:
2015 BMW M3/M4 running the Nurburgring in 7:50 minutes
Video:
After about 4 minutes, brake overheating. Lap time is about 9 minutes.
If there is a better brake maybe 8:20.
It's not uncommon for stock brake pads to be designed to operate in the temperature window closer to ambient temps, than 500+F they will be heated to during track duty. Thus many folks who track their cars upgrade to track-pads (direct replacement). That would help TM3P a lot.
What is harder to correct is the fact that Tesla did not build any brake cooling ducts into Model 3's.
Again, this can be remedied with some surgery of the plastic parts (there are aftermarket brake duct DIY kits for many cars), but all BMW M-cars come with brake duct cooling from the factory. For this very good reason!
I watched it. The driver was pretty skilled. There was way to much traffic though to count that time. There was also a passenger in the car, so 150 pounds heavier.
The driver definitely has some experience at Nurburgring, not just on track. He always took the correct line through blind corners, and was never slowed by the traffic. He did not track out much, but that was mostly because he was fighting understeer a lot, and likely didn't have full confidence in the car.
BTW, the traffic in the video was VERY light for Nurburgring, and well behaved, and the cars he passed did not slow him down much, if at all, with the exception of white SUV at 5:43 time stamp.
The understeer he was fighting through most of the high speed turn did slow him down, and so did the brake temp overheating message. He visibly backed off from 6:00 minute time stamp and onwards.
He never went full throttle at the straights afterwords, and braked way early.
You can compare TM3P's speeds with BMW speeds at the same corners in the video below.
For example, 5:33 BMW GTS lap time stamp below corresponds to the 9:52 time stamp in TM3P video above.
M3 hits 200 kph by the end of the following downhill section, TM3P driver backs off at 143 kph.
I'm sure TM3P could have gone faster and posted quicker time, but either driver had not confidence in the brakes anymore, or the car was limiting power output by that point.
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