Quote:
Originally Posted by (K)
So yesterday, 1/20/22, was my official 1 year of ownership with the Competition. I'm ashamed to admit that I've only been able to put about 5500 miles on it since new. Barely enough seat time to really get to know the car but enough to make a couple of impressions. Just some background, I come from a world of sub 350hp MT Japanese cars I used as my daily drivers (S2000, V6 Accord, TL-S, G37S, 350Z).
The elephant in the room is that the car is capable. Overly so. FRUSTRATINGLY so. Too capable for everyday, public road use. Every drive is a practice in restraint and the general character of the car is that it is constantly goading you into hooning the thing. So much power, so much braking, just so much everything available to you at the drop of a hat. I knew this going in but didn't really understand it until ownership. I have to remind myself to not romp on it in day to day driving but I do try to find every opportunity I can to open it up for short bursts of elation. In my neck of the woods, winding roads are a little scarce but there's no lack of highway access. My goal this year is further drives out west where the good roads lie. The silence of back roads will be filled with the cacophony of snaps from the Akrapovic exhaust and my own cackles.
To follow up on this, even the M lite M240i is more than sufficient for street use and really that was one of the cars that made it to my final list of cars to buy when I was shopping. What made me choose the Competition over the M lite was the allure of the M and, most importantly, just those absolutely fantastic hips. I've seen M2 bumper swaps on the less capable 2'ers but they just don't look nearly as great as the real deal, not without those hips. So apart from performance, the looks of this car is just grade A beef. This is not an elegant car, nor is it a particularly "handsome" one, but man it does look great! Everything from the way the 2NH brakes needlessly fill the wheel gaps to the way the stance kind of reminds you of a bulldog. I think BMW did a fantastic job packaging this car. Everything is just excessive and in all the right ways.
Some grievances, as not all is perfect on the M2. The shifter is definitely in need of improvement, as is the clutch pedal feel, as is the steering feel. This is true for many newer production cars short of a Porsche. Most of this can be easily remedied through the common trifecta of shifting mods (UCP, CDV delete, AS SSK) but it would have been nice to have had it sorted from factory. I'm also not one for the burble tune so I'm itching to get to that in a year or two. Outside of that, there's the usual complaints of brake dust/noise and ridiculously small gas tank. Not the fuel efficiency, mind you, just the size of the tank for overall range. All traits befitting a performance oriented car but they would have been great quality of life improvements.
So where do we go from here? Well I'm already close to half the price of the car in mods, probably even more so. A fact that I'm not proud of but a figure I refuse to keep track of. The list continues to grow and will do so until I decide otherwise. I may likely still be in the honeymoon phase but I really don't see this car leaving my garage any time soon. Will continue to mod and drive as much as I possibly can. I know there are those out there planning to baby their M2(OG/C/CS) and keep them pristine with low mileage (and for good reason, I'm sure) but you are doing yourself an injustice. Get out there and tear it up as much as you can. Life's too short not to.
Attached: one of my favorite pictures of the thing during the first month of ownership. I'm just as bad with taking more pictures of the thing as I am with putting miles on it. Hopefully that's going to change more this year.
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Put a Auto Solutions SSK in it with the UCP (Ultimate Clutch Pedal). End of complaints :-)