Now, the most obvious sign of age is the number that stands before us. But the real indicator of how old you really feel, is the number of old-fashioned moments that pop into your mind on a daily basis. And if you’re still a little confused, let me share it with you.

My first car was a BMW E30 and I must emphasize that I did not buy it new. I’m old… but I’m not that old. As a BMW owner in the 00s, I remember vividly when the E36 chassis was still modern and the E46 was a kind of spaceship.

I imagine it’s like how E21 owners felt when the E30 first came out, especially later models with ‘fancy’ plastic bumpers.

And before you know it, the E46 has also been replaced by the E92. The fact that you see so many of them as cheap race/drift cars these days feels a bit odd when I think back on how ‘halo’ they felt compared to the E30 I had. But hey, let’s not dive into the E30 values for now for my own sanity…

Fast-forward to a couple of years ago and we enter the F80 era. I’m a complete BMW fanatic, so while the F80 series has entered a new chapter – especially with the now supercharged M3/M4 – I don’t really have much of an opinion on them.

But that’s also partly my fault; any BMW under five is probably something I won’t own for the foreseeable future.

But then we come to the current generation of G8x. Oh man, there’s no danger of not forming an opinion on this, right? And I think I joined most people at first by having a strong ‘it’s not for me’ reaction the first time around.

Grille, yup we’ll talk about it quickly. I suppose you could fit five to six E30 kidney grilles inside one of these. Because in my day, the BMW kidney grille was more of a design cue than a deciding factor. And we’ve got it, some of it, and I’m going back to ‘my days’…
That was three years ago. And you know what? Maybe the joke is on us and BMW knows what they’re doing all this time. Because the grille – and the styling as a whole – has really evolved for me to the point where it actually looks pretty cool now.

Even if you’re still not satisfied with the styling, BMW ensures that the car’s outstanding performance cannot be overlooked. And hey, when you’re behind the wheel, the grille isn’t something you have to look at.

Get your hands on that power plant. The S58 – the 3.0-liter twin-turbocharged, in-line six – has been used in all G8x platforms (Series 3 and Series 4), and although it may not has the sound of previous M cars, but the way it delivers performance and sends it through a similarly capable chassis is astounding.

SH Titan Motorsports G80 21
Taken together, you’ve got one of the best sports cars in modern automotive, and you still have the option for the right manual, which is a rarity in 2023.