In Memorium: 1999 BMW Z3 M Coupe

I SUPPOSE this was bound to happen at some point: a eulogy to my departed BMW M Coupe. You all know the car: small Z3-based coupe, M engine, developed by a renegade band of engineers to be the ultimate driving machine... It was the stuff of legends, and for a year it was mine.

Cast your mind to when you were young and that first romance with the wrong sort. The one who taught you all those little things, tying feathers to your heart as you soared higher. Your friends knew it would never work out, and secretly you knew they were right. That was the M Coupe, and like Icarus, the wings did not hold. Let me explain. 

It was another Monday morning, driving to work at Lotus. The main road gets pretty busy, so I stick to the lanes that twist through the villages. Radio on, following a C-Class estate. 30, 40mph; the C-Class pulls away as we exit the village (damn those turbo-diesels are fast). I followed suit, accelerating to a respectable 50mph before braking for the sharp right-hander I knew so well… At this point, a brief interlude: remind yourself that the back-end of an M Coupe is notorious for being eager to see what the front is up to when the weather dampens (did I mention it had just been raining?).

Too late; the back has already gone. Fast-forward three seconds and I am wondering whether I am going to roll. Oh yes, there we are. Snapshot in my mind: poppies upside-down, framed by the windscreen. I land, wheels-down (CRASH: there goes the under-carriage). I sit and turn off the engine, vaguely wondering why the airbag hasn't gone off. I gather my lunch and the blanket from the boot (a present from my sister-in-law, my wife would kill me if I lost it), and walk back through hedgerow hitherto unpenetrated. A police car and ambulance will soon arrive.

RIP 2010-2011

My wedding is month away, and the wedding car has just been destroyed. I hastily find a Z4 Coupe to hang the ribbon on instead. It is perfect. Fast, smooth, economical, good-looking. Not a day goes by when I don’t think back of the M Coupe. 

Remembering that car is like turning the pages of a photo album. Little events stick out, each narrated by the moment's joy. Keeping pace with a CL63 AMG. The other Estoril Blue Z3 M that trailed you from London. Wheel-spinning on your cousin’s lawn. Once, pulling up at the flat after work, I walked away from the car unable to stop looking over my shoulder. That slack hammock-like shoulder-line; goofy arches; obscene bonnet; fake-but-I-love-them-anyway side-vents; FOUR EXHAUSTS. I wondered whether it was actually possible to love an inanimate object. Yes it was, I concluded. Yes, it was.