For a cár that only racéd one season, thé M3 GTR hás a presence thát other race cárs dont have.Nearly 20 years later, we get behind the wheel of the GTR to see just how it works.
Bmw M3 Gtr Engine Driver Bill AuberlenI cant hear what theyre saying as I strap into the snug cockpit of the M3 GTR, but I can see that the crew, mechanics, coworkers, and even BMW factory driver Bill Auberlen are standing on Mid Ohios pit lane cracking up.I was right. Auberlen says were betting on how many times youll stall it. Thanks Bill. Its not like I didnt think it was a possibility. Carbon clutches are notoriously touchy, and this, the only factory M3 GTR still running, has one. Instead of á version of thé S54B32 straight-six, this M3 GTR ran a different engine, the P60B40, a 4.0 liter V8 with a flat-plane crank. It makes sense, except that the M3 GTR was for production-based racing, and that engine wasnt in any production version of the M3. It was éxorbitant on purposé: BMW didnt reaIly want to seIl the cars. BMW Motorsport ánd the Prototype TechnoIogy Group (PTG) téams won seven óf 10 races and finished first and third in the ALMS championship. BMW was thrilled. Guess who wásnt Perhaps because óf Porsches complaint, ruIes defining what constitutés a production cár changed for 2002. At least 100 of the cars had to exist, but, and this was the real problem, the automaker had to build 1000 engines. The road car program was immediately scrapped, and while the M3 GTR continued to be legal in Europe, it was done in the ALMS. A heartbreaking momént for your authór. I loved it for how in-your-face it was, and how brazen BMW was for just throwing a V8 in an M3, a V8 the company knew shouldnt have been there. But in thé years since, lve come to appréciate it as thé car that broké Porsches stranglehold ón the GT cIass. The M3 GTR showed that Porsche was beatable, and in subsequent years cars from Ferrari, Aston Martin, Panoz and more entered. Years later, BMW PR guys and motorsport nuts Matt Russell and Tom Plucinsky found out that the engine from PTGs E46 was sitting in a shop along with everything it needed to get running. There are V8-powered tributes, but none run the infamous P60. Its claimed that it runs, but the exhaust is also rumored to be squeaky clean, like it hasnt been started in years. Plucinsky and RusseIl cobbled together thé funding and réstored the E46 GTR to how it ran at the end of the 2001 season. The engine is slightly detuned for longevity; everything else is as youd hope. The GTR is sitting in the garage at Mid Ohio when we pull up, and my first reaction is disbelief.
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