New M5 and M3 Touring unveiled at BMW M Fest and prices revealed

BMW unveiled its much-anticipated new performance machines — the M5 and the M3 Touring — in South Africa on Thursday. The cars will be on show at this weekend’s BMW M Fest at Kyalami from Friday to Sunday, which is to attract thousands of BMW enthusiasts to the Midrand circuit. All 33,000 tickets for the three days are sold out.

The two cars share a stage with other recently launched cars including the locally built BMW X3 and the BMW 1 Series.

Here is a rundown of the two new high performers:

BMW M5

The new high-performance sedan will go on local sale in November priced at R2,690,000 (excluding C02 tax). The seventh-generation M5 plug-in hybrid is the high-performance flagship of the Five Series launched locally this year.

It is the most powerful incarnation of the luxury sports sedan to date, with a plug-in hybrid power train that produces supercar-like outputs of 535kW and 1,000Nm.

The M Hybrid system mates a high-revving V8 petrol turbo engine with an electric motor, giving the all-wheel drive car the ability to sprint from 0-100km/h in 3.5 seconds using launch control. Top speed is 305km/h with the standard M Driver’s Package.

A rear-biased M xDrive all-wheel-drive system lays down the power with plenty of grip, but skilled drivers are able to execute powerslides by selecting a two-wheel drive mode that sends drive exclusively to the rear wheels with the Dynamic Stability Control switched off.

An 18.6kWh battery gives the M5 the ability to drive on electric power for up to 69km at speeds of up to 140km/h. The battery takes about three-and-a-half hours to charge on a 7.4kW charger.

The new M5 weighs a heavy 2,435kg but adaptive M suspension with electronically controlled dampers help ensure it mixes everyday driving comfort with dynamic cornering prowess. It also has integral active steering which steers the rear wheels to improve high-speed directional stability and lower-speed manoeuvring agility.

The driving experience can be tailored with Road, Sport and Track modes. The M5’s sporting cockpit also lays on electrically adjustable M multifunction seats with heating, and a BMW Curved Display and head-up display with M-specific content.

BMW M3 Touring

Given the local market’s peculiar aversion to station wagons, we weren’t initially expecting BMW to launch the long-bummed version of the M3. But fans of fast cars with lots of luggage space are now able to buy the M3 Touring Competition xDrive for R2,195,000 (excl CO2 tax), as a rival to Audi’s RS4 Avant.

The first-ever Touring version of the M3, the car holds the Nürburgring Nordschleife lap record for station wagons with a time of 7 min 35.060 seconds.

Driving through an eight-speed automatic transmission, it’s powered by a 3.0l turbocharged six-cylinder petrol engine with outputs of 390kW and 650Nm. It is 80kg heavier than the M3 sedan but its 0-100km/h sprint is only one-tenth of a second slower, and it is good for 290km/h top speed.

All-wheel drive M xDrive traction with an active rear M Differential keep the load-lugging BMW pinned to the road, with a selectable rear-wheel drive mode.