[CT_M3]

I’ll be keeping my F80 for a while... the next car would be a 991.2 or 992.1. Was going to go there eventually, but the direction BMW is taking sealed it for me.

It’s not just this M3/M4 launch, if you look at BMW, the company is chasing the masses, slapping M on almost everything. I was ok as long as they left the M cars alone, but it looks like they are moving them in the direction of mass consumption, neutering what made these cars stand out. The new M3/M4 is just blingy, see the ad on BMW USA’s site. Makes me laugh.

The more I think about it, the more I think the departure of Albert Biermann, the former head of M, signaled a significant change in BMW. Gone were the tinkerers, the guys who pushed the envelope for M. Biermann’s poached a few M guys with him to Hyundai’s N division, but if you dig around on his reasons he left, he saw the direction BMW was taking M and disagreed with it.

Edit: I’m so glad I got the last M platform that Biermann presided over. If you watch his videos and read his bio, here was a guy who was with M since almost the beginning. His passion during the F8x launch shone through and its sad that M let him leave.