Shadow Boxing

摘要

It was idling in the paddock when I noticed the contrast. A 1987 FIA Group A BMW M3 race car doesn't so much idle as grumble to itself, a weird disparity given the visual bloodthirst of the car's bodywork. If a first-gen M3 were a person, you'd take it to bars just to start fights. The sticker on the driver's door read "Lieber Nurburgring als Ehering!" - "rather the Nurburgring than a wedding ring." You can't look at that car without seeing it bodychecking a Mercedes in Breidscheid, but when the M3 launched in 1986, an angry-looking street car built to legalize a race version, the name meant bubkes. Now, gospel touts that machine as the winningest touring car in history, and Internet hordes will tell you that the rapidly appreciating street model is the only BMW worth having. Never mind that the current M3 is a carbon-roofed, 425-hp titan. Much as Jaguar has spent 50 years in the shadow of its E-type, every new Emm Drei is released to the arched eyebrows of those who love the original. So our staff of arched eyebrows put a 2015 M3 and a balls-to-the-wall Group A car on a track in the same day, in the hands of a former pro driver and yours truly. If this were a boxing match, an announcer would thunder it open: The legend and the upstart! The brute force of tomorrow versus the poise of yesterday! You'll pay for the whole seat, but you'll only need the edge!