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BMW Z3 M Coupe | In The Name Of Driving Pleasure
BMW Z3 M COUPE
Words Andrea Balti / Photos BMW Group
The world is full of clichés and the automotive panorama is certainly not exception. This means that likewise, the simplest answer is often the correct one (read this Occam’s razor). The story of the Z3 M Coupe, also solely known as M Coupe, seems like one of those tales enriched with a pinch of imagination, almost as if to follow the concept telling that the best things are born by chance. Two and a half years after BMW had introduced the Z3 Roadster, a handful of Bavarian engineers working at the propeller brand spent a few hours at the end of their shift head down in an experiment that took the foundations of the new model and transformed it into something never seen before: a shooting brake.
This term, which is nowadays used almost inappropriately, aimed to make the fixed roof version of the Z3 a model that came for unsettling the sports car world order. To make it more interesting, the M Department made its warlike intentions very clear by shoving a generous 3.2-liter straight-six under the bonnet. Despite the obvious features in common with the roadster, the Z3 M Coupe was a whole other story, starting with a design that made extreme shapes its understanding key. We are talking about a hood with more pronounced curvatures that continued along a passenger compartment that was now one with the curved tail widening beyond belief above the rear wheels, those displacing traction, of course.
The absence of half measures already from a stylistic point of view were the worthy preview of a performance boost developed to enhance the driving pleasure offered by a coupe just 1.2 meters high, 4 meters long and with an overall weight that stopped at 1,390 kg. The naturally aspirated 3.2 was the ultimate tool that would guarantee steady progression and translated into 321 horsepower at 7,400 rpm and 350 Nm of torque at 3,250 rpm. This is why its on road presence need extra emphasis, so they fit a wider track for the rear axle in comparison to the front one and with tires 245 and 225 inches respectively, the Z3 M Coupe did not ask for anything else that being able to unleash the cavalry and let the driver grappling with a 5-speed manual transmission that would have given way to one of the most ecstatic experiences that could be lived at the wheel of one of the best and most unsuspected GTs on the market.
Among the many strong points of the Z3 M Coupe is precisely the fact that it is one of those cars that, in order to be truly appreciated, must first of all be understood. It is not just any sports car, its shapes could almost turn one’s nose upside down, but for those looking for a driver/machine relationship that makes the purity of an output based on the search for the ideal rev per minute for every type of road, the M Coupe is the ultimate performance tool. Unleashing the end of the world from the two pairs of exhausts and with an intimate cockpit mainly facing the driver, the comfort to which BMW has accustomed those who have tasted the more domestic Z3 Roadster is not at all gone away. After all, the M Coupe is also able to offer enough space for luggage useful for a trip out of town. Whether you decide to avoid tossing luggage at the back and the passenger is entirely up to you, but the dual nature of this car clearly leans towards aggressive behavior bordering on psychotic bits.
The justification for any bad action involving the throttle lies in the weight balance and the small size that make it a hollow point bullet always ready to disintegrate a corner after the other. It is the magic of a refined wine that enhances its taste with the passing of years, an object that needs time to be properly appreciated and which reminds us that cars of this kind are now a completely extinct species, as an end in themselves, devoted to that pure driving pleasure that by consecrating them as timeless classics increase the melancholy factor and leave us with damn aseptic heirs. The BMW Z3 M Coupe is the best antidote to the excessively filtered contemporary sports cars and its image halfway between the exotic and the extravagant is the added value of a world that, despite being just over twenty years away, seems so long gone.