All new performance cars now come with a Nurburgring lap time, it’s bordering on mandatory, like a crash rating. Nonetheless, manufacturers keep giving up Nurburgring lap times because we love them, just like how we love watching those crash test videos.
So how fast does BMW’s new little sports car do the ‘Ring run in? It’ll get around the Green Hell in 8:12, dead equal with the Z4 M Coupe and ahead of the outgoing E60 M5 that runs the lap in 8:13 but short of the E63 M6 that will lap it in 8:09.
Nonetheless, if you’ve just got the keys to an Audi TT-RS or work in Ingolstadt, you can sleep easy at night. The TT-RS still owns the 1M with a time of 8:09. However, the 1M has water dispenser bragging rights over the Aston Martin V8 Vantage that only manages a 8:13.
All you JDM fanboys can still flip the 1M off too, as the Mitsubishi Evo IX takes it to school, coming in a cool second quicker on its lap.
How does it compare against its bigger brother, the E92 M3? Well it definitely falls short as the M3 runs the ‘Ring in a time of 8:05 and the more hardcore M3 GTS clocks in at 7:48. There was no way that BMW would have allowed the 1M to be quicker than its bread-and-butter M3, pure business sense really.
If you’re looking for a level playing field, then the previous gen M3, the E46 will have to be called back to the stage. Both being straight-six machines, it does make more sense to compare them. The E46 M3 has a time of 8:22 but the track-focused CSL version is still ahead with a time of 7:50.
While the 1M does come with the fairy dust ‘M’ button, as we mentioned earlier, the button only adjusts the throttle response and does not increase power.
Source: BimmerFile
