"Ring Taxi" ride in the new E92 M3.
BMW invited me to fly to Germany in early October, at my own expense, to participate (again, at my own expense) in an "Ultimate Driving Experience" with the all-new 2008 BMW M3.
What made this invitation especially compelling was not only the fact that the new car will not be seen outside of Europe by the rest of the world until next May, but that the driving experience was to take place at The Nurburgring in Nurburg, Germany, site of the fabled "Nordschleife" racetrack, which is to driving what St. Andrew's is to golf.
Not surprisingly, I came away from the experience completely sold not only on the new M3, but on the BMW brand in general; I had an epiphanic moment during one of our brainwashing sessions where I concluded (again, and once and for all, with permanent finality) that BMW's machines are worth every penny of premium over everything else on the planet.
This realization arrived at the moment they revealed to us that every single car BMW makes ("Ultimate Driving Machines" in the US) must pass what must be the Ultimate Torture Test: 4000km of at-the-limit driving by one of BMW's test engineers around the Nordschleife, a mountain racetrack of 22km in length, with some 72 turns, and some of the most punishing tarmac in the world. BMW believes that, if a car can take 4000km of this sort of punishment, then it will be good for 250,000km in the real world (3 times longer than the car's warranty coverage).
But besides durability and reliability, in order to get around the Nordschleife safely at speed, you MUST build a car with extraordinary handling characteristics, and the car must be able to communicate those characteristics to the driver.
BMW does this better than any other maker.
Tags: BMW M3 Nurburgring Nordschleife V8 E92
![BMW F1 Nurburgring Nordschleife Nick Heidfeld [FULL ONBOARD]](http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/0ceX5Wk-zSY/default.jpg)
