The BMW ‘Concept’ M5 debuted this weekend at the Shanghai Auto Expo, while the actual production version, which we assure you will be almost exactly the same, will debut at Frankfurt later this year.

Quite why the M5 gets so much attention is beyond us, but it somehow always ends up being the benchmark for shit-yourself-fast saloon cars. The Mercedes E63 AMG is a great car, no doubt, and the Audi RS6 BiTurbo V10 is like something created by the dark arts, but in the domain of lilly German sedans, no one quite does it like BMW.

Since the Sharknose, the M5 has seemed to define sports-saloon, if such a concept isn’t bunk in itself. The last incarnation featured a frankly bonkers V10, which will certainly be missed, but the new twinturbo V8 is nothing to raise your nose at. This does mean however that the latest M5 will be the first forced-induction M5 in BMW’s history.

BMW claims it is 25% more fuel efficient, while producing more power and more torque. 431kW to be almost precise, up from 408kW. Some overseas magazines are citing “sources” saying that the 0-100km/h time is down to 4.5 seconds, but for all we know they might as well be citing “sauces”.

Judging by our drive in the 530d late last year, the M5 should be fantastically good. With an exceptional interior, a tight chassis and M-tuned suspension in the mix, they’d have to actually try and get it wrong.

Full gallery after the jump…

Gavin didn't get to drive his through a Dulux factory, unfortunately.

Let’s be honest, there are certain things women didn’t traditionally do. Like drinking until throwing up on a fern in an Umhlanga hotel lobby or just throwing. Until recently the world of car design has been as male-dominated as a Premier League changing room. But the new Z4 is, wait for it…designed by two women; Juliane Blasi and Nadya Arnaout and fair play to BMW for giving the ladies a crack. I suspect it might be some sort of guilt-laden PC response to all the male chauvinist BMW owners in Ray-Bans and Sasoons who were responsible for 80s divorce rates.

It was quite obviously time for BMW to respect the ladies and the bodies they create and not just see them as a passenger side pair of airbags.  Remember too that an Iranian woman, Zaha Hadid, designed BMW’s faultlessly cool Leipzig Central Building. So, are they going a bit soft and girly in Bavaria?  Not a chance.  The new Z4 is all flared aggression and full frontal machismo.

The ladies have always preferred a bit of rough rather than a hair-dried ponce talking about his yoga, or so I’m told. But they do like someone who shares their feelings and the Z4 certainly does that. I have no idea how BMW consistently just make their cars feel so…right.  It’s something in the suspension geometry, in the driving position and their rear wheel drive DNA that just makes the new Z4 compliant yet thrilling, red-bloodedly fun yet pointed.

The new model has somehow managed to improve ride comfort without sacrificing grip. Sitting low-slung, right out over the back axle with that bonnet seeming to curve into infinity, you get that real go-kart feeling.

Like all new Beemers, especially these estate agent roadsters, it will divide opinion on whether men can be taken seriously in one, but when that glorious straight 6 or the mental 3.5 twin turbo kicks into life, you’ll find yourself not really caring what anyone else thinks.  It’s a manly car designed by women that women will buy and men will secretly covet. Oh, the tangled webs we weave.

More info here:  http://www.bmw.co.za/campaigns/z4/

Gavin Williams

Step 1:

Have a major manufacturer withdraw it’s works support.

Step 2:

Have a Portsmouth FC-like uncertainty surrounding your future while throwing around words like “uncertainty”, “future” and “interested consortium” all bloody winter.

Step 3:

A miraculous buy-out occurs by former employees of the works team.  General backslapping and spirited press statements ensue.

Step 4:

Unveil your sponsorless car sporting a liberal interpretation of the rules with two drivers looking apprehensive and slightly sheepish.

Step 5:

Absolutely confound everyone by setting very quick times in pre-season testing even though you arrived late in a caravan.

Step 6:

Win Championship.

Step 7:

Lose egotistical world champion driver who believes it was his sheer pace that brought home the title.

Step 8:

Get bought out by the world’s greatest car manufacturer or something.

Last week at Jerez, a sponsorless Sauber (BMW) driven by Kamui Kobayashi topped the timing charts consistently.

Phone your bookies.

Ta-da, there it is! The crowd goes absolutely ballistic.

Gavin Williams

www.youtube.com/watch?v=npTRXr4Sgxg

Youtube. Extraordinary. But most of the time you visit you just end up watching a dog on a skateboard or someone injuring themselves in a humourous way. There is hope though, especially if you’re slightly interested in cars. We’ve gone into Youtube’s archives and pulled the five Most Viewed videos of All Time, in the Autos & Vehicles category. Above is number five, click through for the rest.

Number Five (above): “Real Car Crash” -- 14 768 355 views

That first one is both hilarious and extremely disconcerting; it’ll make you chuffed that you live in warmer climes. It’s literally car-skating on ice. These poor sods have absolutely no control over their cars; literally they’re just sliding in whichever direction the gradient of the road is running. Gives me the heeby-jeebies.

Number Four: “Bugatti Veyron vs. Yamaha R1 RACING DOWN MOTERWAY” -- 15 155 807 views

www.youtube.com/watch?v=WShY1ObPvhQ

We can’t really understand why this has obtained so many views. But there are a few moments of awesomeness to look out for: right in the beginning, watch for the way the rev-needle shoots up. Bikes are simply ludicrous. At about the 30 second mark, the sheer acceleration of the Veyron is breathtaking, considering the Yamaha R1 is the fastest accelerating bike on earth (we think) and then there’s a really nice little surprise at 1:29.

Number Three: “Ken Block jumps his rally car 171 feet” - 15 400 077 views

www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDi0MZJZ-w0

Ken Block. Popular. Small wonder then that one of his vids is in the top five. There are better clips of this and like he says: “This is a lot less scary then racing; 90 miles an hour sideways through trees is a lot more frightening”.

Number Two: “Ferrari vs. Lamborghini” - 21 575 606 views

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeBd_F2Bz5Y

What an unbelievably shit video. I don’t know what saddens me more: the awful ’90s German rave music soundtrack, the fact that the 53 year old IT consultant who made this probably drives a VW Golf with a Ferrari sticker on the fender, or the fact that there are so many desperately bored fanboys on the interwebs who helped this vid get to 21 million views. I also can’t believe I actually sat through it.

Number One: “Bugatti Veyron vs BMW M3″ -- 23 269 033 views

www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEL5ABddZ0k

Okay this is decent. A bit of showboating in the M3 leads to a drag race between the Veyron and the Beemer. The M3 gets off to a cracking start, but as soon as the Bugatti drivers stops picking his nose and actually accelerates, the way it shoots past the hapless German is simply astonishing. It’s like it’s propelled by some other-worldly force. The sound of the Veyron at idle is also magic.

Ciro De Siena

Anyway, while I was wandering around enjoying a chilled glass of fresh orange and ground cinnamon water, I found this, tucked away upstairs to the service desk. I like that. This is my kind of interior decorating.

Hit the jump for a gallery and more info.

I had to run before I could ask its particulars but suffice it to say it is very old, very special and very immaculate. My uncle tells me that back in his day these were used in one or other local racing series. That’s fantastic.

That's what he thought of your offer, Toyota.

This morning’s headline came as a bit of a shock to me. We all knew that the Japanese car industry was in trouble when giants Honda pulled out of F1 and Subaru pulled out of WRC. Colin Mcrae must have 360′d in his resting place.

But a goliath like Toyota pulling out of F1 is just massive. Over the next few days be sure to expect everyone with a slightly dim view of the sport trumpeting its demise. But on closer inspection, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. With a budget of £300m a year, Toyota participated in 139 races without a win. They did nab 13 podiums, but then again, so has Vettel, almost, and he’s 16 or something.

The thing is, Toyota, like Honda, failed to realise that F1 isn’t about the goliaths. It’s not about smart suits sitting in a boardroom in Tokyo making decisions about a tyre choice at Interlagos. F1 rewards teams that think on their feet and make the best decisions under the circumstances.

Better days.

Just look at Brawn this season; that team used to be Honda and also used to have 10 times the budget. (And if anyone is about to throw Ferrari at me, let’s just remember that how small that operation started out; Enzo made road cars so that he could fund his racing team. Ferrari and F1 grew up together.)

So perhaps BMW, Toyota and Honda leaving F1 is not a bad thing in the long run. Let’s see more smaller teams on the grid, gritting their teeth threw the tight budgets and tough decisions. Hell, maybe the actual on-track antics of the sport will become more exciting. No more light shows in the deserts, Bernie.

Ciro De Siena

It took 15 seconds. I’m not even near joking. It took 15 seconds.

Before I get to that though I’d like to talk about the image/perception that exists in most retail stores and brand “equity” that bounds around our modern age. It is devil’s-hand crafted to make you feel inspired and worthy, apparently.

By Gavin ‘I hate BMWs until the moment the door closes’ Williams

As a trivial example, walk into any Edgars store or gaze at one of their catalogues and you see a reassuring bunch of youth slouched on a beach or leaping airwards indiscriminately near a table at a picnic sight.  They’re as happy as people acting happy in outdoor scenarios.  Walk into the same retail store and again, you’re presented with aisles, posters and “shelf talkers” (believe me, this phrase exists) depicting idyllic tableaus of utter winsomeness and aw-shucks-ain’t life-just the bees-knees-ness.

But here’s my point. People have to work there. In Edgars. Rubbish hours over holiday seasons when they’d rather be in the scenarios depicted on the posters surrounding them. Instead, behind the false façade of commerce these stores – just behind the change rooms in the bowels of the mall – there are grudging employee smoking areas and bitter “assistant managers” spouting nonsense to hung-over and disinterested staff.  I have a friend, who in high school walked directly to his senior supervisor and handed over his name tag on some lost Saturday afternoon at Edgars after a customer asked him in all earnestness “Do you have that jean whiff the star and tick on it?”

BMW has no such problem. Although I’m loathed to admit it, they deliver on what they preach.  Anything not containing a 3 or a 1 as the prefix that is.  It was no coincidence then, that when I picked up the new oddball X6 from their corporate image head quarters at the V&A Waterfront, behind the perfectly poised arc-lighting, polished marble and designer luggage I found a golden, sculpted, squat banshee waiting silently for me. It was far away from the bowels of the mall, the opposite of the tired projectionist beaming imagery of far off, exotic times and pleasures as he slowly fades to nicotine gray.

It was what you see on the poster only better. It was the depicted “lifestyle” made shimmering metal (not even Bee-Em’s CEO could tell you what that lifestyle is) but it was there.  Someone once said (and I’m paraphrasing here so I might have dreamt it) “Californians invented the phrase ‘lifestyle’ – and for that reason alone they all deserve to die”.  Yes. BMW invented this peculiar vehicle of choice for divorced plastic surgeons that still have to pick up their own kids and other people’s women.

Actually, when I first saw the snaps of the X6 I thought “God. That’s absolutely hideous”, followed by a “what’s the point of that?” moment; as a lifelong BMW anti-acolyte it was pretty easy to dismiss.  So in some ways it did differ from its poster imagery: for once, the reality actually looked better than the hype.  The opposite of California/Edgars then, towards which its “carrying-TVs” flanks and macho snout is no doubt aimed.

Then it happened.  15 seconds after I turned the key I turned into a dipshit. A popped collar fuckwit. A knob. A Man. A boytjie. A… someone who equates your intelligence to how much money you’re making.  I became what I was not.  I became a BMW X6 driver.   I pulled up to the stop street not 20 metres from where I’d picked up the car and a particularly gorgeous woman walked across the street with her 6-or-7 year-old child in tow. Possessed by the BMW demon I wound down the window and in tongues that sounded strangely like my own voice I said “Your mom’s quite hot, hey”.  I was mortified at my own shiteness, but had an inward sense of righteousness at the same time. It was weirdly fulfilling. It was the world of BMW. Unfettered and awful.

I could go into the brilliant detail of how this car drives and feels. So I will. It’s brilliant, brilliant, brilliant to drive, but the sculpted bottom line is that it turned me into a dick, and I cannot forgive it that.  It has a complicated rear diff system, which, as Ciro explained to me works not unlike a tank, when one side of it’s pulling you in one direction the other side isn’t. It’s complicated and makes you wonder who actually won the war when the US car industry is teetering on the brink of oblivion and England’s already there.

The twin-turbo’d 3.0 litre specimen we drove is just fantastic, with plenty of torque, curvy power and the ability to hound down the coast at a right-old canter. I feel sorry for BMW in many respects, they make such perfect cars.  Audis are too hard, Mercs are too old money and the rest don’t even have an invitation to the banquet.  But you buy into the poster; you buy into the lifestyle it seems to project. And the Bee-Em at least lives up to it.  For better or worse. All cars are almost the same these days; it’s mostly perceived imagery and very slight dynamic differences that make them one different from the next.

And if someone like me can be this corrupted by the necromantic call of the BMW x6, imagine what it’ll do to a genuine asshole.

Unlike just about every other brand out there, at least it delivers on its promise. Tell me; when last did you want to break into a game of sunlit park volleyball just because you’re wearing a Truworths Pullover?

And now there’s an M version. God help us. Your Mom’s quite hot though.

In our first instalment of “That’s not a car, that’s just pornography”, I’d like to bring to your attention the BMW 507.

I have a bit of a weakness for this car. I think it’s because I feel better about life just knowing that it exists.

It comes from an era when the Jag E-Type was redefining what sports cars, and indeed cars, were capable of. 150mph was a heady speed back then, especially when the whole thing was probably held together with leather straps. It did that though while looking fantastic, which was just revolutionary.

BMW needed something with which to take the Jag head on and the commissioned a designer who’s middle name was ‘Zeppo’ to pen this. I think designers who have middle names should be commissioned more often.

The result is sumptuous. Flowing lines like this just don’t exist anymore. Everything has to be hard edged and sporty and upgradeable to an R-version. The 507 is a reminder that at one stage none of that mattered. What did matter was creating a car that would make men lustful and women lustful for those men who could afford one.

Powered by an aluminium 3.2 litre V8, the 507 TS (Touring Sport) made do with a heart stopping 160hp and was capable of a breathtaking 141mph (227km/h).

But none of that was important either.

The car, much like the lovely individuals who occupied the passenger seat, was a heartbreaker. BMW lost money on every 507 made and after just 252 they shut down production. A cash injection from a rich baron was needed to resurrect their finances.

But, like most things that were done right the first time, those cars kept their value magnificently. Bernie Ecclestone sold his on auction or US$904 000, and if you want one today you’d have to get about US$1.5million together.

If you don’t have that sort of money in your sock drawer, here’s a gallery to ease the pain. Hopefully you’ll feel better too.

My uncle owns a top-notch, busy little Italian eatery in Seapoint, Cape Town. It overlooks a petrol station and a main road. It has a few tables outside on the wonky paving which are perfectly suited to enjoying a glass of wine and arguing about whatever drives past.

It’s not the greatest location, the interior isn’t stunning and the waitresses aren’t supermodels but the food is remarkable and keeps a dedicated clientele coming back for more year after year. People don’t need my uncle’s pizza, but as is apparent, they certainly want it.

At this point I should probably mention that my uncle is a blind-faith BMW man. Bayerische Motoren-Werke can do no wrong. He has owned many Beemers over the years and currently makes do with a first generation V8 X5 and a classic E46 328i convertible. I also own an old Beemer, but my job as a motoring scribe has introduced me to a myriad of machines which help put everything in perspective. So suffice it to say that when the topic of the X6 comes up, things get heated, wine is consumed with greater vigour and family ties are threatened.

And this is why: I think the X6 is hideous. Sure it’s muscular and menacing and literally frightens people into the middle lane, but I’m sorry, if you want a pretty car, phone that brand with four rings. I don’t want to get down to specifics but I think it’s the rear that gets me; it looks like a Japanese teenager’s running shoe.

Climbing inside however is a wonderful thing. Firstly, you don’t have to look at it anymore and secondly it is first-class BMW in there. The car shrinks around you in that special way that BMW X cars manage to and the steering wheel is just the right thickness. The comparatively low seating position and the muscular nature of the thing bumps up your heart rate just slightly, even before you turn it on. It’s that kind of car.

BMW X6 Interior

As the twin-turbocharged inline-6 kicks over, a shrill, mechanical rasp fills the air until the engine warms up and settles down. Throttle response is lively – you are after all prodding the two-time world engine of the year.

Of course in this modern age of vehicle design the car is a pleasure at low speeds, gentle as an angry but recently subdued circus elephant, and attracting just as much attention.

Once the road clears up in front of you though the X6 becomes another animal entirely. Good God this thing is good round corners. Hammer the throttle, click up the gears using the flappy paddles and watch the needles race endlessly clockwise. Corner coming, drop a few gears, ease on the anchors, throw it in like a hatchback and nail the throttle just after the apex. This thing is epic in the twisties: flat, composed; so utterly planted as to almost be worrying. Especially to people who own decent sports cars.

How have they done this?

Well it’s all down to something called DPC – Dynamic Performance Control. In a nutshell, power goes to the rear diff – business as usual. Then on each side shaft is a set of gears and a clutch. When the car feels that you’re being an arse or that it needs more traction, it actively speeds up the necessary rear wheel. Think of it like a tank: if you want to turn left, speed up the right side and vice versa.

It’s all much more complicated than that I’m sure but forget about the mechanisms – its not important unless you’re German. What is important is how this translates through the seat to your backside and the steering wheel to your sweaty palms.

Quite simply, you turn the steering wheel less, the car is infinitely more capable than it should be and if any of your mates own a Porsche Cayman you can phone them, pull out your tongue and make rude noises.

Back to the engine, and I feel this is important, if you can hold on till next year, wait for the twin-turbo V8. The inline-6 is very good but it’s a bit loud at high revs and it does feel the weight of the car. This is the kind of car which needs, and wants, a lot more power.

Right, so, in summary, BMW have produced a 4-seater Coupe with 4 doors which handles like a sports car. No wait, that’s not right. BMW have produced a 4×4 with high ground clearance which looks like a Coupe but handles like a sportscar. No, that’s not it. BMW have given the world a high end sportscar which looks like a 4×4 but is shaped like a coupe but has the added practicality of four doors and a boot.

This could take a while.

Bottom line: you don’t need a car like this, you want one. Just like I don’t need another pizza right now…

Prices and specifications for the BMW X6 in South Africa

Model: BMW Xdrive35i
Price: R654 000
Engine: Inline-6, 3.0 litre
Power: 225kW at 5800rpm
Torque: 400Nm at 1300rpm (holy s#!t)
Accleration: 0 – 100km/h in 6.7 seconds
Top Speed: 240km/h
Fuel Consumption: 12.1 litres/100km (combined EU cycle)
CO2: 286g/km

Model: BMW Xdrive35d
Price: R724 000
Engine: Inline-6, 3.0 litre VVT diesel
Power: 210kW at 4000rpm
Torque: 580 Nm at 1750 – 2250rpm
Accleration: 0 – 100km/h in 6.9 seconds
Top Speed: 236km/h
Fuel Consumption: 9 litres/100km (cobined EU cycle)
CO2: 237g/km