This year’s Frankfurt Motor Show has marked the
premieres of numerous innovative all-electric cars and bold new hypercars, but
even among such exalted company, the BMW M8 Competition manages to stand out. The Bavarian automaker first showed
the new M8 Competition back in June before the car made a scintillating live
appearance at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. The example in Frankfurt is
painted in a truly phenomenal shade of matte blue that suits it nicely.
It may have an old school powertrain compared to
other cars launched in Frankfurt, some of them by BMW itself, but is all the
better for it. The M8 has so far been revealed in Coupe and Convertible guise, in
standard and Competition spec, and in November’s LA Auto Show the Gran Coupe
will complete the range.
All variants are powered by a twin-turbocharged
4.4-liter V8 delivering 592 HP and 750 Nm of torque in the base
model, and 617 HP in the Competition (torque remains the same). The sprint to 100 km/h is dealt with in 3.3 seconds for the Coupe and 3.4 seconds
for the Convertible, and 3.2/3.3 seconds respectively for their Competition
versions.
BMW is adamant the M8 is so good it doesn’t need a
dedicated supercar in its range, as its range-topping grand tourer offers
anything its customers could want. It sports an Active M differential with
all-wheel drive and rear-wheel drive modes, M-specific Adaptive dampers, M
Servotronic steering and BMW’s integrated braking system that offers two levels
of pedal feel.
