That is the one-off 550bhp secret BMW M5 CSL

I do know what you’re pondering. It seems to be like a ‘Ring Taxi. Perhaps that was the intention, the right disguise for a prototype because it pounded across the Nürburgring, though Harry, who runs this facility, reckons the livery was added later. The E60 M5 was essentially the most hardcore common M5 there was. I all the time assume M5s go in waves. You get a comparatively mushy centred one (the E39 V8), then this automotive went the opposite means. The one after, the F10, was a bit podgy. The hunt for a candy spot maybe.

What issues right here is that they have been going to take essentially the most uncompromising M5 there had ever been. And intensify it. The usual automotive, famously, got here with the S85 naturally aspirated 507bhp 5.0-litre V10 that developed peak energy at 7,750rpm, revved nicely previous eight grand and cherished to go there. It was mated to a seven-speed sequential guide gearbox that even again then was thought-about a little bit of a head-banger.

There’s a course of all these secret CSLs have been by. An thought morphs into an informal undertaking. That leads someplace so a improvement automotive is commissioned. A feasibility examine occurs (may it’s a industrial actuality? Will it make the corporate cash? Does it match within the model portfolio?) and if the engineers, managers and designers are satisfied they’re on to a superb factor, they’ll pitch it to the board. That is the place most tasks die.

This one by no means made it that far. For causes which are misplaced to time – or BMW doesn’t wish to disclose – the E60 M5 CSL was stillborn. There’s a visible clue to what’s been accomplished. See the additional grille the place the numberplate must be? It was wanted for further cooling, as a result of the V10 was bored and stroked out to five.4 litres. Round 550bhp. They’re not precisely certain, as a result of it was by no means dyno’d.

The larger information was the gearbox. No, not a guide conversion. That well-liked aftermarket retro-fit was not what BMW had deliberate for its forward-looker. This one had a twin-clutch gearbox, the identical one fitted to the E92 M3.

After which they set in regards to the weight. The inside is fabulously mismatched, the one piece Recaros seem to have been bolted in on the final minute, the flocking that changed the rear seats is dishevelled. However, over 100kg was stripped out – that, apparently, is all the time the goal – however then it stopped. BMW isn’t saying what killed this, or another CSL, so both you are feeling comfortable understanding what they have been as much as behind the scenes, or unhappiness at what may need been.

Me? I’m imagining M engineers pounding round in their very own ‘Ring Taxi, grinning wolfishly.

BMW M constructed a one-off secret M2 CSL, and that is it