Another classic racing car made available to the public
to satisfy homologation racing rules, only 457 of the
glass-fibre bodied M1's were made - all for the local
European market.
The Motorsport 1 (M1) remains the only mid-engined beamer
to be developed, and that in itself if enough to make
the car truly unique.
But more important than any break
away from traditional design was the cars fabulous handling
and performance.
Using the fabulous "M-Power" in-line 3.5 liter six,
the engineers were able to have it develop a staggering
277 bhp - all this mated to a silky smooth 5 speed
manual transmission.
From any angle a supercar, it was to reward the lucky
owners with an amazingly comfortable ride, and even though
the car was really built for the race track, BMW still
made the interior appointments everything a purchaser
would expect, with inclusions such as leather interior,
air-conditioning, electric windows etc.
While BMW were not suitably geared up to produce such
a low volume car, production was initially outsourced
to Lamborghini - until they hit financial trouble.
Subsequent
cars had their tubular space frames manufactured by the
Italian firm Marchesi, while other Italian companies provided
the glass-fibre body panels.
Assembly was completed at
Italdesign, and the nearly finished vehicles finally shipped
to coach builder Baur in Germany.
Before any were released to dealers, each was thoroughly
tested by BMW Motorsport. But unfortunately for Joe Public,
the M1 failed to tame the turbo propelled Porsche 911
and, given that the race track was the sole reason for
the cars creation in the first place, development was
stopped just shy of 12 months after it had commenced.